Page 33 of Hero's Prize

But now, it was done.

“Have you gone to see Ella yet?”

Colton glanced over at Bear, not entirely sure how to respond.

Lincoln saved him, calling out from one of the obstacles. “You know, if we change the angle of this wall, it would allow the rope swing to get greater trajectory when someone jumps and grabs it.”

Bear glanced over at Lincoln to see exactly what he was talking about, and Colton took a sip of his beer to hide his sigh of relief. Because he didn’t want to answer his friend’s question about seeing Ella. Except for the people who had been working on the obstacle course with him, nobody even knew he was in town.

He just wasn’t quite sure what he was going to say to anybody, especially Ella. Again, not that he was here to see her anyway.

His hermit-like behavior hadn’t been a topic of conversation for anyone or even part of his own thinking because they’d been working from dawn until late in the evening to get this obstacle course ready. But now, that time-filler was done, and he wasn’t sure what he was going to do.

Bear got up and walked over to stop their cousin from doing anything drastic like rebuilding the wall, but Colton stayed where he was.

And grimaced as he felt a tremor start once again in his hand.

Goddamn it.

He jumped up to his feet. He could not go through this again. He walked over to where Lincoln was still discussing the pros and cons of a steeper climbing wall and how it would affect the rope swing. Bear was amazingly patient with their cousin, given the fact that if the man had made his concerns known a few days ago during the planning process, there would be no need to rebuild anything now. Not that rebuilding was needed—this wasn’t Olympic training; this was just something for the kids to have fun on.

But if they did change the wall, it would at least give Colton another few hours of something to do.

“Actually, Lincoln may have a point.” Colton thumped his fist on the climbing wall. “It won’t take very long for us to rebuild this at a steeper angle.”

Bear’s eyes grew wide. “Are you kidding me? You’re actually agreeing to this? My to-do list is already ten thousand items long, it’s eight p.m., and we’ve been working on this for three days straight.”

“Yeah, but?—”

“No.” Bear’s tone brooked no refusal. “There’s plenty of other stuff that still needs to be done before the kids get here in a few days.”

Colton knew he was right, but damn it. “Are you sure?”

Bear looked like he might actually take a swing at him. Colton couldn’t blame his friend. He knew he was being unreasonable. Lincoln was pretty much always unreasonable, so that was understandable. But Colton wasn’t usually in the crazy camp with him.

“Are you messing with me right now?” Bear asked.

Colton forced a smile onto his face. “Yeah. Of course I am. I’ll stop.”

“Good. Because I expect this sort of stuff from Linc, but there’s no need to encourage him. This course is amazing just as it is, and the kids are going to love it. Now, I’m going home by way of the Eagle’s Nest for a bite to eat first. Anyone interested?”

Colton knew he should rip off the Band-Aid and head into town. See everyone and get it out of the way. But he couldn’t when he was walking such a fine line and didn’t have control of his body the way he wanted.

“Rain check for me. I’m going to make it an early night.”

Bear was distracted enough not to push it. “Lincoln?”

“Yeah, I’ll meet you there in a few minutes.”

Bear shook his head. “So help me God, if you guys rebuild this climbing wall…” He didn’t finish the threat as he walked toward his car, looking down at his clipboard with the never-ending checklist.

Bear’s car hadn’t even started before Lincoln said, “I estimate that we could rebuild this in just under six-and-a-half hours if it’s just you and me working on it. Roughly three hours and forty-five minutes if we can find a third person.”

Colton held up a hand to stop Lincoln before he continued with exact estimates for how long it would take with five people, six, seven… No doubt he’d already done all the calculations in his computer of a mind.

“I don’t think rebuilding is necessary.” Although he was tempted. “Like Bear said, the kids are going to love it just as it is. Plus, if we’re up half the night working on this, Bear will never let us hear the end of it tomorrow.”

Lincoln continued to study the climbing wall for a few more seconds before turning to Colton and nodding. “Yes, Bear will be upset. And I do understand that there are more important things to do than this.”

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