Secret Nights and Northern Lights
Author: Megan Oliver
Date: 2025-11-18 08:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Romance; Contemporary; Adult; Travel
Description: Childhood best friends and first loves are reunited on a make-or-break work trip to Iceland, with old feelings coming to the surface in this charming romance from debut author Megan Oliver. Mona Miller lives her life by she’s just fine, thanks; all good; not a problem! Everything is right as rain—even if it’s all a lie. Everyone at the travel magazine where she works knows her as a team player (in other words, the one who won’t complain about the endless fluff pieces pushed her way). But, feeling snubbed after being passed over for a promotion, Mona jumps at an international assignment to Icel
Publisher: Berkley

BERKLEY ROMANCE

Published by Berkley

An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

1745 Broadway, New York, NY 10019
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Copyright © 2025 by Megan Oliver

Penguin Random House values and supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to continue to publish books for every reader. Please note that no part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner for the purpose of training artificial intelligence technologies or systems.

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Cover art by Liza Rusalskaya

Cover design by Colleen Reinhart

Title page art: Aurora borealis © WinWin artlab/Shutterstock; forest landscape © NMacTavish/Shutterstock

Book design by Laura K. Corless, adapted for ebook

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Oliver, Megan author

Title: Secret nights and northern lights / Megan Oliver.

Description: First edition. | New York : Berkley Romance, 2025.

Identifiers: LCCN 2025006125 (print) | LCCN 2025006126 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593952405 trade paperback | ISBN 9780593952412 ebook

Subjects: LCGFT: Romance fiction | Novels

Classification: LCC PS3615.L58663 S43 2025 (print) | LCC PS3615.L58663 (ebook)

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2025006125

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2025006126

Ebook ISBN 9780593952412

The authorized representative in the EU for product safety and compliance is Penguin Random House Ireland, Morrison Chambers, 32 Nassau Street, Dublin D02 YH68, Ireland, https://eu-contact.penguin.ie.

ep_prh_7.3a_153889992_c0_r0

Contents

Dedication

Author’s Note

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

About the Author

_153889992_

For ten-year-old me, who carried a book in her hands everywhere she went.

Look at us now, Meg!

Author’s Note

Dear reader,

While Secret Nights and Northern Lights is a heartfelt second-chance romance with a guaranteed happily ever after, this story does contain the following content and themes: recreational alcohol consumption, sexual content, anxiety disorder and panic attacks, memories of a toxic parental relationship, and child neglect. If any of these are potentially sensitive topics for you, please read with care.

Chapter 1

There’s a cold hard truth no one mentions about turning thirty-one: Nobody cares, yourself included. The youthful romanticism of one’s twenties has passed. The pain of crossing the bridge into “real adulthood” at thirty has faded. And all that’s left is the overwhelming sense that time passes faster and faster, the birthdays less meaningful each year, the individual days of the week racing by in a dulled blur.

It’s fine, though.

I’m sure every person feels this way as they age. God, what an awful word that is when used as a verb.

Today’s melancholic outlook likely stems from yet another birthday spent in the dull gray cubicle of my “office,” spinning slow circles in my desk chair and memorizing the tatters in the Happy Birthday banner that’s dragged out of the supply closet whenever there’s an office birthday. Usually by me. But that’s fine, too.

I, Mona Miller, age thirty-one as of midnight, am happy to fill the role of cheery office party planner, known peddler of a bright smile and an enthusiastic Lovely day out, isn’t it?

But lately, my chipper exterior and No Worries! life motto feels like it’s wavering. Then again, maybe this is what it’s like to age into someone older and disillusioned. Perhaps I should join a bridge club or partake in a bingo night.

Who am I kidding? I’m not social enough for that.

But if I’m being honest, truly honest, with myself in this drab cubicle—the place no dreams are made of—perhaps my gloom stems not from my age in and of itself, but rather the idea I used to have of my life at this age, and how starkly different that idea is from reality.

I used to have dreams.

Big ones.

Now I have complacency, but it comes with a nice 401(k) match.

Before I can sink deeper into my philosophical birthday musings, my desk phone rings. Mid-reach, I take pause when the caller ID flashes an extension from one floor above. The thirty-seventh floor. The important floor.

Swallowing sudden nerves, I press the receiver to my ear with a cheerful, “Good morning, Shirley. What can I do for you today?”

“Cal wants you in his office,” a husky smoker’s voice rasps. “Stat.”

There are a couple defining qualities when it comes to my boss’s secretary. One, she’s worked for Calvin Cramer III for exactly forty-two years—I should know, I bought her fortieth-anniversary cake—hence, the only reason she gets away with calling him Cal. And two, she smokes a pack a day minimum, yet has never been spotted in the designated smoking area outside the building. Everyone knows Calvin lets her smoke in the office when no one’s watching.

The line goes dead, and Shirley’s curt manner does nothing to quell the anxiety unspooling in my belly. In my seven years at Around the Globe Media, Calvin Cramer III has never once summoned me to his office. Placing the receiver back on the hook, I take a moment to get my bearings. Then I leave my cubicle, weaving through the monochrome walls like a mouse in a maze.

Am I getting fired on my birthday? Surely not.

My last article on the Montpelier Biscuit Festival may not have been Pulitzer-worthy journalism, but I thought I managed to highlight the kitschy, quaint charm in a way readers would find appealing.

Honestly, there is only so much one can do with a biscuit festival.

Reaching the elevator bay, my hand hovers on the down arrow as I briefly consider making a run for it. But that would never happen. I am nothing if not responsible, professional, dependable, and predictable—the embodiment of all the boring words wrapped into one. If getting fired on my birthday is my fate, I will face this unexpected challenge with class and a polite smile, most likely thanking Calvin for the opportunity and inquiring whom I shall appoint to the office party planning committee of one on my way out.

I press the up arrow.

Awaiting the elevator, I examine my reflection in the shiny steel doors, smoothing away any wrinkles in my black pencil skirt and crisp white blouse, running a hand over my sleek brunette ponytail to tamp down any flyaways. My normal sun-kissed complexion has turned pallid, so I pinch my cheeks a few times in hopes of bringing back some color as my round hazel eyes reflect only one thing back at me: fear.

All too soon, my mirrored image splits apart as the doors slide open with a high-pitched chime, and I step inside the (thankfully) empty box and lean against the far wall, closing my eyes as the doors slide shut.

