Page 168 of The Route to You

As promised, within a few minutes, Isla and Cheyenne were out on the driveway. Cheyenne had her car keys in hand. “I thought a drive before we go up to the race might help,” Isla said with a sunny smile. “I told the others I was kidnapping you.”

“Don’t make that joke to my parents—they might call the cops on you like they did with Kyle,” Cheyenne said with a laugh as she unlocked the doors to her car. “Don’t mind the Cheerios on the ground,” she told Isla, who climbed into the back seat.

Sloan slipped into the passenger seat as Isla laughed. “You don’t have to worry about a few Cheerios with me. I spent half my life in Costa Rica, and pura vida is a way of life for me now.”

“Oh, I love Costa Rica,” Cheyenne said, her voice filled with genuine enthusiasm. “How did you end up married into the Winnick fold?”

“Not the Winnicks, precisely—the Camdens. Quinn and my brother, Callum, were best friends growing up. And obviously, Quinn married Elle and Callum married Liddy . . . and I married Quinn’s brother, Aiden. It all sounds somewhat incestuous and weird, right?” Isla smiled brightly and winked, leaning forward from the back. “Any place you want to go before the big show, Sloan?”

Sloan checked her watch. The race started in three hours. She needed to meet Penny in a half hour.

Outside, the sky was bright, blue, and cloudless—reminding her of those first few days of freedom last winter. “Actually . . . there’s this church I used to go to occasionally when I was here in the winter, staying with Cheyenne’s parents. Not really to pray, but because it’s really beautiful. The entire wall behind the sanctuary is a picture window that looks out over the Tetons. It was a good place to go and quiet my mind.”

“Oh, the Chapel of the Transfiguration? Totally. I love that place,” Cheyenne said, starting the engine. “Let’s do it.”

They started driving and Sloan leaned back in her seat, letting Isla and Cheyenne fill the car with light chatter as she stared out the window, willing herself to relax, not to think about the fact that Kyle was out there, getting ready to do something that could be incredibly dangerous. Something that might hurt them both if it went wrong.

But he’d asked her not to define him by his injury and coddle him. And he’d put hundreds of hours of blood and sweat into getting here.

She hoped he knew what he was doing.

As Cheyenne pulled up near the chapel and parked, Isla reached forward and squeezed her shoulder. “Do you want us to come with you, or would you prefer some alone time?”

“I think I’ll go alone,” Sloan said softly. “But thank you.”

“Of course.” Isla gave her an encouraging look. “I love Kyle. He’s like the little brother I never had. And I know what you’re planning—Elle and Liddy told me. I know it means a lot to them and it’s really brave, but I just want you to know, as his bonus sister, I think you can change your mind if you need to, and the Winnicks will all love you just as much as they do.”

“Thank you,” Sloan said, hugging her. Isla meant well, but this wasn’t the time to chicken out either.

She needed to do this.

“We’ll be right out here if you need us,” Cheyenne called as Sloan stepped out.

Sloan shut the door and headed for the chapel.

The snow crunched under her boots as she left the parking lot, the sound dry in the rising cold of the January morning. Ahead, the wooden, log cabin structure of Chapel of the Transfiguration sat against a backdrop that was almost unfair in its scale. The Tetons rose in impossibly crisp majesty against a sky so blue it looked freshly painted. Endless, vaulting winter blue.

The path narrowed, and each step brought a shift in her perspective: the chapel grew, the mountains rearranged themselves behind it, and the wooden structure slowly claimed more of her field of vision. She heard her own breathing now, the soft rasp of it, the thrum of her pulse.

The door handle was smooth from decades of hands and warm to the touch. A lot of tourists came to see the view, but she’d found refuge here too, at a time she needed it most.

Inside, the air was cool and still, carrying the scent of old wood. The chapel was dim after the glare outside, her eyes needing a second to adjust. Light spilled in through the famous window behind the altar, framing the Tetons so perfectly it felt less like architecture and more like a deliberate act of reverence.

The floorboards creaked softly under her weight as she took a seat in the back row of benches, where she normally sat when she came here in the winter before. She clasped her hands, leaning forward slightly, her heart still unsettled, fears crowding her mind.

What if Kyle gets injured?

What if something worse happens?

She didn’t know if she could survive it. Maybe she would, but she would never be a whole person again, probably.

Sloan ran trembling fingers through her hair, tying it in a ponytail. She covered her face with her hands.

Then, even though she was out of practice, even though she wasn’t even sure if she believed, she choked out in a whisper, “God, please keep Kyle safe.”

The words didn’t linger in the air. The walls absorbed them as silence took their place. She closed her eyes, her chest so tight with pressure that she thought her heart might burst from it.

Maybe I should have told him what I was planning. Maybe he would have changed his mind—felt free to turn down the offer from Blue Ridge.