17. Reed

Chapter seventeen

Reed

Petra is intoxicating. I’m too busy trying not to stare at her—or reach for her, or pull over on the side of the road to kiss her—to concentrate properly. By the time we arrive at the trail, my shoulders are tight.

“The waterfall loop?” Petra asks.

“Have you been? I want to record some audio while we’re here, and it’s finally stopped raining.” I grab my bag out of the back. I didn’t bring much, but my Zumie goes everywhere with me. It’s my favorite on-the-go binaural recorder.

Petra raises an eyebrow at me. “Good thing I’m wearing Converse. You know this trail is steep, right?”

“Good. I’ll record your panting—not much different from your sounds last night,” I tease, pulling her into me.

It’s the first time either of us has broached the topic. After that series of touches in the parking lot, I’m done allowing her any distance. I nip her neck, drunk off the scent of her skin.

“What I wouldn’t give to have recorded those, Pet. To hear my name a strung-out moan in my ear.” She shivers, and I love it. Keeping her on edge is my new favorite pastime. She’s got me there without trying, and her soft moans are going to haunt my dreams. “Was last night out of the ordinary, or are you not a screamer?”

Her swallow is loud in my ear. “I don’t scream. Ever.”

My blood rushes south so quickly that it makes me dizzy. “You shouldn’t say that.”

She manages a small snort of derision, but her pupils are blown. “We’ve said far worse.”

“True,” I say, holding tight to the remnants of my self-control. “But that was practically a challenge.”

“Oh.” When my implication registers, she drops her head to my chest. My heart pounds fiercely under my jacket, so hard she must feel it.

“Let’s go hiking, before I maul you like a bear.” I offer her my hand, struggling not to lay her down in the backseat instead.

“No wonder you’re a bachelor if that’s your best pickup line.” She’s fronting; her breath hitches each time I pull her close. I tug her onward—against my deepest desires—because she needs to know there’s more to dating than never leaving the bed.

“You love my pickup lines,” I shoot back, and she laughs as we walk up the path.

Petra is patient with me as I frequently stop along the trail to record the babble of a brook or call of a bird. Oregon is so beautifully green. Everything is wet—the soil nearly black with the damp—and covered in a verdant groundcover that’s reminiscent of an enchanted forest.

The nearby stream provides an undercurrent to the snap of old twigs and pine needles. The wind whistles through empty branches of trees still waiting for spring, and its high, mournful cry makes me inexplicably sad.

This is why I chose audio as my medium. I have a love for these sounds I can’t describe, but with Petra I don’t have to. She pauses when I do, cocking her head in an attempt to decipher which sound I’m isolating. I record Petra’s gentle crunching steps with my phone and text it to Mom as my favorite sound of the day.

Occasionally a soft smile will cross Petra’s face as she tracks things that aren’t there. Her eyes flit from the base of a tree to a high branch, though I can’t spot an animal. “What do you see?”

“Oh. It’s nothing.” A blush creeps up her cheeks. “I have a vivid imagination.”

“If you were writing, what story would you imagine here? ”

Her eyes light up as she takes in the trees around us, and points to a space beneath a tangle of roots. “This is the house of the Bobbity family, obviously. Little Ian Bobbity is the youngest, and a troublemaker of a bunny. He never comes home on time for dinner.”

“Obviously. And this?” I point toward a deep hole carved out from the bank of a small creek. “Who lives there?”

She shakes her head playfully. “No one. It’s a training arena for the Trouncing Toads. They’re the most elite squad there is and are sworn to protect the realm.”

“Trouncing Toads? I love it. So, when do I get to read about Ian Bobbity?”

Petra just shrugs. “I’d have to write it first.” She gives me a small tour of her imagination whenever I point out gnarled branches or oddly shaped rocks. Through her, I fall more in love with the land.

We’re almost to the first waterfall when my phone interrupts our peace. Caller Unknown. A chill sweeps over me as I silence it. The needling sensation creeps in, and when we stop in front of the rushing fall and Kinley calls a third time, I turn my phone off completely.

“You okay?” Petra asks. “I can give you some privacy.”

Her consideration melts the ice crusting over my skin. “No, that’s not the problem. It’s…the person I was telling you about.”

“Need me to kick her ass?”

I laugh, but when I turn to her, she’s dead serious. “You don’t need to get hurt on my account, but thank you.”

“Way to stick me in a box,” she scoffs. “Unofficial black belt, remember? My other sister, Silla, was dedicated to martial arts. I was her practice partner, whether I wanted to be or not. Violence doesn’t solve everything, but this woman can’t seem to take a hint.” I flinch at how close Petra is to the truth.

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Petra sits on a nearby bench, silently waiting me out, and I sink down next to her with a sigh .

“Kinley wasn’t all bad. I think I loved her in the beginning, or maybe I loved who she pretended to be. But things disintegrated. She grew obsessive. She wanted private recordings, and then I couldn’t even discuss DKP without her there. Eventually, I couldn’t make eye contact with a woman without Kinley going off on me. She wanted me to stop working so she didn’t have to share me. Kinley never understood that DK isn’t real.”