A leader in the travel journalism industry, Around the Globe Media is primarily known for its cable television station of the same name, featuring hour-long programs of young, attractive hosts visiting far-off locales and informing the viewing audience at home of the top ten things they simply cannot miss the next time they happen to swing through Phuket.

I, however, work for the more reserved monthly magazine—again, of the same name—primarily known for its cover photos of unimaginably beautiful beaches, waterfalls, and rainforests that look *chef’s kiss* on the magazine racks of dental office waiting rooms nationwide. (Combined with orthodontia, these make up a shockingly large market.) Even my own dentist is a subscriber, though he tucks us away on the rack while giving Travel + Leisure the coveted coffee table spot—which, fine, I’m not bitter or anything, but I bet none of their staff writers are his loyal patients. Every visit he proudly asks if I saw the latest issue out in the lobby, and I always nod and smile and muffle an awkward response around the instruments in my mouth.

The elevator chimes again.

I open my eyes, blow out a breath, and plaster on a smile.

No Worries!

Except all of them.

All of the worries.

My heels click-clack against polished marble floors as I make my way down the overly shiny hallway and reach a set of glass double doors. Etched above brushed nickel handles are an interlocked A and G inside the planet Earth. The illustrious thirty-seventh floor. An entirely different world from floor thirty-six and its threadbare carpet and cramped cubicles. Floor thirty-seven is where the real action goes down, housing not only “Cal” and Shirley, but the senior writers as well, better known to us floor thirty-sixers as the Internationals.

I pass by their offices now, all empty. Not entirely surprising since Calvin lets them work remotely when they aren’t on international assignment. As long as they agree to come into the office once a week for company-wide meetings, he has no problem extending them that flexibility—a flexibility never extended to us Locals. Calvin calls it a perk earned for all their time spent flying across the world. I call it bullshit.

Reaching Shirley’s closed office door, I knock softly, hand trembling, heart jolting against my rib cage with each rap of my knuckles against glass. The entire thirty-seventh floor is a transparent box that reflects any sunny skies outside a little too harshly—except for Shirley’s office, where the shades stay permanently pulled (to hide her perverse indoor smoking habit, I’m willing to bet).

A gravelly cough emerges from the other side, followed by a husky, “Come in.”

As I push through the door, Shirley waves away the last wisps of smoke.

“Go on.” She inclines her head in the direction of the open office door of Calvin Cramer III, president of Around the Globe Media’s print division. “Cal’s waiting.”

Moving past her desk—hoping my hair doesn’t pick up the lingering scent of cigarettes—I tap my knuckles against the open door of Calvin’s office to announce my arrival.

Steel gray eyes cut to mine over the top of a computer monitor, and my stomach twists. I don’t know why this man intimidates me this much. Yes, he’s my boss. Yes, he’s worked for this company longer than I’ve been alive. Yes, with his glassy eyes and head full of solid-white hair leading to a short, well-kept beard the same color, he gives me major President Snow from The Hunger Games vibes. But in any of my (limited) interactions with Calvin Cramer III in passing, he’s never been anything other than professionally polite, even if a bit dismissive.

“Ah. Ms. Miller,” he says, halfway rising from his seat and motioning opposite his desk to a plush chair that definitely cost more than the entirety of my cubicle furniture combined. “Please, have a seat.”

I sink into what can only be described as pure suede luxury. “Please, just Mona is fine,” I manage, feeling my go-to, No Worries! smile firmly in place.

Calvin leans back in his ergonomic chair, fingers steepled in front of his chin, backlit by a sweeping view of Manhattan. “All right then, Mona. I’ll cut to the chase. I was impressed with your last piece.”

The biscuit festival?

“Oh. Um. Thank you, sir.”

“You do solid work here. Always have.” His cold eyes wash over my face. “You’ve worked for us now, for what? A few years?”

Seven in addition to the eighteen-month internship out of college, but who’s counting?

I nod. “Yes, sir.”

“After reading your last article, I think it’s time to give you a shot at bigger things. I think you’re ready.”

Again, the biscuit festival?

I’m so confused. Clearing my throat, I gingerly prod. “Thank you, sir. May I ask what you mean by that?”

Leaning forward, he places both elbows on his tidy desk. “I’m sending you international. Iceland to be exact. I’m giving you a shot at the December cover story.”

It’s official—I’m dreaming. Or hallucinating. Or maybe I’ve been transported to some weird birthday parallel universe.

“Mona?” Calvin prompts at my prolonged silence.

Fingers pulling at my stiff, starchy collar, I tilt my head. “Sorry, I’m a little confused. You read my article on the Montpelier Biscuit Festival, and now you want to send me to Iceland?”

Shifting in his chair, he hesitates, then says, “I’m in a bit of a pinch. Iceland was Suki’s story, but she broke her ankle roller-skating this weekend. Abigail is going on maternity leave any day now. Devon just returned from Cairo. And Jeff’s preparing for his wedding next month.”

Ah. Now this makes sense.

There are four Internationals, and Suki and Devon are the two typically assigned to locations with any need for athletic prowess. Both are the fit, outdoorsy, adventure-loving, risk-taking types. I don’t know much about Iceland, but somewhere in the depths of my brain I recall the country is known as the land of fire and ice, which certainly has the ring of an adventurous, risk-taking kind of place.

There once was a time in my career I used to daydream of an overseas assignment, yet I always imagined something serene and relaxed. Riding a gondola through Venice. Carb-loading in Rome. Driving the rolling landscapes of Tuscany in an open-top convertible with my silk scarf whipping in the wind.

So, Italy. I imagined Italy.

Iceland feels challenging.

“If you don’t want it, I’ll get someone else,” Calvin says at my silence. “I thought everyone aspired to be an International. Was I wrong about you?”

This comment irks me on a deep level.

I used to want nothing but this, would have sold my soul for it actually. But four years ago when there was an opening in the international division, I gathered my courage and applied, only to be passed over in favor of Devon, an outside hire. Calvin didn’t even interview me, just announced Devon’s arrival at the next staff meeting. I took that as a clear signal he didn’t think I had what it takes. And he was probably right, he knows this business better than I do. So, I’d tucked away my childhood dreams of seeing the world and decided I was content covering my weekend fried-pickle festivals and small-town county fairs. At least I have a job writing for a living that pays my rent—as long as I keep a roommate—and provides decent health insurance. Well, as decent as health insurance gets in this country anyway.

