He bent a little closer to me and I automatically leaned away so that he wouldn’t get a good whiff of the minty, chemical smell that was my current scent.

“People do what I say because I know what I’m doing, which means I’m the man in charge more often than not. Now get your ass in the harness and up the rocks, Leo.”

Deciding that arguing with him in front of everyone else was only going to waste time and ultimately end in embarrassment, I begrudgingly moved closer to him and rested a hand on his shoulder as he crouched down in front of me and helped me step into the sturdy canvas rig. His shoulders felt as hard and as sturdy as the rock face I was about to try to tackle. Everything about him seemed like it was made to be indestructible and unyielding. I gasped when he situated the straps between my legs so that they were secure between my legs and around my hips. There was no teasing touch like there had been when he helped me on the horse, but having him that close to the center of me, to the part of me that wanted more than sweaty, sexy dreams, was unnerving. All it took was a puff of air from between his pursed lips as he adjusted buckles and straps to fit me for my entire body to light up and tingle. I wanted to feel the rough scrape of his dark scruff across my legs and between them. I wanted to see if any part of him could be soft or if he was hard all the way through. I wanted him to put his mouth where my body was silently begging for him. My fingers curled into the sinewy strength that was practically holding me up as I leaned on him. His slate-colored gaze shot up to mine like he knew exactly what was going through my mind.

He shot to his feet and gave the straps one last tug that had me slamming into the immovable wall of his chest. My hands flattened against the hard muscle and my fingers curled into my palms as I felt the way his heart was racing. “In case you’re wondering, I happen to like annoying and mouthy. When a woman doesn’t have anything to say that means there’s trouble brewing, and you find yourself blindsided when she finally does tell you what’s bothering her. By then, it’s too late to fix things. Now go have the good time you’re paying a fortune for and maybe when you don’t smell like the inside of a medicine cabinet, I’ll forget my better judgment and make this a vacation you remember forever.” He plopped a helmet on my head and tightened the strap under my slackened jaw before turning to face the rocks.

I yelped, not only from the shock of his words, but from the soft tug that followed them as he pulled on the end of one of my pigtails. I blinked up at him in question as I grabbed the safety rope and turned to look up at the vertical rock face in front of me. It was a gentle gesture, something soft, like he knew I was a nervous wreck and could use the soothing. I didn’t want to do this. But the fact that I didn’t want to it because I was scared was exactly why I put a booted foot on the first foothold that Cy pointed out and hauled myself up. There literally was nowhere for me to run. All I could do was face my fear. This entire trip had been me being forced to do just that.

It took me a long time to reach the pinnacle. Way longer than it took the kids and Em. It took longer than it probably should have because when I was only halfway up, Lane offered to take the rest of the group down to the river to go fishing. Everyone left except Em, who stayed to cheer me on. I slipped a few times as I worked my way up, and each time I almost called down for Cy to come and get me or to help me down by releasing the rope, but I didn’t. I bit back the terror and slowly but surely found the next place for my hands and feet to go. Slow and steady I pulled myself back up and found the next foothold.

What felt like hours later, I reached the top and I almost cried. From the way Em was shrieking and dancing around below me, I was pretty sure she may have shed a tear. And even up as high as I was, I could see the white slash of a grin cut across Cy’s face. It wasn’t quite a smile but it was close and it did something sweet and hot to my heart to know that me conquering this hurdle, no matter how small it may have been, made him not quite happy, but something close to that.

From the top, I let out a victorious whoop and threw my arms out. I was embracing this new side of myself and I owed Emrys more than I could ever repay for introducing me to this whole other side of the woman I was. This was the woman I needed to be in order to get over my own insecurities. It took climbing a rock and venturing into the unknown for me to figure that out. Lane was right, the city made it way too easy to ignore some of the quieter things in life that I really should be focusing on. The country life and all of its serenity allowed me to hear a lot of unsaid things that were tumbling around in my own head, words that were shouting to be heard, words that I’d chosen to ignore for too long. I was figuring out that I could survive this upheaval in my life and I was doing it one challenge—one hurdle—at a time.

“Hey, Leo, come on back down. We need to saddle up and head to the campsite for the night. There’s a shower waiting for you.” I looked down at Cy and gave him a nod as he walked me through the easiest way to rappel back down without scraping my knees and palms all to hell. Before I descended, I took one last long look at the awe-inspiring landscape. Miles of trees and rivers painting the mountains green and blue. It was unspoiled and pure as far as the eye could see. At least it was until my gaze caught on a weird void in the tree line way up the river. It looked like a meteor had dropped from the sky and left a huge empty spot in the thick and lush foliage. I thought it was strange and I meant to ask Cy what it was, but as soon as my boots hit the ground I was engulfed in a hug that made me forget. It was a hug that almost made up for all the hugs I missed from my mom growing up, for all the hugs that were nothing more than lies that came from Chris. And it was from the one person I wasn’t expecting to ever hug.