9. Jack

CHAPTER NINE

jack

When we start hiking again, Maggie hangs back while Fiona takes the lead. "We may never get where we're going with her in the front."

"What? Why?" Graham asks.

Maggie laughs. "She's notoriously good at not following a map or trail and landing us in sticky situations."

"I'll hike with her. The two of you behave." He moves up ahead to take the lead with Fiona.

"I see you've decided to hike with me."

A smirk appears on her face. "Gotta keep my enemies close and all that."

"Do you go around kissing all of your rivals?" I blurt out. My cheeks go warm when it takes her a moment to answer.

"Can't say I do."

"So, I'm just the lucky guy who happens to be the man you hate the most?" I ask it in a teasing voice, but I really want to know the answer.

"I don't hate you the most." She glances at me, and in looking up from the trail, she stumbles. I reach out to grab her, but she steadies herself and looks back down at the path. "That title goes to snakes."

I put a hand on my heart. "Oh, I'm honored not to be at the top of your hate list, just below snakes."

"You should be. It would take a lot more than what you did to get you to the top of the list."

This is my chance. I should ask her what I did to make her hate me so much. But instead, I change the subject. "It's a pity, don't you think, that when we go hiking we have to spend so much time looking at the ground and not enough looking out at the nature around us?"

"Ha," she says. "Changing the subject, I see. Not ready to own up to your crimes. Fine, fine. We can talk about something else. And yeah, I have to remind myself to look up every now and then. I can't risk it all the time, this trail is too rocky."

"So, what have you been up to?" I ask. "Besides losing your job?"

"Well, I was working most of the time. I had my own place in Laguna Beach, but I don't think I'll be able to stay there. My lease ends at the end of the month and I don't really have any money saved."

"Don't realtors make a lot?"

She nods. "Yeah, I guess. I just haven't been very good with my money. I have some saved, but not enough to keep living the way I have been for more than a few months. I'm still trying to figure out what I'm going to do next. What about you, did you start working for your dad after college?"

"I started working for him while I was still going to school, actually."

"That's great. I know you always wanted to do that."

"What I really wanted to do was stay in California so I could be close to you." Maybe it's too bold of me to say; maybe the mountains are already making me braver. "You always said you wanted to stay close to family."

She looks at me then, her blue eyes crashing into mine so fiercely that I have to stop walking or I may trip and fall. "What?" I ask.

She tilts her head. "I don't get you."

"What's not to get?"

"You're still a flirt."

"What's that got to do with anything, love?"

Her cheeks turn pink. "I just don't get it."

"Get what?" I ask as we start to walk down the trail again.

"How you can still flirt with me after everything that happened." She sighs like she regrets bringing it up.

"You flirt right back," I tease. "Plus, you're the one who kissed me."

"You should just forget that kiss ever happened."

"Why would I do that?"

This time, she stops walking and turns to face me. "Jack Freaking Donovan. You can't say things like that."

I stare her down. "And why not?"

"Because you declared war."

"A prank war. With all of our usual flirting. Though, I do miss the touching and innocent bumps. We always seemed to do that back in high school." I risk it and wink. Pink creeps back up her cheeks.

She bites her lip, and I can't tear my eyes away—I don't want to. I want to kiss her again. Flirting with her is even more fun than it used to be, and I want more.

"We shouldn't touch," she says finally, but she takes a step toward me. "That would be a bad idea."

"Why would that be bad, love?" I give her the grin that was always reserved only for her, and her eyes widen.

"Just, because."

"You don't have a boyfriend, do you? A fiancé?"

She grimaces. "I wouldn't have kissed you yesterday if I was into someone else. I'm not like some people."

Her words feel like a jab, one that I'm still trying to make sense of when she says, "Not that I'm interested in you. I'm just saying, I wouldn't tell someone that I'm interested in them and then go and kiss someone else."

She takes a step away, putting the space back between us. I want to close the gap, but she starts walking.

"I did have a fiancé, though," she tells me. "I ended things about nine months ago."

It feels like my stomach is full of the rocks I put in her pack. "You were engaged?"

She nods. "I was. His name is Liam. We met when I started working at his family's agency after I finished college. We dated for about six months before he proposed, and we were engaged for another six months. The wedding was planned. I even had a dress picked out."

I think I'm going to be sick. I knew that Maggie had never been mine, but even in my head, the only person she ever ended up with was me.

"But then I realized we were too different. He was too impulsive and too married to his work. I want to settle down and have a family, and he didn't. So I called it off."

An awkward silence fills the air when I don't reply, because I'm trying to take it all in.

"Anyway, now that I've told you way too much about my life, I'm going to go hike with Fiona."