But maybe that long-buried dream isn’t completely dead after all. Or maybe it’s just been resurrected, and on my birthday no less! That has to be a sign, right? Fifteen minutes ago I was bemoaning another year passing while my life remains stagnant, but this lucky break (for me, sadly not for Suki) could change everything. Iceland may not be what I’d imagined, but this could be my chance to finally prove I’m worthy of being an International. An opportunity seven years in the making.

“No! You weren’t wrong,” I suddenly demand. “I want this. I’ll go.”

Calvin Cramer III signals his approval with a stern nod. “Glad that’s settled. This is last minute, so you leave on an overnight flight out of JFK Monday night. Will that be a problem?”

Problem? Only having the weekend to figure out what one takes to Iceland? “No. No problem, sir. I’ll be ready.”

He nods again, adding, “Now, one other thing. About your photographer…”

Around the Globe’s customary procedure is to send teams of two to cover an assignment. One writer. One photographer. I hope it’s one of the newer photographers, Jaylen, going to Iceland with me, though I’m doubtful. He hasn’t had an international assignment yet, but there’s something about his photos that screams raw talent.

“We’re going freelance on this one,” Calvin continues, dashing that hope. “There’s a photographer I’ve been wanting on our team for years now, but he always turns me down. Just yesterday I finally persuaded him to do this one assignment as a test run.”

“Oh. Okay.” I’m not sure how I feel about traveling across the globe with a complete stranger, so I make a mental note to pack some pepper spray. Then I make another mental note to google if pepper spray is TSA approved.

“You’ll be spending a lot of time together, so make sure to let him know how wonderful it is to work for Around the Globe.” Calvin pauses a beat, appearing to consider his next words carefully. “And keep in mind, this photographer is very important to me, Mona. I’m giving you a chance here to show me what you’re capable of. If things go well, there may be a permanent spot for you in the international division.”

Those last sentences send a jolt of unease through me. I get a clear sense that if I want a shot at my dream again, not only do I need to write the best article of my life, but I also need to recruit this photographer like my career depends on it—because I think it just might.

I smile pleasantly and ask, “And who is this photographer you think so highly of?”

Calvin straightens in his desk chair and adjusts his paisley tie. “I’m sure you’re familiar with the work of Benjamin Carter. He’s been featured in publications such as The Times, National Geographic, and—”

Calvin continues speaking, but I no longer hear anything beyond the blood rushing through my ears. My body goes rigid, my limbs stiff.

This isn’t happening.

Life cannot possibly be this cruel.

Not the Benjamin Carter—or just Ben as I know him (correction, knew him)—who grew up with me in our small hometown an hour and a half north of the city. Not the Ben who was best friends with my twin brothers and practically lived at our house, or the Ben who always smelled of summertime and fresh cotton. No, it couldn’t possibly be the Ben who spent the summer before our senior year sneaking into my bedroom late at night after everyone else was asleep—the same Ben who led me to believe I was special, that I meant something to him, and then vanished from my life and shattered my fragile teenage heart into a billion pieces.

“—Ah, and here he is now.”

Calvin’s words catapult me back to the present as heavy footsteps land behind me. Achingly slowly, as if moving underwater, I cast a glance over my shoulder. My gaze first lands on a pair of faded jeans, then scans upward over a white henley, coming to a stop on the face I haven’t seen in person since I poured my heart out to him, only for him to walk out of my life for good. My eyes catch with his apple green ones, and I lose my breath.

“Mona,” Ben says, voice and expression equally timid, “it’s been a while.”

Chapter 2

I squeeze my eyes closed so tightly that blobs of neon green form behind my eyelids. For a second there, it seemed as if the one guy to ever break my heart just casually strolled back into my life. It seemed as if my boss wanted me and said heartbreaker to travel to Iceland together. It seemed as if my suddenly revived dream of being promoted all hinged on said trip with said heartbreaker going well. So well, in fact, that heartbreaker wants to join our team, and I’ll have to see heartbreaker every single damn day in this building. My building.

“Mona?” Ben’s deep, hauntingly familiar voice vibrates through me. Down to my bones. “Are you okay?”

At the same time, Calvin says, “You two already know each other? Excellent.”

Yes. Excellent indeed.

My eyes flip open, and I don’t bother trying to keep them off Ben. After all this time it’s a battle I’d surely lose. His green eyes roam me over in return, two boxers sizing each other up before we throw down in the ring.

Unfortunately, the first thing I notice is precisely how good the years have been to him. Great, actually. The best the years have been to anyone in the history of all the years. Not that Ben wasn’t good-looking before. He always had that Tim Riggins–esque look and the accompanying enigmatic air that made all the girls in our high school fawn over him while simultaneously being too intimidated to talk to him. But Ben never really paid any of it much attention—remaining quiet and reserved and somehow above it all—which meant the girls of Hudson Springs High were better off settling for one of my twin brothers, who were all too happy to fill the void.

But now…

Ben’s boyish face has matured into hard edges and stubbled growth on a chiseled jaw. His tall, lanky frame transformed by lean, muscled biceps and shoulders, apparent by the way his long-sleeved shirt perfectly hugs his body. The hair is still the exact same, though; light brown with strands of gold that catch the light, tousled by restless fingertips and grown out just long enough to suggest he needs an appointment for a haircut.

God, he looks good.

It’s only when my gaze drifts to Ben’s full lower lip that I realize he’s speaking. He’s telling Calvin that we grew up together in Hudson Springs. “Old family friends,” he says as I twist back around and flash my practiced smile at Calvin. I have no other option here. I’m not about to cause an awkward scene and lose any chance of ever getting another opportunity like this. So I’ll grin and bear it. Even if I’m dying on the inside. Even if my forced, No Worries! smile makes my cheeks ache.

“If no introductions are necessary then—” Calvin stands, buttoning his suit jacket with one hand in that precise way wealthy men always do. “Mona, you’re free to go. In fact, take the rest of the day off. You’ve got packing to do. Benjamin, if you’ll stick around, Shirley has the contract ready for you to sign.”

I stand at my dismissal, eyes again colliding with Ben’s as I pass by him on my way to the door. He regards me with a slight wince, as if in apology, and moves to take the seat I vacated. I wonder what’s going through his head right now. This situation must be as awkward for him as it is for me. Or maybe it’s not. Maybe for it to be awkward for him, I would’ve needed to matter to him in the first place.

