Jill Shalvis - Instant Attraction

“Sweet!”

They hit the mountain slope again, arguing over who to bring with them to Wilder, and Cam followed.

On foot.

After flying their clients to Cascade Falls, Stone and Nick spent the day leading them down a series of verticals. By late afternoon, they’d tackled four different peaks and sat at the top of Mt. Paiute, looking out over what felt like paradise.

“Never gets old,” Nick noted.

“Nope.” Stone turned off his iPod. “Cam should have come.”

“Said he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do, whether he’d stick around or not.”

“Yeah.” They were both well used to Cam and his special level of bullheadedness. “I’ll call him.”

“Don’t,” Nick said.

“Why?”

“Because you’ll piss him off.”

“Will not.”

“You’re his brother. It’s what you do.”

Yeah, but it was worry that propelled him. Partly that was because Stone was the middle child, and that’s what he did, worry, and partly because their father hadn’t ever worried about Cam. In fact, he’d resented the hell out of the baby who had not only not been his but sickly too. Cam had eventually gotten healthy-no thanks to their father’s harsh discipline-and had ended up with Annie-a fact that Stone was convinced had saved Cam’s life.

The old man was long gone now, but Cam still took everything to heart, deeply to heart, and had a habit of just shutting down rather than feeling something, even before the quick rise to celebrity and fame had closed him off. And then the snow-boarding accident, which had taken away the one thing he’d loved above all else.

Without the rush of his sport, Stone knew Cam was flailing, lost, trying to find his place. What Stone didn’t know was how long it’d be before Cam figured out there wasn’t a physical “place” at all, only a mental one. With Nick shaking his head, he called Cam.

“You lost?” Cam asked dryly.

The relief Stone felt from hearing his brother’s voice made him instantly grumpy. It’d always been this way. Stone doing his damnedest to take care of everyone, especially Cam, and Cam doing his damnedest to make Stone not want to. “Nick wants to come back for you so you can ski with us tomorrow.”

Nick rolled his eyes.

“We could use the company,” Stone went on. “Our clients are a bunch of spoiled, rich punks who don’t want to ski as much as find a good view and sit and drink beer.”

“Sounds like you a few years back.”

“I was never more interested in beer than skiing.”

“Right. You were much more interested in women.”

Okay, true. “You coming or not?”

“Not.”

Stone tried to keep his cool, but as he considered Cam a flight risk, it was difficult. “You getting restless feet again? Because I swear to God, if you even think about leaving, I’ll attach cement blocks to your feet.”

“Jesus, relax. I’m not going anywhere.” Cam hesitated. “I went hiking. My knee’s swollen up.”

Cam’s pain after the accident had nearly killed him, and had nearly killed his brothers to watch him suffer through it. Stone hadn’t realized there was still that particular demon to fight. He swiped a hand down his face and fought to keep his voice even. “Have you been keeping up with your PT?”

“Yeah.”

“The meds?”

“Quit them at the same time I quit you.”

“Have you-”

“Stone.” Cam’s voice held frustration, and something else. Defeat? Whatever it was, he didn’t sound like himself. “It’s just a bad day.”

Sympathy wouldn’t work here, not on Cam, even though that’s what Stone felt. “Sorry, didn’t get that you were still so fragile. You just stay there and relax.” Beside him, Nick sighed, and Stone ignored him. “Take a nap.”

“You know what? Fuck you.”

There. There Cam was, and just like that, the tightness in Stone’s chest eased in relief. A bum knee they could deal with. An attitude-ridden Cam they could deal with. It wouldn’t be pleasant and there would be fights, but what they couldn’t deal with was Cam vanishing again.

“Look, I’m back, okay? I’m here, and I’m…trying. I’m trying to help like you asked.”

“I’d rather you want to want to be back,” Stone said.

“Yeah, well, I’m working on that too. I’ve spent the past two hours booking no less than four upcoming groups, all of which will bring in more money than you did in the last month.”

“Is that why you told Katie I’d triple her salary to shut up?”

“Mentioned that, did she?”

“She did.”

“She also mention that she survived the Santa Monica bridge collapse?”

“Yeah.”

“She’s…different.”

“You mean because she doesn’t worship the ground you walk on?”

“That doesn’t happen so much anymore,” Cam admitted.

And he didn’t know how to deal with that either, Stone guessed. “I’m not the chick police, but she’s not your type.”

