Page 6

Her eyes dropped to the patch of bare soil, then to her hands, and her face fell in a way I’d rather it hadn’t.

“I didn’t know that.”

“No,” I agreed. “You didn’t.”

I crouched beside the plant, careful of the exposed roots. The damp soil still showed where her fingers had gone through it. “This colony has been here longer than either of us.”

She knelt too, close enough that her shoulder nearly brushed mine. “How long?” She’d completely forgotten my reprimand. Her entire attention was on the root.

“Long enough.”

“That’s not a measurement.”

“It’s the only one I have.”

She made a small sound that might be amusement. “For someone who seems to know a lot about this place, you’re surprisingly vague.”

I straightened. “I’m an arborist. And for someone who’s trespassing, you’re surprisingly comfortable.”

That got her attention. “I have authorization. Botanical survey, twenty-one days, all of it properly documented.” She reached into the side pocket of her pack and pulled out a plastic sleeve of papers. “I can show you the letter.”

She handed it over. I took it because refusing would be childish. Her fingers brushed mine in the transfer, and the scent of ink and warm skin hit me again, closer now, threaded with something green—crushed moss from where she’d been kneeling.

The page was dense with official language and stamps. I read it twice, not because the language was complicated, but because I needed a reason not to look at her, and because the pressure of her fingers brushing mine had sent a spark through the animal part of me.

“Provisional. Not for this area.”

She frowned. “I have a research grant.”

“A grant doesn’t make the forest safe.”

“My work matters.”

Something in her voice made me look at her again. “I’m sure it does. It isn’t worth getting hurt over.”

“You don’t know what it's worth.”

I looked at the exposed root between us. She was right. “No. I don’t.”

“My grandmother spent years documenting this forest.” Her voice rose, her words tumbling out of her mouth. “She kept journals. Plants. Medicinal species. Things nobody else believed she’d actually seen. I came here because she left me information about a plant she believed was growing here.”

There was no teasing in her face now, only something that looked a great deal like hope. I knew what hope looked like in this forest. It usually ended badly.

“What’s the plant?”

“I don't know.”

“You came here to find a plant you can’t identify?”

“I have drawings.”

“That’s reassuring.”

She smiled. “And descriptions.”

I shook my head, but I was smiling too, and the tension between us loosened.

She sighed, pushing the documents back into her bag. “I’m Hazel.”