“Mona, I almost forgot…” Calvin’s voice forces me to turn back just as I’ve almost escaped.

I grin politely, prepared to accept another obligatory Happy birthday.

“Could you arrange a little office party for Shirley’s birthday next month?” He speaks in hushed tones, though I’m certain the woman in the next room over couldn’t care less about eavesdropping on our conversation. “Doesn’t need to be anything extravagant. And no need to worry about it until you get back, of course.”

“Right. Of course.” My cheeks heat from the embarrassment of thinking Calvin would recognize my birthday, or maybe it’s the intensity of Ben’s gaze blistering my face like a sunburn.

Spinning in my black leather pumps, I flee Calvin’s office so fast that I don’t know if the smoke trailing behind me is from my high heels or Shirley’s cigarettes.

Back on the thirty-sixth floor—an oddly comforting home now—I don’t make it to my own cubicle. Instead, I collapse into a cheap plastic chair in the cubicle next door belonging to Jacklyn, my best friend and roommate ever since we interned at Around the Globe together, and sputter through what took place on the floor above us.

“Wait,” she says when I finish. “Your Ben is the photographer Benjamin Carter? As in half-a-million-followers-on-Instagram Benjamin Carter?” Her wide, cobalt eyes blink several times in rapid succession. “How have you never told me this?”

I shrug. “I don’t know.”

Yes, I do. It’s because I wanted to avoid the expression staring back at me now. And because the Ben I knew—teenage Ben with faded jeans and worn-out T-shirts and a customary flannel button-up tied at his waist—is an entirely different person from the photographer upstairs.

“It didn’t seem important.”

“Yeah, okay,” she scoffs. “So, what are you gonna do?”

What am I going to do? Part of me wants to rush back upstairs and tell Calvin I’ve changed my mind, but I don’t have the nerve. I suppose I could lie like a coward, call Shirley up later and tell her I broke my ankle, too. Just like Suki! What are the odds? But I know I’m not going to do that, either.

“I’m going to Iceland,” I sigh. “With Ben.”

“Wow.” Jacklyn slowly shakes her head, tosses her wavy auburn hair. “Traveling across the ocean to spend ten long days with your ex. I don’t think I could do it.”

“You wouldn’t know. You have no such ex to speak of.” It’s not an insult. Jacklyn chooses to remain blissfully unattached despite a myriad of worshippers falling at her feet. “Besides, it was a long time ago.”

“Still. Hypothetically speaking, if I had to travel to another country with a guy who did to me what Ben did to you, I’m not sure we’d both make it back. I imagine there are plenty of accidents that could happen in Iceland.”

A genuine smile tugs at my cheeks for the first time today. “It’ll be fine. I’ll be professional yet distant. We’re two colleagues and nothing more.”

Jacklyn’s expression remains dubious, but she has the good manners to let it go. “Speaking of distant, you spending your birthday at your parents’ house with the fam?”

“Of course. It’s tradition.” But at the mention of tonight’s birthday dinner, dread rises in my stomach. Okay, I shouldn’t use the term dread. That makes me feel guilty. It’s more like the intense desire to stay curled on the sofa in the Brooklyn apartment I share with Jacklyn and eat strawberry ice cream straight from the carton. (Although I’d never commit such atrocities; I’m a firm believer in bowls. It’s just nice to think about sometimes.)

“Come with me?” I beg. “Pleeeeeeease?”

“Can’t. As much as I’d love to see Mason’s gorgeous face—”

My nose scrunches in disgust.

Jacklyn has no problem hooking up with a different person (or persons) each night of the week and then casually discarding them the very next day. She’ll tell anyone willing to listen that commitment of any type shouldn’t be entered into until one is at least forty. Because why would anyone want to miss out on all the fantastic sex they could be having with beautiful strangers? That philosophy is all well and good, and I’m certainly not one to judge anyone’s lifestyle. However, when Jacklyn and my brother Mason are in the same room, their underlying sexual tension permeates the atmosphere, and I don’t want any knowledge of that situation.

“—I have to finish my article on my weekend in Providence.”

It’s then, as Jacklyn shuffles a stack of old Around the Globe editions on her desk, that I realize how inconsiderate I’ve been.

“Are you okay with this?” I gently prod. “There’s no good reason why Calvin chose me for this assignment instead of you.”

“Yes, there is.” She folds her arms on her desk and focuses her astute blue eyes on me once more. “I like my job here, but I don’t love it. Moving up to the Internationals is your dream, not mine. I’m thrilled for you.” She grimaces. “I mean, minus the whole Ben thing.”

“Honestly though, I’m not sure it is my dream anymore.” I trace my index finger along the edge of her cheap particleboard desk and put voice to my biggest fear. “What if I don’t have what it takes?”

“No, we’re not doing that today,” Jacklyn answers without hesitation. “You’ve wanted this for as long as I’ve known you, so I’m not allowing you to self-reject before the trip has even begun. You need to get whatever self-doubt bullshit you’re telling yourself out of your head this instant and seize the damn day.”

“Maybe you’re right,” I say, wishing I had even an ounce of Jacklyn’s confidence.

“Of course I’m right.”

After a moment, I rise from my chair with something akin to determination (at least my quieter, softer version) stirring inside me. “I guess I need to figure out what the hell one takes to Iceland.”

* * *

After an hour-and-a-half train ride from the city, I stand in front of a two-story white colonial farmhouse backed by lush green woods, clutching a bottle of sauvignon blanc. Everything about my childhood home is the same now as it was five years ago, ten years ago, fifteen, probably more. The mailbox is a mini version of the house itself, down to the same charcoal gray shingles. The flower beds are filled with shrubbery my father loathes yet doesn’t seem to possess the ability to kill off. The well-worn tire swing still hangs from a branch of the old oak tree in the front yard, responsible for a multitude of sprained ankles and other miscellaneous injuries in the Miller family.

Fallen leaves crunch beneath my heels as I make my way up the red brick sidewalk and slip inside the glass-paneled front door, hoping to dissolve into the chaos with minimum visibility.

Surprising no one, my father and Mason (twin #1) show up half an hour late, blaming their tardiness on the ever-present mayhem that is life as emergency room physicians. An excuse I’ve heard from my father all my life and have now come to expect from Mason ever since he decided to follow in our father’s footsteps—or maybe he spent so much time in the ER getting stitches and slings as a child that he felt at home there. Either way, they’re now Hudson Springs’ dynamic doctor duo, both living for their jobs above all else. My father is so, so proud.

