“Always.” He gave her fingers a squeeze and was gone.
She dozed for a while, then got up and made breakfast and coffee. She ate her yogurt and fruit out on the deck, the fresh morning breeze carrying the songs of birds and the gurgling of the creek—okay, and the distant growl of a semi on the highway.
After breakfast, she tidied up the kitchen, took a shower, then went for a short walk, the land that surrounded the cabin now so familiar to her. The big boulder covered with lichens in different shades of green. The columbines that grew in the shade. The little pools in the creek. The rocky outcropping where a pine tree grew in seemingly nothing but rock. The field of golden banner down by the road.
A bittersweet ache gnawed at her breastbone. God, she was going to miss this place. She was going to misshim.
She’d never felt so close to anyone in her life, never felt the relaxed kind of intimacy she shared with him. The two of them fit together so well. Being away from him was going to hurt.
But she couldn’t just quit her job, tear up her roots, and move to Colorado next week. She’d be acting on emotion, setting herself up for more heartbreak, more mistakes. Before she could move here, she would have to know what came next in her life. More than that, she would have to be sure about Eric—and about herself. They’d known each other for less than two weeks, after all—not counting last summer.
It’s not that she doubted her feelings for him. She just didn’t trust herself to see the situation clearly. She needed to think things through with the logical part of her mind, and that meant going back to Chicago and facing her life there.
As much as she knew this was true, she hated it.
She made her way back to the cabin to find the driveway empty. When she got inside, she checked her cell phone. No messages. She hoped he was okay. She hoped everyone on the Team—and the person they were trying to rescue—was safe.
Worry niggled at her, sliding into her thoughts like storm clouds creeping across a sunny sky. Was Eric okay? Would anyone think to let her know if something happened to him? Whom could she call to find out what was going on?
Stop being silly.
He’d told her it was a technical rescue. He was probably just working hard, hanging upside down on a rock somewhere.
If she lived with him, this is what her life would be like all the time—spending days by herself, waiting for him to come home, wondering every time he left the house whether he’d get injured or even killed on the job.
Could she handle that?
The answer came to her without a moment’s hesitation.
Yes, she could.
If he could handle the danger and the emotional fallout that came from being a first responder, she could damn well handle loving him. Besides, he knew what he was doing. He hadn’t become fire chief or a primary Team member by shirking on safety. He knew what he was doing. He wouldn’t take unnecessary risks.
To keep her mind busy, she took out her laptop, checked her email, then looked at public-relations firms in Denver, Boulder, Fort Collins, and Colorado Springs. There were fewer than ten large companies in the entire state, and none of them had anything other than entry-level positions available at the moment. She would have kept searching, but looking at the screen made her head ache.
She’d just started making egg salad for lunch when Eric pulled into the driveway. Relieved, she met him at the front door. Immediately, she could see on his face that something was wrong. “What is it?”
He let the screen door shut behind him, took her into his arms, and held her, raw emotion surging through him. “God, it’s good to have you to come home to.”
She held him tight. “What happened?”
“It turned out to be a body recovery. A young climber fell, hit his head. There was nothing we could do.”
She could hear the strain in his voice. “I’m so sorry.”
He held her for a moment longer, his body communicating a need he couldn’t. Then he shut all the emotion away.
He stepped back, kissed her. “Joe called. He wants you to come to Knockers tonight. He hasn’t had a chance to treat you yet for the pizza lesson, and he and some of the others also want to say goodbye.”
At the word “goodbye,” her stomach sank.
Her stolen week in Scarlet Springs was almost over.
* * *
Eric drovedown the mountain toward town, warmed by what his fellow Scarlet Springers had done to honor Victoria. She hadn’t noticed—not yet. He slowed down, wondering how long it would take her.
“Please promise me no one is going to make a big deal out of anything.”