Petra’s eyes are big enough to swallow me whole, and it makes the rest of my words come easier.

“By the time I saw who she was under all the pretty lies, she had a hold on my whole life. My identity, my secrets, my family—she’d armed herself with an arsenal of information when I wanted to remain anonymous. It was nearly impossible to dig myself out of that situation. Sometimes it was so overwhelming that I wondered if it was worth it to try.”

Shock blooms over Petra’s face. “She was going to dox you?”

I rake a hand through my hair, frustrated. Kinley is unpredictable at best, malicious at worst. “That’s the least she’d do. Has done. She brought hell to earth for me.”

Petra laces our hands together on my knee, and the electric current running over my skin is no longer scratchy. It hums with a familiar sound—a lullaby. It mixes with her scent—so familiar that the full memory sits just outside my reach. All I have are glimpses of sunlight through trees, bells ringing, and something sweet and hot melting on my tongue. Even so, it warms the last of the chill that Kinley’s calls brought on.

“I’m so sorry,” Petra says. Her woodland eyes reflect the forest, earnest and beautiful. “You’re a kind person, and I can’t imagine what it’s like to have someone betray you that way. Plus, share you? You’re so…you. It’s obvious when you slip on the mask, and I can’t believe after knowing you longer, she didn’t get that.”

“She ignored it.” It’s a reminder I desperately need so I don’t lose myself in Petra. She’s a listener, which means DK already has her more than I ever will. “Kinley preferred him over me. I have too many flaws in real life. ”

Petra shakes her head. “We all have flaws—her more than anyone. Our flaws make us unique. Human. You’re a beautiful human.” She reaches for me, tugging my face back to hers. She smooths her thumb over my jaw in a comforting pattern that makes me want to burrow into her. “The pretend version could never live up to the real you. She mistreated you—didn’t deserve you.”

Her words are a balm. Through the entire battle, court, lawyers, and police, no one told me outright that I didn’t deserve it.

“My tattoo is because of her,” I confess, but the rest of the words stick in my throat. They won’t move past the knot of pain. Petra climbs onto my lap, wrapping herself around me. Her warmth is soft and comforting.

“You don’t just deserve dawn,” she murmurs, her thumb stroking my cheek. “You deserve sunny afternoons, with the heat of day warming your skin. You deserve vibrant sunsets that make your heart blaze in their reflection. You deserve hot summer nights under a full moon that makes the world shine silver and keeps any shadows at bay. You’ll get them, Reed.”

I can’t hold her gaze. My fingers tangle in her soft curls, and the light plays and swirls with each curve. “Maybe.”

Petra’s hand catches mine, holding it against her neck. “It will still hurt horribly sometimes, but not constantly.”

There’s a pang in my chest at her words, because she knows my grief. Once again, she and I are mirrors, but I don’t want her to embody the words in her notebook. I want her safe and happy.

“She’s the reason you’re moving?” Petra asks, far too observant. I nod, measuring how much truth to give her, but she doesn’t prod. “That makes sense. It’s hard to live in a place that acts as a cage.”

“Yeah, it is.” I hope she knows that I mean the same for her. She doesn’t say anything else. She lets go of my hand and settles against my chest. She strokes my arms, my back, and I do the same. Kinley’s hands aren’t imprinted on my body anymore. Petra’s are there instead, soothing my old wounds. The last two nights with her have been more effective than any shower .

After a while, Petra climbs off my lap and reaches out her hand as an olive branch. “Want to keep going?”

I nod. There’s a strange tightening in my stomach as we walk, hands intertwined. I prod her with questions until we arrive at the second waterfall, where Petra perches on a nearby rock. Her face is as tranquil as our quiet, smiling moments between midnight and dawn. Once I get the recordings I want, I join her, offering the puppy chow mix from my bag.

“Every time I eat this, I’m going to remember your bathtub,” Petra says.

“That makes me unreasonably happy.”

Petra’s eyes crinkle as she pushes my arm in response, but I’m solid and not going anywhere. “I’ve listened to the recordings so often, but it’s better when it’s real,” she admits. I nod, captivated by her voice in my ear—it beats any recording.

She shies away when I turn on my phone to take a selfie of us, but I’m at peace, and that’s worth documenting. “Come on, Pet. Let me remember Swift River, and one moment of happiness in front of a waterfall. Unless you want me to take a less socially shareable photo of bliss?” I waggle my eyebrows at her until she laughs, bright and full.

“Fine, then.” She settles in against my shoulder, gorgeous and serene. I grin at the photo before I get up to snap more photos of the falls. I quietly sneak one of Petra perched on the rock. She’s a siren with her chestnut hair and the glacier blue water and deep green ferns behind her.

It’s beautiful. She’s beautiful.

I break another rule, and switch to my private account to post them on my story. A simple, temporary banner that will show up again in a year—a reminder of a moment when the bruises I carried began to heal.

A moment where we are both brilliantly alive.