Page 41 of Tempting Promises
I place my hand on Faye’s arm and smile. “I’m not going far up. I promise, I’ll be fine.”
She lets out a long breath through her nose. “If you say so.”
“I know so. I’ll be back in the morning withoutany issues. Watch.”
What a lie that was.
Little did I know that four hours later I’d be eating those words and wishing I had just stayed in Sugarloaf.
I’m in the back country, however, I’m pretty sure I sprained my ankle. I was walking one of the trails and misstepped, and then suddenly, I was rolling down the mountain. Thankfully, I managed to grab onto a rock, stopping myself from slamming into a tree.
As wonderful as it was not to end up with broken ribs, my ankle is still swelling badly and throbbing even worse.
I’m a six-mile walk from the house, and the sun is already setting. I can’t go back in the dark without possibly falling further, and I could injure myself worse trying to get down to where I know there was a cabin. The one thing I really can’t do is stay here and hope for a miracle. I’ll freeze to death and the storm is coming in. Thanks to the weather idiots who were wrong again.
I push myself up to standing, wincing as pain shoots up my leg.
“Why me? Seriously? What did I do in another life?” I ask the sky and then reach for two small branches. I put them on each side of my ankle and wrap it with the ace bandage I brought. Once that’s done, I grab a large branch and test if it’ll fit under my arm so I have a crutch of some kind.
“Like I’m going to be able to walk? No. I’m not. I’m going to die out here of hypothermia or starvation. Why? Because I’m an idiot and wanted to get away from the man I tried to maul. Way to go, Charlotte. Super smart.”
There’s a rustling noise behind me. I freeze, stop my tirade, and look around. The guidebooks did warn about wildlife, which would’ve been totally fine, but it’s March and the bears are probably still in their comfy caves or whatever.
Relax, Charlotte. Bears don’t like the cold, and it’s freezing right now. It’s probably a deer. Deer are cute-ish.
The tree leaves shake again, and then there is atwackingnoise.
“Hello?” I say carefully. Bears are bad, deer are a little better, but another human would be either a blessing or could be here to kill me.
Never to find my body.
Lord, I have an overactive imagination.
“Hello?” a deep voice calls back.
Okay, not a bear, but maybe a murderer. “Hello?”
“Charlotte?” the voice says, and immediately, I know it’s worse than a murderer.
I look up to the sky, telling God what I think of this turn of luck. “You must hate me.” Then I sigh. “Yes, Rowan, it’s me.”
He pushes through the tree branches and comes to a stop beside me. “What are you doing?”
“Knitting a sweater,” I say with sarcasm dripping from each syllable.
“I’m an extra large, if you’re taking orders.”
“I’m not.”
He smirks. “Your leg.” Rowan’s entire demeanor shifts when he sees my makeshift brace. Gone is the arrogant smart-ass, replaced with a guy who has concern etched on his face. He crouches, his hand moving down my shin, barely ghosting over my swollen ankle before settling lightly on the top of my shoe. “What happened?”
“My pole hit a rock and I slid. I ended up rolling down a hill and hurting my back and shoulder, but my ankle got the worst of it.”
Admitting all of that hurts more than the ankle.
He nods, pulling his backpack off. “We’re pretty far from the house. If we start now, maybe we can make it before the”—thunder booms and lightning flashes across the sky—“storm.”
“Seriously, just leave me here, I’m sure I’ll get struck and I can just be done with this insanity.”