While my dad and Mason shovel lasagna in their mouths and play catch-up, Marcus (twin #2) tells us an engrossing story about his recent close encounter with a black bear—not entirely alarming since he’s a ranger in the nearby state park—while his three children, Jack, Eli, and Ava, run circles around the dinner table and everyone (but me) tunes them out.

I’m usually quiet at these family dinners, happy to hear about everyone else while keeping the mundane details of my own life private. Really, who wants to hear about biscuit festivals in comparison to saving lives or near misses with woodland creatures?

Despite the physical similarities I share with my brothers—our matching chestnut-colored hair and hazel eyes that shift between green and brown depending on our wardrobe choices, though at five foot five I got skipped in the height department compared to their six-foot frames—I’ve always been the outlier in the Miller family. The quintessential “accident” born only eleven months after the twins (and my father’s failed vasectomy—an unfortunate fact overheard at one of my parents’ dinner parties that went a little too heavy on the alcohol).

My father and brothers are loud and boisterous and spend any free time they have hiking or fishing or cycling or skiing or anything else outdoor-related. It’s as if none of them ever learned how to just be still. Then there’s my mom, Mary Ellen. If I had to describe her in one word, I think it’d be tired. Being a stay-at-home mom, especially to twin hellions, couldn’t have been easy, I get it. Some might think I’d relate more to my mother since she’s nothing like my father and brothers, either, but there’s always been a distance there. Maybe it’s because I was never supposed to be born and was just one more kid for her to raise.

Even as a small child, I had the vast understanding that I needed to be the exact opposite of my brothers. I needed to be the easy one. The one who never got in trouble and didn’t demand attention. The child who played quietly with her dolls and didn’t fall out of trees and need stitches every other week. That was my role, and I was happy to fill it. Though sometimes I felt like the piece of the puzzle with warped edges that never quite fit, so even with only one open spot left, it must be forced into the place it belongs.

Tonight though, I’m more than quiet. I’m withdrawn. And it has nothing to do with my loud, chattering family or my unwelcome birthday or even the fact that I’m leaving for Iceland in three days.

No, my mind is occupied by one thing and one thing only: Ben Carter.

More specifically, the way his green eyes locked on mine in Calvin’s office today. As much as I try, I can’t seem to interpret his expression. Apologetic, yes. Curious, certainly. But there was more in those eyes that couldn’t be entirely concealed. Ben looked almost…relieved.

Everyone finishes with dinner, and my mother carries in my cake with thirty-one lit candles while everyone sings “Happy Birthday” to me. It’s awkward basking in the attention, feeling everyone’s focus on me while I try to act natural and keep my smile from turning to a grimace. Twenty seconds of pure discomfort.

“Mona.” Once slices have been distributed, my mother’s soft voice coaxes me back to the conversation as I take small bites of my birthday cake. Red velvet. My favorite. Only my actual favorite is strawberry. Red velvet is Marcus’s favorite, but I don’t have the heart to say anything. Red velvet is good, too. “You seem a million miles away tonight. What has you so distracted?”

Ben Carter.

“Uh, work,” I sputter, spine lengthening as I straighten in my chair. “Iceland. I’m going to Iceland Monday.”

I do not mention I’ll be going with my brothers’ former best friend. My family never knew about the two of us and our…whatever we were…but mentioning Ben would lead to reminiscent conversations of memories past. And I don’t want to hear any of that.

“No. Fucking. Way,” Marcus declares, earning a swift look of disapproval from his wife, Carrie, for using the F-word in front of their children, while Jack and Eli—miniature hellions by way of genetics—light up at the use of such naughty language. “You’re going to Iceland? As in waterfalls, volcanoes, and glaciers Iceland? You?”

“Yes, me,” I say defensively, pushing the rest of my not-favorite cake away. “I work for a travel magazine, what’s so hard to believe about that?”

“I think he’s just trying to say that Iceland isn’t your typical scope,” Mason interjects. “Don’t you cover knitting conventions?”

“There was one knitting convention. One!”

“Ignore them, Mona,” Carrie cuts in from across the table, dabbing at her mouth with one of the cloth napkins my mother breaks out only on special occasions. “They’re just jealous. You’ll do a great job.”

“Thank you,” I tell her, grateful Marcus married up. Truth be told, I admire Carrie and wish we could be closer. It’d be nice to have a friend and confidant within the Miller family, but with three kids, a full-time job, and heading up the Hudson Springs Elementary PTA, I don’t know how she has time to eat or sleep, much less slip away to the city to hang out with me.

Marcus and Mason naturally take over the conversation in the name of filling me in on all things Iceland, and my chest tightens with each tick of their fingers as they list off all the top sites to explore. Explore as in lots of walking, hiking, and climbing. In the elements.

I’m in decently average shape, I suppose. I’ve been known to accompany Jacklyn to a yoga class from time to time. Yet, as my brothers drone on and on about what all I’ll need for this trip—hiking boots, waterproof pants, thermal base layers, wool socks, a hiking backpack, collapsible trekking poles (what even are those?)—my worries compound with each addition to their lists.

Polishing off my glass of wine, I immediately pour another. Across the table, Carrie must register my alarm because she leans forward on her elbows and says in the calm, motherly tone one inherits the instant they become a parent, “Relax. You’ve got this. We can go shopping tomorrow for everything you’ll need.”

“Thanks, Carrie,” I say, a tiny glimmer of light twinkling at the end of the dark tunnel of panic. “That’d be great.”

“I’ll come, too,” Mason chimes in. “I have the day off from the hospital tomorrow and I could use a new pair of hiking boots.”

“So, uh, how much is all of this stuff going to cost me?” I ask, trying to get an approximation of how much I’ll have to spend to make this trip happen.

“Doesn’t your company cover expenses?” Marcus questions, cutting a second slice of his favorite cake.

“They cover my expenses on the trip,” I reply. “They aren’t going to cover my expenses to add to my wardrobe.” At least that’s the answer I anticipate, not that I’d ever ask Calvin in the first place. I’d rather take on the credit card debt than put myself in the awkward situation of having him shoot me down when I present a receipt for items Suki and Devon probably own in multitudes.

“I’ll pick up the tab,” Mason says then, catching me off guard. “Whatever you need.”

“No, you don’t have to do that,” I protest.

