Page 79 of Hero's Prize

TWENTY-EIGHT

The next morning, mind on food, Colton drove into town and parked at the Frontier Diner. It had been a long night.

Once they were dry enough, they’d walked back to camp, which, fortunately, hadn’t been too far away. Bear and Lilah had immediately surmised something was wrong. Colton had been about to tell the story but then realized that this was Marshall and Ashley’s chance to shine, so he let them tell it instead.

The rest of the campers were enthralled to hear about the near-death experience and why wilderness survival skills were so important.

Marshall didn’t mention that his shoulder was hurt, but both Bear and Lilah had realized it by the way he was holding his arm. While Marshall and Ashley fielded questions about everything from how cold the water was to whether they’d thought they would die, Colton told the leaders that the kid definitely needed to be checked out by a doctor.

When Bear explained to the campers that it was necessary for Marshall and Ashley to go back, the rest of the kids banded with them and packed up to go too.

It had been a really nice moment.

Once they got Marshall to the clinic, the kid had still been atrooper as they reset his shoulder. Didn’t mutter a word. Having had a similar injury more than once, Colton had expected Marshall to be more relaxed once the joint was back in its socket since the pressure and pain eased dramatically once it was back in place.

But, if anything, the kid looked more upset.

“Are you all right?” Colton asked. Maybe he had more injuries than he’d been letting on.

Marshall shrugged with his good shoulder. “Yeah, I’m okay, I guess.”

“No offense, but you don’t look very okay. Are you sure your shoulder was the only thing that was hurt?”

“Yeah. Just…”

Shit. Marshall looked like he might cry.

“Hey. What’s going on?”

Marshall slumped over on the examination table. “Is being a hero something you can only do as an adult?”

He was taken aback by the question. “No, I think you proved that today.”

Marshall shook his head slowly. “No, I didn’t. I dropped Ashley. I couldn’t hold on. A hero would’ve held on. Wouldn’t have let her fall.”

Colton raised an eyebrow. “No offense, but that’s bullshit.”

“But—”

“Butnothing. You held on to her even after your arm had been ripped out of its socket. That’s more than most adults—hero or not—would’ve done.”

“But I couldn’t get her back up. She almost died because of me.”

He slid an arm around the boy’s shoulders gently. “Listen, a lot of things could’ve gone really wrong today and would’ve ended up in disaster. Starting with, if you hadn’t caught Ashley and held her as long as you did, there is probably no way that I could’ve gotten to her, and we would’ve lost her in that river.”

“I still wish I could’ve pulled her back up.”

“And maybe you work toward building your upper body strengthso that if you’re ever in a situation like this again, you can. But make no mistake, being a hero has nothing to do with physical strength and everything to do with your willingness to help others even if it hurts yourself. You’re definitely a damn hero—don’t tell yourself otherwise.”

The boy nodded solemnly. “I’m glad everyone is okay.”

“That’s always the most important thing.”

When they made it back to Linear Tactical, it was obvious that Ashley considered Marshall to be her hero also. She zoomed right to his side and stayed there until it was time for the campers to go to their respective cabins.

Yeah, Marshall was more of a hero than most of the grown adults Colton knew. Ella was one also. He knew wilderness survival wasn’t her expertise and that she was only on the trip as a personal favor to Bear, but she had done everything damn near perfectly. Hell, even getting him out of the water had been difficult—throwing her body weight around like she had had left her with multiple bruises.

The woman was fucking amazing. The more he was around her, the more he wanted to be around her. And as soon as this stalker situation was handled, he and Ella were going to have a very important talk. One he was very much looking forward to.

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