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We barely speak on the way back to the campsite.
Wes tries to talk, but I shut him down.
A part of me insists I’m overreacting—it wasn’t a lie, so much as a failure to share information—but the rest of me is already in lockdown. Finding out Wes is keeping things from me shouldn’t be scarier than having bats in my hair, but it is.
I was falling so hard for him, so hard that I’d let myself forget how much it hurt the first time he let secrets get between us.
Now, it all comes rushing back, making my head spin.
How much it hurt to learn the man I’d been making love to all night was in a relationship with another woman. How my heart shriveled in my chest when that break-up he’d promised didn’t come. How I wanted to jump through a wormhole to another dimension when I spotted Wes and Darcy at a table in my favorite café a few days after our night in the woods.
They didn’t look happy—not even close—but that didn’t matter. He’d still chosen her, not me.
It’s the story of my life.
For one reason or another, I am always the unchosen one.
If I were a character in a fantasy novel, I wouldn’t be the princess who learns she has magical powers or the slayer who has to save the world from zombies. I wouldn’t even be the spunky sidekick who assists the heroine with my encyclopedic knowledge of healing plants or weapons expertise. I’d be the mayor’s daughter who’s killed by bad guys in chapter three, a plot device to show how bad the bad guys are.
Back at the camper, I quickly clean up and change clothes, but when I cuddle Freya, she can obviously still smell that I’ve been getting up close and personal with other furry things. I endure her frantic sniffing of my hair patiently, wishing I had a similar skill set. If I could smell other women on my man, maybe lies wouldn’t feel like such a big deal.
But even as the thought drifts through my head, I know that’s not the real problem.
I’m not worried about Wes cheating. Maybe I should be, but I’m not. I believe that he’s falling for me as hard and fast as I’m falling for him, and that he clearly feels terrible about keeping Darcy’s texts from me—regret is etched in every tense line of his face as he emerges from his own clean-up in the bathroom.
I just want to be able to trust my person. I need that.
And I need to know that he trusts me. I can’t live with this kind of uncertainty, always wondering if I’m being told the whole truth, always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Over time, even little white lies can come between two people, and Wes’s lies aren’t white. They’re an “I like to manipulate things behind the scenes without telling people” shade of gray.
At the Emergency Room, we learn we do indeed need to start the rabies vaccine protocol. Apparently, bat teeth are so tiny and sharp that we could have been bitten and not even know it. We’ll need to get one round of shots now, and then another shot at the three, seven, and fourteen days post exposure. The day three shots, we can get here at the hospital in Utah, the nurse says. Afterwards, she can send the vaccination records to our primary care providers in Bad Dog, so that we can finish the protocol when we’re home from our trip.
If we decide to stay the rest of the week.
Right now, that’s a big “if.”
I just want to go home. I want to crawl into bed with Freya, watch reruns of Gilmore Girls, and remember that even Lorelei Gilmore, a gorgeous, spunky, intelligent, hardworking woman, with a fantastic sense of humor and a heart as big as the burgers at Luke’s diner didn’t find her happily ever after until late in life.
I don’t have to commit to a future of ferret-nurturing spinsterhood. There’s still time for me to find my person. With time, I’ll forget the dazzling, magical, perfect way Wes made me feel. I’ll forget that he’s the only man who’s ever appreciated my goofy side as much as my sexy one, the only man who’s looked at me like I’m the answer to every question, the only man who’s ever felt like home.
“Can we talk? Please?” Wes asks from the door to the camper.
He ate the burger and fries we picked up on the way back to our campsite inside at the banquet. I ate out here by the fire, Freya cavorting on her leash beside my chair, gratefully snatching at the tiny pieces of meat I tossed her way.
Even after the exhausting day, I just wasn’t that hungry, and I still don’t want to talk. But I owe Wes that much.
I nod toward the other camp chair.
He settles into the seat, leaning forward with his elbows braced on his knees, his expression still drawn. “I have something to tell you.”
My brows lift.
After a beat, he continues, “I don’t want lies between us anymore, not even lies of omission. I understand why you’re upset, but honestly, Tessa, the last thing I’d ever want to do is hurt you. I just didn’t want to ruin the fun by bringing up Darcy’s texts. I was going to tell you, I swear. And now that I know how much things like this upset you, in the future, I would know to tell you right away.”
I sigh and cross my arms tighter over my chest.
“I’d be fine with you going through my phone if you wanted,” Wes adds, making me frown. “Whenever you wanted to.”
“I don’t want to go through your phone,” I say. “I just want to know I can trust you, Wes.”