He waves me off. “It’s fine. Harry at the outdoor store gives me a steep discount ever since I patched up his wife when she slipped on some ice in their parking lot last winter. Consider it your birthday present.”

“Thanks, Mase.” Guilt fills me again over dreading this dinner. My brothers are good humans, they’re just…a lot sometimes.

“You’ll stay here tonight then?”

I shift my attention to the head of the table. My father’s bespectacled face is austere yet youthful at age sixty, despite the salt waging a solid battle against the pepper in his thick black hair.

“No need to take the train back this late.”

My heart warms to think this may be his inadvertent way of getting me to stick around a little longer on my birthday. Then again, he’s always been a pragmatist. “Sure. I’ll stay.”

Later, after exchanging goodbye hugs and kisses with my nephews and niece and helping my mother with the dishes, I climb the creaky wooden stairs up to my old bedroom. Everything about my room is still the same as when I left it. Cool blue walls. Overstuffed bookshelf. Metal-framed bed. Rustic wooden dresser that still contains some old T-shirts.

Well past eleven now, I change into an old V-neck tee and a pair of loose plaid pajama pants that belonged to one of the twins. Then I kneel to flip on the trusty night-light plug-in near the door.

A soft ping strikes the window behind me.

I freeze in place, arm extended.

Because it’s not any random noise, it’s a specific ping against my windowpane that I haven’t heard in fourteen years. A flutter stirs in my stomach. It couldn’t be…Could it?

Another ping.

My breath catches.

I rise from my crouched position and close the distance separating me from what surely couldn’t be. Shaky fingers unlatch the casement window, and I press the panel outward, following it with my upper body, only to quickly reel backward when I spot another pebble flying directly toward my face. It misses and skitters across my bedroom floor. I pause to make sure there are no more flying objects being hurled my way before I lean back into the tepid night air and search below for any explanation other than the one my brain is unwilling to accept, the one that hasn’t made sense since high school.

As if this day could get any more unpredictable, Ben Carter stands in the grass below, face awash in the glow of a floodlight, hand full of pebbles from the nearby flower bed.

“Sorry about that,” he whisper-shouts with a wince. “Guess I’m a bit out of practice.”

Chapter 3

“Ben? What are you doing here?” I whisper-shout right back at him.

The motion-sensitive floodlight shuts off, leaving him illuminated in silvery moonlight. With the familiar way he sways back and forth on his feet and how the night camouflages any sign of age in his features, I swear I could have fallen years back in time, and that could be seventeen-year-old Ben standing in my backyard with a hand full of pebbles.

“Can we talk?” he asks. “Please?”

“Uh…” Completely thrown, I glance down at my ratty tee and pajama pants. “Give me a minute.”

I pull my upper body back inside the window and fasten the latch, then collapse against the nearest wall and study my room as if painted on my walls somewhere I’ll find the answer to why Ben Carter is standing in my yard. But I don’t have time for that because Ben Carter is standing in my yard! Shit! Shit! Shit!

I pull in a deep breath and summon practical, controlled Mona’s return. Ben’s waiting, and he just wants to talk. It’s fine. Completely fine. One hundred percent fine.

Looking around my room again, I see the only shoes available to me are the heels I wore to work, and as much as I love the idea of Ben seeing me in these pajamas, I refuse to further embarrass myself by adding stilettos to this ensemble. A fleeting moment passes where I hastily debate changing back into my entire work outfit, but then that seems like I care a little too much.

Doesn’t it?

Do I?

Screw it. Pajamas and bare feet it is.

I do take a moment to put my bra back on because I’m not a free spirit like that. Then I slowly slide my bedroom door open and tiptoe downstairs, holding my breath as if getting caught sneaking out is still a punishable offense at age thirty-one. Knowing my father, it just might be.

The latch on the front door clicks softly into place behind me, ensuring my stealthy escape has gone unnoticed, and I blow out a relieved exhale.

But then I have a new, much more pressing problem. As of today, I’m thirty-one years old and still afraid of the dark. Well, to be frank, afraid doesn’t cut it. I’m fucking petrified.

I have my reasons. Reasons involving a neighborhood game of hide-and-seek gone horribly wrong the summer before I turned ten. Reasons involving the antique chest in my parents’ bedroom and an ill-conceived idea of the best hiding spot ever! Reasons involving getting trapped in that chest for nearly an hour when the outer latch snapped closed after I’d lowered the lid, confining me in the tiny space in a darkness so consuming I’d screamed until my voice went hoarse and pounded my fist against the cedar until I lost all feeling in my hand.

I still have nightmares about it—my petite body stuck with my legs drawn into my chest and my chin pressed against my knees with barely any room to breathe. The heat of the stale air and the musty smell of the only other occupant—a pile of quilts knitted by my grandmother’s grandmother or someone else of familial significance—that I’d simply shoved to the side in my hurry to hide. (Marcus never counted the full twenty-five Mississippis and everyone knew it!)

No one came for me for the longest time, and I knew—even at nine—I was going to suffocate in that chest. But then, as my screams turned to muffled cries with the loss of my voice, the lid miraculously flipped open, and there was the most beautiful set of apple green eyes staring down at me, my new favorite color.

Ten-year-old Ben held out his hand and helped me climb from the trunk, and as soon as I was safe, I wiped my tears away and made him pinky-promise not to tell anyone ever about what happened. I felt so dumb to have made such a dangerous error, and I didn’t want to hand my brothers any ammunition to use to make fun of me. Ben twisted his pinky with mine, and he never told anyone my secret. At least that’s my assumption, though I learned years later that Ben doesn’t always honor his promises.

Because he’s the only person who knows why I’m afraid of the dark, I assumed he’d be waiting for me here at the front door, but he must have forgotten about my phobia. Not entirely surprising since we don’t really know each other anymore.

Cold sweat dampens the back of my neck.

Where is he?

I have limited time before the motion-activated floodlight above shuts off, and my brain screams to go back inside where it’s safe. Maybe if I run to the back of the house, I’ll set off the other floodlights and stay submerged in light.

It’s a risk but…

Sprinting toward the back of the house, I bounce on the balls of my bare feet and keep my eyes glued to the ground to avoid any rocks or sharp objects. My plan proves spot-on as I round the side corner and another light clicks on above me, illuminating the damp grass passing beneath my feet. And it’s precisely because my fear forces me to make such careless haste that I round the back corner of the house without looking up and collide, hard, with Ben’s chest.

Ben’s lean, muscular chest.

