Page 79 of Kilt Trip

The image of Heather’s dark hair tumbling down her back, a few rogue strands lifted by the breeze, superimposed in Addie’s vision.

Her chest swelled like an incoming tide.

Addie could picture her mom out here, unencumbered by the unsteady footing, swept up by the open land and the striking terrain and the gentle flow of the river, rushing to take it all in at once. She would have called over her shoulder, “Hurry up! Come see this,” waving Brian around the densely packed trees and climbing onto the boulder.

Then, his laughter at her impatience, barely noticing the grandeur all around them, only seeing her.

Lifting the camera to capture her joy. To freeze a moment worth remembering. Worth living. A testament to an endless love.

Addie climbed up, stepping into her mother’s invisible footprints. A direct line rooting her to this spot. A heavy heartbeat like an echo across time.

Born and raised in the desert, she’d finally come home to this lush and ancient land. Addie’s throat tickled, and tears filled her eyes.

She’d been unmoored for so long, this tug was a parachute opening, ripping her back from the free fall.

Heather used to say that life was waiting to surprise you if you went looking for it. She lived with an openhearted exuberance Addie had tried to emulate but confused with wanderlust.

She couldn’t bring her mom back, but she could honor her memory by living with the same fearlessness. Open herself up to the people and places that left an imprint on her heart. Heather’s courage ran through Addie’s veins, too.

Suddenly, she wanted something permanent. Some token to remind her of the whispering wind, full of secrets, the opalescent clouds watching stories unfold beneath them, and the wonder she felt in her bones.

She turned to Logan, the flutter of her heart brushing her breastbone. “Will you take my picture?”

Surprise skittered across his face, quickly smoothed over with a smile. “Of course.” He raised his phone camera.

Addie spread out her arms, tipped her head back. Smiled into the swirling gray above her. Pearl, lead, silver, steel. The winter air felt light in her lungs.

Logan drew closer, the pebbled riverbank protesting his footsteps. She hopped down and nudged the rocks aside with her muddy boots, searching for a skipping stone.

Addie reached for the perfect one, like it was left there just for her, and slipped it between her thumb and index finger.

She was tired of outrunning her past.

Tired of punishing herself for the way her father pulled away from her. Of holding so tightly to her grief and anger it all but defined her. She was ready to let it all go, to leave it here on this moor that made her scars feel insignificant in the face of its timeless beauty.

With a flick of her wrist, she sent the rock hopping across the water. “My mom always skipped rocks. She liked the idea of defying the things that would pull us under.”

Logan picked up a stone and copied her motion, but his hit the water with a plunking splash before sinking into the river. He frowned, and her chest filled with a swelling warmth she couldn’t quite name.

Gratitude? Awe?

Without Logan, she would never have recognized Loch Ness in the picture or found this remote mountain. Even if she had, she might not have worked up the courage to go without him. Might have turned back at the first rogue sheep.

The stream gurgled by their feet, and a bird’s cry pierced the air. Addie picked up a smooth oval stone. “My dad says it’s all in the curvature of the rock.”

Logan’s hand curled around hers before slipping the rock from her grasp. He placed a lingering kiss to her temple.

Rolling the stone between his fingers, examining it, he tossed it above the shallow rapids. It went skidding across the water, and he turned that warm smile on her.

Addie didn’t want to hold back anymore. At Carbisdale Castle, she’d asked Logan to take a risk, but she hadn’t given in to it herself.

She slipped into his embrace and breathed the familiar smell of pine as his hand skimmed up and down her back, soothing as a sunrise.

She burned and shivered at the same time, an unsettling fever of recognition.

Of rightness.

Logan turned her, unzipped his coat, and tucked her inside. She nuzzled against the soft fabric of his sweater, dipped her head under his chin.

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