“Good morning, Queen. How are the Sawtooths?—”
“The Sawtooths are in Idaho.”
“Same diff, girl.”
Through the phone, I hear Jeremy. “Is she okay? Did something happen?—”
“She’s fine, Stanford. Just missed me.”
“Put me on speaker, Avah.”
She sighs. “Are you sure?”
“Now.”
“Sloane, what’s wrong?” my brother demands, and the genuine worry in his tone makes my throat tighten.
“Did you know about this?”
“About what?”
“About the fact that Jensen Grant made camp fifteenfeet from my tent last night, then offered me a cup of coffee this morning like we’re filming a nature-coded SUV commercial.”
The beat of silence that follows tells me everything I need to know.
“Avah,” Jeremy says slowly. “What did you do?”
“I trusted my instincts,” Avah says, sounding less cheerful. “Which have proved themselves to be spot-on recently.”
“Why don’t you trust me?” I sound bitter and sad, which I hate more than I hate myself for loving Jensen’s perfect brew.
“I do trust you,” she says emphatically. “I swear I do, Sloane. But I couldn’t stop thinking about man versus bear.”
“What are you talking about?” Jeremy demands, but his tone is gentle because he’s always gentle with Avah.
I remain silent while she explains the hypothetical debate to my brother.
“If a woman is alone in the woods, would she rather run into a strange man or a bear?”
Jeremy’s answer comes quick. “I’m guessing the bear.”
“Yes, in the majority of cases.” It sounds like she’s giving him a private Ted Talk. “Because bears are a known threat. They don’t strike up a conversation or ask you for directions or kidnap you because they’re an unhinged survivalist whose equally unhinged son needs a wife.”
Jeremy coughs out a laugh. “That last part is weirdly specific.”
“It also happened,” Avah shoots back. “Google Kari Swenson right now. You’ll see that?—”
“Not right now,” I interrupt, because we’re losing the thread here, and my justifiable anger is dissolving at an alarming rate. My toxic trait is that I’m a sucker when it comes to my friends. “And no more looking up wilderness true crime, Avah.”
“Fine,” she mutters. “But I’m not sorry, Sloane. I mean, I’m sorry you’re mad, and I know we shouldn’t have interfered. But I can’t send someone I love into the great unknown alone without backup.”
“She’s not wrong,” Jeremy tells me.
“You don’t know Jensen,” I counter. “He could be unhinged.”
“He’s not,” Avah says simply.
I don’t argue. Because even though I hate admitting it, I know she’s right. But I also know he’s not the man versus bear kind of threat. I know it from just two nights in Nashville. And from a photograph that represented years of him playing guitar for cancer patients long before I was one of them.
