Page 18 of Forgotten Mountain Man

“Maybe with a few pairs of socks.” He reappeared holding a stack of power bars and meal supplements that looked like cardboard and probably tasted the same. “I’ve got an old pair of Trav’s. He’s not as big as me?—”

I stared at him, aghast. “The man is six foot and six inches tall!” Mind, I reckoned that Walker capped out at around just shy of seven feet. What in the hell was I complaining about?

“—And you might be able to fit into this with some…help.” He ignored my outburst and kept on packing. A tube of sun cream bounced my way. “Put that on. I’ve got a hat, but it’s not going to stay on that little pinhead of yours.”

I glared at him. “I beg your pardon?”

Walker smirked. “Come on, Precious. Don’t we have a business of yours to get you back to?”

My stomach swooped. “Yeah. Cause That’s the stuff that really matters, right?” I grabbed the sunscreen, lathering it on and cursed the rain for ever stopping.

“Did you fall out of the wrong side of my bed this morning, Faith?”

I didn’t need to look at him to know that Walker was frowning at me, his inked face scrunched up like one of those roly-poly dogs.

“Nope.” I kept on slathering.

“Whoa. Slow down there.” He liberated the cream and placed it gently back on the bench. “You wanna talk to me?”

I laughed at my hands covered in an excess of white goop. “Nope.”

“That’s something new.” He sighed. “Pee. Drink a lot of water. It’ll be dark before we reach Red Hart, but we’ll get most of the hike done before the sun sets. I’ll carry an extra jacket for you.”

I glared at his back as he turned away from me. “I’ll carry my own things.”

“Suit yourself.”

His shoulders lifted in a shrug, his irritation a match for my own.We’re more alike than you think, Walker Roan.

He hadn’t been privy to the conversations I shared with his father over the years when there was no one else to listen to the lonely old man talk. Because while Walker seconded himself away from the world, his father was a social butterfly…until he wasn't.

Until life took away his open intentions and locked a suddenly old man away in his own body and mind, and a small town like White Cap started to forget that he ever existed.

The irony was that Walker wanted what his father achieved by accident. The role reversal wasn’t lost on me, or the old man I visited on a weekly basis. By the end of the first month I had a tea collection to rival a foreign court, because that’s what his father drank. Every month I added to it, and we shared stories—-or at least, he did while I listened. Collected his memories so that one day, I might share some of those stories with the son who left after they fought, and never came back.

And now, I had one day left and I hadn’t done the real job I came to do when I decided to invade the mountain where Walker Roan hid himself away years ago in a bid to make sure that the world forgot he existed.

And I still didn't know why any more than his father did.

Because Walker never told him, either.

A cough brought me out of my thoughts. “We need to leave, Faith.”

Walker stood a few feet away from me, two jackets clipped to the backpack strung across his ridiculously broad, muscular shoulders that his black tee did nothing to hide.

Lumber snack, activated.

I nodded. “I’m ready.”

He held out three pairs of thick, woolen socks and kicked muddied boots my way. “Almost.”

I nodded, planting my butt on the floor without argument. He was ready to go. There was no point fighting. We were done,clearly. Lacing my borrowed footwear up as best I could around my ankles under his watchful eye, I declared myself ready a second time.

Walker said nothing, raking his gaze over me. His eyes lingered on my lips. For a moment I thought he might kiss me, but he seemed to have shut that part of us off the moment he made the choice to push me out of his house.

I swallowed hard. We really were done. The fun part of this unintentional mountain segue was over, and I was being evicted out of his life. I turned on the heel of my borrowed boots to stare out at the view I could finally see that went on and on and on over the pine forests. Cold air lit my lungs with a need to stare for hours and absorb everything.

From here, if I stepped close enough to the edge, it felt like I was flying.

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