Which I know because my fingers now spread across his sternum.

“Shit, Mona, I’m sorry.” His breathless voice is somewhere near my ear, his hands wrapping around my elbows to steady us both. “Are you okay? I thought you’d come out the back door. You always come out the back door.”

Always is a peculiar word choice when we haven’t actually done this in over a decade.

I lift my head to meet his gaze, but I don’t remove my hand from the soft cotton of his shirt, a small comfort in this stress-fueled situation. I barely refrain from twisting the material between my fingers. “I’m fine.”

I’m not fine.

I’m not fine because already the background blurs as my immediate senses heighten; the same reaction I had to Ben all those years ago. His fresh cottony scent surrounds me like I fell into a basket of newly laundered clothes. The familiar timbre of his voice echoes in my ears, a soothing comfort unlike any other. His warm, calloused fingers make my skin burn beneath his touch. Despite my earlier musings that Ben and I don’t know each other anymore, no one sent that memo to the rest of my body, which reacts to his as if there hasn’t been a single day since we were last together. The urge to rise onto my tiptoes and press my body against his is—

Ben’s hands drop away from me, breaking the spell.

Snapped from my trance, I jerk my hand away from his chest, dropping it to my side and discreetly shaking it out.

“I, uh…I just came to talk.” Ben shoves his hands deep in the pockets of a dark gray utility jacket he wears over the same white henley from earlier today. “You looked rattled when you saw me today. I hope I didn’t upset you.”

“Rattled? No,” I lie. At the dubious furrow of his brow, I amend by adding, “I mean, I was surprised, that’s all. It’s been fourteen years.”

Is that too precise? Does it seem like I’ve been counting the days? I should’ve rounded up and gone with fifteen.

“Yeah. Wild coincidence, huh?” He casts a glance over his shoulder to where the manicured grass of the backyard gives way to the lush woods lining the property. “You up for a walk down to the lake?”

At the mere mention of the spot where we spent endless summer days—and nights—together, I’m assaulted with a forceful blow, as if I stepped off a curb and didn’t see the Mack truck headed my way.

“I’m barefoot,” I manage, regaining my bearings. “I can’t walk through the woods like this.”

Ben dips his head, eyes falling at my feet. “Right. Sorry. Stupid idea anyway.”

Somewhere off in the distance an owl hoots an urgent warning. I wonder if it’s intended for me. “Ben, why are you here?”

“I told you. I wanted to talk.”

“No, I mean, why are you in Hudson Springs? At my parents’ house? How’d you know I’d be here?”

He keeps his head downcast, blocking any view of his expression. “I came back to town a couple months ago to finally clean out Mom’s place. I’m staying there while I get it ready to sell.”

“Oh.” I’d heard that his mother, Charlotte, passed away a couple years ago. I didn’t know her well, at least not outside the parameters of “Ben’s mom.” While Ben was a staple at the Miller house, I don’t think my brothers were ever at his. I’d thought about reaching out when I’d heard the news from my mom, but I didn’t know how to go about it. I no longer had Ben’s number or knew where he lived. DMing my condolences via social media certainly hadn’t felt right, and from what I understood, there was no public funeral, only a private graveyard service for family. Ultimately, I’d decided he had long moved on, and my sympathies would be another added to the list he felt obligated to respond to. “Ben, I’m really, really sorry about your mom.”

He lifts his chin, and I don’t miss the quick clench of his jaw, the brief grimace of unease. “Thank you.” Immediately, he clears his throat and changes the subject. “Anyway, I figured you might be around since it’s your birthday. Miller family traditions and all.”

The responsive quiver in my stomach is both unwelcome and illogical. Who cares if he remembers my birthday? “And what if you were wrong? What if the light in my bedroom was my father on his nightly walk-through to ensure the windows and doors are properly locked?”

“Then I would’ve run like hell.” Ben’s short, raspy laugh alleviates a bit of the tension between us. “Dr. Miller terrifies me, you know.”

“You and me both.” Unable to stop myself, I smile. And now we’re smiling together. Just like old—

Nope. Not going there.

My smile abruptly fades, and Ben’s follows close behind. Above us, the floodlight times out and plunges us into the dark of night. I suck in a deep breath as I startle.

“Shit. Hang on.” Ben quickly jogs down the side of the house and back, setting off the motion sensors once more and triggering the lights on both corners of the house. Returning to me, he asks, “You okay?”

I guess he does remember.

“I’m fine,” I manage.

In the triangle of artificial light, his green eyes shine as they search my face. “Look, to be honest, I just want to make sure you’re okay with this,” he says earnestly. “This is your job, your company. I’m the outsider here. If you’re not comfortable with us covering this assignment together, I’ll drop out.”

I fold my arms over my chest. “What makes you think I wouldn’t be comfortable?”

“Your face when I walked into Cal’s office today.”

“Cal?” I sputter. “He told you to call him Cal?”

Ben’s expression shifts to one of confusion at the unexpected switch in topic. “Is that not what everyone calls him?”

I’m so screwed.

If Calvin’s chummy enough with Ben to let him call him Cal, he must be downright desperate to have Ben join the company. Which means my comfort level that Ben is concerned about matters exactly nil. If Ben drops out at my request, I won’t be going anywhere other than the Newark Pumpkin Pie Fest for the rest of the year. I can’t do it anymore. Food festival competitions are ruthless, the competitors deceivingly good-natured until you bite into an apple fritter where the sugar has been surreptitiously replaced with salt. I’ve suffered the acid reflux of BBQ spiked with seven too many shakes of the hot-sauce bottle.

The main takeaway: I need Iceland. And in order to get there, I need Ben.

“Uh, no, that’s not what everyone calls him,” I reply, shuddering at the thought of a future filled with fried Oreos and all-you-can-eat funnel cakes. “Like I said, I was surprised to see you, that’s all. I’m perfectly comfortable traveling together. No worries there.”

“Mona, come on.” Ben tilts his head, surveying me. “I know you.”

The statement doesn’t sit right. Not after the way he left things. Not after years upon years of silence.

“Actually, you don’t know me anymore,” I bite out, harsher than intended but not undeserved.

His face falls, and the urge to apologize crashes over me like a tidal wave. If it were anyone else, I would. I don’t chastise others or make them uncomfortable, even to my own detriment. It’s not who I am. But with Ben, I was never able to wear that mask, or maybe he just always saw through it. Either way, he’s the kryptonite to my No Worries! persona. At least he used to be. For the sake of this perilous journey to Iceland together, I can only hope that’s no longer the case.

