AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“It’s beautiful. But I think I should’ve brought rope.”
“Nah, the log is fine. Just don’t fall in.” She winked and jumped up onto the thick trunk of the dead pine tree that had been here for a decade.
The smooth surface of the wood was slightly damp, but earlier in the spring it had been icy in spots, so this was a piece of cake. She rushed the fifteen feet across and jumped off on the other side. She turned around to see if Gabe was following, only to find him landing on the ground inches from her.
“I’m going to take you climbing,” he said, smiling down at her.
“No, you’re not.”
“You weren’t the least bit nervous about that. You’re a natural.”
“You’re insane,” she said, laughing as she followed the trail along the creek. It got steep again, but this time she hardly noticed. This part of the hike was magical. The switchbacks wound through the trees, so it looked as if you were walking into dead ends of dark ponderosa pines, but then the trail would turn sharply and head into spring-green towers of aspens.
She turned to grin at Gabe behind her. “Isn’t it amazing? I mean, it’s not Yellowstone or Jenny Lake, but it’s right in our backyard.”
“It is amazing,” he said. “Thanks for showing me. It’s the perfect place to run after work. No one could be tense after this.”
“Is it a stressful job? I know Lauren hates preschool hour.”
“It’s not that. Kids are fine. It’s just a little weird to be brought in to change things, you know? Especially because I’m male, and all the female librarians here have more experience than I do, but I have to come in and say, ‘This is what you’re doing wrong.’ It’s shitty on the face of it, but it’s what I was hired to do.”
“I can put in a good word with Lauren, if you like.”
“It’s no problem. Lauren is great, actually. If I didn’t have her on my side, I’d probably beg you for help. I wouldn’t want to fuck with Lauren.”
“She is pretty badass,” Veronica agreed. Both of her girls’-night-out companions were really badass, actually. “Have you met Isabelle yet? She’s an artist. She comes into the library sometimes for reference materials when she’s working.”
“I don’t think so.”
“She’s good friends with Lauren. A brunette. She’s usually got paint in her hair?”
“No, I definitely haven’t met her.”
“Anyway, she was a federal fugitive for a while.”
“What?” Gabe snapped.
Veronica laughed. “That’s really all I can say. You’ll have to catch us out for girls’ night sometime. Buy her a drink and see if she’ll tell you the story.”
“Are you serious?”
She shrugged. “What, you don’t have any wanted fugitives as friends?”
“I probably do—I just don’t know it. But now I know you’re kick-ass enough to handle climbing.”
If her friends made her seem more interesting than she actually was, she didn’t mind, but no way could she imagine herself climbing any higher than a ladder. She wasn’t one of those girls. She’d known a lot of them. In high school and college, they’d been the amazing winter athletes, some of whom had moved here just to hone their skills for world championships. In New York, they’d been the girls unafraid to take on every challenge that the city offered. They’d been glamorous and magnetic and brave.
Veronica had felt as though she’d used up all her braveness just getting to the city. And she wasn’t even sure it could be called bravery, when she’d had no idea how difficult it all would be.
The trail took one last turn and they had to climb up two big rock steps, but they finally made it to the clearing she’d been aiming for. The trail cut between two huge boulders, then edged around a little ravine. Right at the top of the ravine, she stopped and faced the town.
“Here we are.”
“Wow,” he answered.
The setting sun turned the sky pink and gold in the west, and the highest peaks of the Tetons clawed at the colors like dark gray talons. The lower hills that marked the natural boundary of the town were already black with shadow, but beyond the grid of city blocks, the Elk Refuge stretched out for green miles. The river cut through the refuge, a winding line of deep blue that looked like a silk ribbon dropped into the middle of the grass.
Veronica sat down on a flat rock and Gabe joined her, but they didn’t speak for a long time. They just looked at the scenery.
