I delete and retype:
Arrived safely. Subject is cooperative. Ish.
Rhea's response comes through choppy but readable:
That's his version of rolling out the red carpet. Get good material. Cal says the SEAL community needs this kind of press. Channel 16 says hi.
I smile. The Channel 16 group chat has been my lifeline since Rhea brought me into the Salt & Steel orbit for this assignment. I'm not technically on Cal's team, but Rhea vouched for me when Altitude wanted someone embedded with a veteran-run operation, and the S&S network opened doors that would've taken me months to crack on my own.
Cory Matthews, former SEAL. Arctic warfare specialist. Now runs one of the most respected wilderness survival schools in the country from a perch so high you can practically see tomorrow from his front porch.
My editor wants the profile in three thousand words with a photo package. "The man behind the mountain," she said, which is exactly the kind of headline I'd normally roll my eyes at.
But standing in that parking lot, looking up at Cory Matthews with the wind pulling at my hair and his eyes locked on mine like he was reading my survival odds in real time, I understood something about the assignment that I didn't before.
This isn't a puff piece. This man is the story. Whatever he's carrying, whatever drove him up this mountain and made himstay, that's the article. And he's going to fight me every inch of the way.
Good. I've always been better at the stories that fight back.
I check my phone again. Below Rhea's message, another notification sits on my screen. An email, forwarded from my website's contact form.
I know before I open it.
I saw your Instagram story. The drive looks beautiful. Colorado suits you.
No name. No signature. Just the familiar anonymous email address that's been popping up in my inbox for the past four months. Different platforms, different accounts, always the same voice. Calm. Observational. Like someone narrating my life from a window I can't see.
My ex-boyfriend Garrett doesn't sign his name because he thinks that gives him plausible deniability. It doesn't. I know his sentence patterns like I know my own heartbeat. We were together for eight months, which was seven months too long, and I've been running from him for four.
Running is maybe too strong a word. I've been doing what I always do. Moving. Taking the next assignment, the next flight, the next mountain. The difference is that now someone's watching.
I close the email without responding. I always close without responding. Engaging is what he wants. Silence is the only weapon I have.
I also delete the Instagram story he referenced. I posted it three hours ago, a quick video of the switchback road climbing toward Mountain Ready. Nothing that reveals my exact location, but Garrett is resourceful and my published work creates a breadcrumb trail for anyone motivated enough to follow it.
The smart thing would be to stop publishing. Stop posting. Go dark.
But my work is the only thing I've never let anyone take from me. My mother dying when I was twelve took my childhood. My father remarrying took my sense of home. Twenty years of military bases and temporary addresses took my ability to form attachments that lasted longer than a lease.
My writing stayed. My camera stayed. The byline "Shelby Cruise" in the corner of a magazine page is the only permanent address I've ever had.
I'm not giving that up for a man who can't accept that I left.
I pull on a fleece, grab my camera, and head outside. The afternoon light is golden and angled, perfect for exterior shots. I start with the lodge, working my way through the property, framing the cabins against the mountain backdrop, catching the way the equipment yard looks both rugged and precise.
Everything about Mountain Ready reflects the man who built it. Intentional. Stripped down. Built for survival, not comfort.
I'm crouched near the equipment shed, shooting the rope coils and carabiners that Tuck left organized on a workbench, when I hear footsteps behind me. Quiet. Almost silent on the gravel. I know who it is before I turn around because no one else on this mountain moves like a ghost.
"You're documenting the equipment before you've documented the program."
I lower the camera and look up at him. He's standing about six feet away, arms crossed, watching me with that same assessing expression. Like I'm a weather system and he's calculating whether I'm going to blow through or settle in.
"Equipment tells me who someone is faster than a conversation does," I say. "Yours is maintained, organized, and serious. Not a single piece of sponsored gear in sight. You buy for function and you take care of what you own."
Something shifts in his expression. Barely perceptible, but I've spent my career reading people through a lens and I catch it. Surprise. Maybe grudging respect.
"Most writers who come here want to start with the view," he says.