“That’s never stopped you, amigo.”

A not-so-subtle reference to two summers back, when Stone had had a thing with the cleaning crew-two Puerto Rican sisters who’d come on to him one night after too many vodkas and a whole bunch of bad karaoke. The sisters had been excellent at their job and muy caliente, but unfortunately also muy crazy. “I was going through a phase, okay? It’s passed now.”

“Well, so has mine,” Cam said.

“Your pissy phase? Christ, I hope so.”

Cam let out a low laugh and hung up. Stone shut his phone and met Nick’s gaze.

“Hey,” Nick said. “At least he’s still with us.”

“Yeah, but for how long? He’s looking at Katie, which is interesting.”

“He said he hasn’t gotten laid since Serena dumped him.”

“A year,” Stone mused. “Unlike him.”

“Because he’s never had to make the moves before.”

“Yeah.” Stone shoved his cell into his pocket. “Who let T.J. go out on a month-long trek so he doesn’t have to deal with the day-to-day shit of the ranch, including our baby brother?”

“You. You don’t like to be gone for long periods of time, and you know it. You like to be in charge, bossing everyone around, making sure we all do your bidding.”

“Now you sound like Annie.”

Nick fell silent at that. He’d been with them since before Wilder Adventures, years before. He’d gone to school with Annie, had been in love with her since day one, and had helped her out with a young Cam. It’d taken a long time to convince Annie to marry him, because like all the Wilders, she tended to work hard at pushing people away, including the best person to ever happen to her. “The divorce sucks.”

A man of few words, Nick just nodded.

“You’d think it would make her happy since it was her idea, but she’s a bigger nightmare than before.” Stone slid Nick a glance. “Can’t you fix that?”

Nick shook his head. “She has a thing for the UPS guy.”

“What?”

“She likes his shorts.”

“Then get a pair of shorts, man.”

“She said I didn’t see her.” Nick shrugged his narrow shoulders. “Hell, I don’t even know what that means.”

“Maybe it’s girl code. Maybe she thinks you don’t love her.”

Nick looked completely befuddled. “How can she think that? I sold my Jeep to buy her a ring. I sold my Skycrane heli when she had that bad turn with her diabetes and got so sick. I sold my life to make her happy, and she says I didn’t see her?”

“So see her.”

“Yeah. Any thoughts on how exactly?”

“No, but she’s cranky as hell, and she’s scaring people. If you don’t start seeing her soon, we’re all going to pay.”

“So you’re saying I have to get my marriage back together for your sake?”

“For the greater good of Wilder Adventures,” Stone said.

“For your sake.”

“Yeah.”

Nick shook his head. “All of you Wilders are crazy.”

“You’re just now figuring that out?”

Recreation in the mountains was decidedly different than in the city, Katie discovered, and much more exciting. She still had trouble sleeping at night, but she managed to get enough hours to refresh her.

Or maybe that was the high-altitude air.

Every morning, she walked from her cabin to the lodge and looked around in awe. It seemed she could breathe deeper here, see farther. The skies were bigger, the landscape was brighter, a landscape that continued to execute mysterious rustles in the bushes, making her nearly jump out of her skin as she hustled to the lodge steps.

Big Foot her ass, but she had a feeling whatever stalked her was hungry. Still, she refused to run off like a scared little bunny. She stood firm and looked at the bush, which went suddenly still. “One of these days,” she told it, “you’re going to show your face.”

Stone came around the side of the lodge, his downhill skis on his shoulder, an amused look on his face. “Are you talking to the manzanita bush?”

“It talked first.”

He laughed and shook his head as he walked by her, up the stairs toward the front door.

“Seriously, what lives in these things anyway?”

“Wolf spiders, raccoons, coyotes…you name it.”

She’d rather not. She turned back and eyed the bush. “Okay, you win this round.” But in defiance, she stood there a moment longer soaking up the clear, crisp air. The mountains were still, the early-morning sun sparkling like glitter over the snow. It was so beyond anything in her experience, and so…absolutely soul-soothing.

That she had the bridge collapse to thank for this experience was an odd thought, but she had it anyway.

Her life was definitely no longer the same old boring routine.

Annie opened the front door and looked at her. “You going to stand there daydreaming all day, or are you going to get in here and eat the best omelet on the planet?”

“Yours?”