Page 88 of My Star-Crossed Summer

“Ah, give the man a break, love,” Logan says, giving her a mischievous smile. “Imagine if I hadn’t flown back to you, that night you thought I was gone forever.” He gives her a devilish wink as he slips an arm around her waist.

She bites back a smile and ruffles his hair. “As if you could have stayed away from me.”

He grins, eyes sparkling. “Truth. Now imagine this lad’s feeling even a fraction of that.”

They hold another long look, and after a few raised brows and half-smiles that I hope are code forLet’s help this poor guy out, Gwen pulls her phone from her pocket and turns back to me.

“The only reason I’m doing this is because I know she’s nuts about you, too,” she says. “Has been forever.” She takes a step toward me, eyes narrowing like a cat’s. “But if you break my sister’s heart, I won’t think twice about leaving you in the swamp for gator bait.”

“I wouldn’t expect anything different,” I tell her.

“Good,” she chirps. “Now tell me your number so I can text you an address.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

VICTORIA

That last half-mile is a doozy,” Joan says, peering at me over her reading glasses. She’s perched behind the check-in desk at the main lodge, right where she was when I left a few hours ago. She’s still watching reruns ofBonesand sipping from a massive thermos filled with what she calls her afternoon toddy. A sticker on the thermos has an earnest-looking tabby cat wearing a backpack and proclaims,A life well-lived is spent outdoors.

I’m starting to agree with that sentiment. Even in moments like this one, when my thighs are screaming for a hot bath with epsom salts and my shoulders ache from carrying my backpack.

Joan checked me into this cabin two days ago, and now she talks to me like I’m her new best friend. Yesterday I brought her a lemon blueberry muffin from a bakery in town and this morning she told me about her favorite hike that starts a few miles from here, just off the Blue Ridge Parkway.

“You were right, though,” I tell her. “That view at sunset is incredible.”

“Right?” she says, her face lighting up. “It’s totally worth that brutal uphill climb.” With her pixie-cut dark hair and sparklinggray-blue eyes, she looks barely forty—but told me she’s almost sixty. Born and raised in this little corner of Virginia, she’s spent her whole liferambling in the mountains, as she calls it. She told me she still hikes almost every day, usually early in the morning before starting her shift here at the cabins.

“Thanks again,” I tell her. “For the recommendation.”

“Anytime,” she says, grabbing a guide book from a shelf under her desk. One arm is covered in a sleeve of fine-lined tattoos of flowers and birds, the colors done in muted earth tones. “I marked my favorites in here,” she says, handing me the book. “Just bring it back to me when you check out.” She’s really leaned into this idea of being my local guide. Not that I mind one bit—I came here to clear my head, but also to push myself to get stronger, even if it’s only a week until the next camp begins.

Sophie was right about this place—being here is the perfect way for me to gather my thoughts about how I want to move forward. A cozy, private cabin with no wifi has given me just the right amount of seclusion and quiet to make me feel calm again. And in this quiet, I’ve been able to finally hear that voice deep inside me—the one from the woman who’s been knocked down enough that she was nearly impossible to hear.

But not anymore.

“Thank you,” I tell Joan. The book’s a small pocket-sized guide, with a dozen or more dog-eared pages and generous spots of highlighting. “I’ll take good care of it.”

She nods as the landline next to her rings with a call. “Have a good night, hon,” she says, reaching for the phone.

I give her a friendly wave and head back down the dirt path to my cabin, which is about a hundred yards from this building. Sophie called it rustic, but comfy. It’s not quite camping and is more modern than the room I had at the institute—but I still feel like I’m roughing it a little. The cabin’s like a studio apartment,with a kitchen-living room area, a tiny bathroom, and a loft upstairs that sleeps two.

I climb the front steps and unlock the door, already fantasizing about the long shower I’m going to take to ease these tired muscles. Unlike that first week of camp, I’m no longer gasping for air when I hike moderate trails. I’m still slow, but each day outside gets a little easier—and that just motivates me to keep going. Once inside, I kick off my boots, and immediately think of Noah and how he insisted I get a decent pair. I’ve only checked my phone a thousand times since Sunday night, hoping there might be a text from him.

There hasn't been.

And that fact hurts me even more than I thought it would.

After stripping out of my sweaty hiking clothes, I take a a hot shower—I’ll feel these aches tomorrow, but it’ll be worth it. Every ache lets me know I’m moving forward, training my body to be stronger and grow more accustomed to the unpredictability of nature—and other parts of life, too.

No matter what happens with Noah, my heart will get stronger, just like all other muscles do when you use them. These three weeks with him and the tween campers have reminded me of the one lesson I’d never learn in the Griffin house: the more you love, the more your heart grows.

And that’s always a win.

A little after ten p.m., I’m nibbling on the remains of my microwave pizza, reading Joan’s field guide when I hear a loud clatter on the porch. Certain it’s one of the sneaky raccoons or bears that Joan warned me about, I grab the nearest big object—a wooden duck decoy from the bookcase—and fling open the front door, ready to holler and stamp my feet and scare the biscuits out of the nosy critter.

When I open the door, I’m stunned into silence, mouth gaping like a fish.

Noah’s on all fours by the steps, his leg tangled in the camp chair that was by the door.

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