“You’re right. I’m sorry.” Ben turns his head and stares off in the direction of his childhood home down the street. “I guess I’ve said what I came here to say, so I should get going.”

I don’t respond, choosing instead to study his profile as a warm breeze ruffles the ends of his hair. Different from before, his face is weathered with maturity, yet strikingly similar in a way that still calls to me. There’s the slim, faded scar on the upper-left side of his forehead, from middle school when he and my brothers were roughhousing in the lake too close to the dock. I remember my father stitching him up at the kitchen counter while I watched from the entranceway. Then there’s the ever-so-slight bend to the bridge of his nose, earned sophomore year when he took an elbow to the face during a particularly heated soccer game against our cross-county rivals. Eyes drifting farther down, I study the Cupid’s bow arch of the pouty lips I can almost still feel pressed against mine…

At my silence, Ben returns his attention to me and says, “At least let me walk you to the door.”

I nod, aware that we both know why he’s doing it and grateful he’s polite enough not to bring up my nyctophobia. Making our way around the side of the house, Ben stays close enough behind me that I feel the heat of his body at my back—a blessing and a curse.

Once I’m safely deposited on the porch with the front door cracked open and light spilling out from the foyer, I turn to Ben as he says, “I guess I’ll see you at the airport Monday.”

It sounds more like a question than a statement, so I nod my confirmation. “Yeah. I’ll be there.”

“Okay. Good.” One corner of his mouth quirks into an uncertain grin. “I guess good night then.”

He turns to leave, and I watch the familiar gait of his long strides as he jostles down the porch steps and driveway, pausing at the end to turn back to me once more. “Oh, and Mona,” he calls out, “happy birthday.”

Chapter 4

By ten o’clock Monday morning, I’m tearing through my tiny apartment, tossing clothing into scattered piles atop the living room furniture, throwing open kitchen cabinets and drawers to search for something, anything, I must be forgetting, and stomping through my bedroom, scooping the entirety of my makeup products off my small, mirrored vanity with one swipe of my forearm. As I make my way back to the living room, awkwardly clutching an assortment of items between my arms and chest like the person at the grocery store who foolishly insisted they didn’t need a cart, Jacklyn’s bedroom door swings open.

Dumping my makeup products onto the coffee table with a clatter—perhaps not my best decision as my mascara rolls off the table’s edge and disappears underneath the couch—I start to apologize for the noise. Assuming Jacklyn would be at the office, I haven’t attempted to quell the soundtrack of my chaos in the slightest.

Before I get a word out, I see she’s not alone, and I snap my jaw shut and prepare for the familiar scene that’s about to play out in front of me for the umpteenth time.

Padding barefoot across the hardwood in nothing but an oversize V-neck tee that covers her thighs and (hopefully) underwear, Jacklyn clasps the hand of a statuesque woman in a miniskirt and thigh-high boots. The could-be model trails behind Jacklyn at a snail’s pace, and I internally sigh when I hear her ask in a breathy whisper, “Are you sure you don’t have time for breakfast?”

Oh dear.

“Sorry,” my best friend replies with a sorrowful smile as they reach the front door. “I have to get to work.”

That’s a lie.

“But you’ll call, right?” the woman presses.

She’s not going to call.

I’m always so sympathetic to these poor saps when left to witness this situation. To be fair to Jacklyn, I know she’s always up-front about not wanting any type of commitment with her hookups before they tumble into her bed. What I don’t know is what kind of magical wizardry she performs between the sheets to leave these people always begging for more. Unfortunately, that’s not going to happen, and my No Worries! self can’t handle the disappointment on their sad little faces as they go.

One time, years ago, I felt so awful for a distraught tattooed man named Jax that I offered to whip up some pancakes for him. Sitting at our kitchen table, he droned on and on, questioning when he would know for certain he’d found true love. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that his sexcapades with Jacklyn wasn’t it, so instead I heaped another spoonful of butter on his stack and poured the maple syrup on thick, nodding along sympathetically as he questioned his entire outlook on life and love.

Jacklyn made me swear on our friendship that would never happen again.

So now I pretend to be invisible as Jacklyn purposely doesn’t answer her date’s question—she’s not a liar, she’s just evasive. Gathering her hair over one shoulder, Jacklyn steps close and backs the leggy brunette against the wall, kissing her slow and deep until even I feel a flush in my cheeks. When the woman appears on the verge of sliding down the wall and forming a puddle on our floor, Jacklyn pulls back and smiles. Then she yanks the door open and says, “Thanks for last night.”

Quite the dismissal.

As soon as her date exits our apartment, Jacklyn spins to acknowledge my presence, and I roll my eyes so hard I get a sharp pain through my forehead.

Biting her kiss-swollen lower lip, she shrugs a bare shoulder. “What?” She saunters over to our green velvet sofa and plops down with no regard for my haphazard clothing piles.

“You know what. She seemed nice. And she’s certainly hot enough for you. Maybe even hotter than you. Why won’t you see her again?”

My friend’s hazy blue eyes sharpen. “First off, she is not hotter than me. That’s impossible. Secondly, she was fine. Very talented in the bedroom, actually. It’s almost a shame I won’t see her again.”

I refold a pair of thermal leggings Jacklyn knocked to the floor. “You could, you know. Seeing someone a second time doesn’t equal commitment.”

“Then what? A third time? Nope, that’s too slippery of a slope. Besides, you’re one to talk.”

“Hey!” I protest. “I went on several dates with that Jordan guy a couple months back.”

Jacklyn arches a judgmental, perfectly waxed brow, knocking another pile of sweaters to the floor as she stretches her long legs. “And what was wrong with him?”

“He made it clear he only wanted sex.” I pick up the pile at my feet and set it atop the scattered makeup on the coffee table. “Essentially, he was you.”

A husky laugh fills the air as Jacklyn arches her back and stretches her arms overhead, now knocking my winter coat off the rounded arm of the sofa. Giving up on what was already a muddled mission at best, I lift her legs and replace them in my lap as I sink onto the cushion next to her.

“There’s nothing wrong with just sex, you know,” she says through a yawn. “Might actually do you some good.”

I try to remember the last time I had sex. A year ago? Two? Surely not two. That’s…a while. But the fact that whenever it was, it clearly wasn’t memorable enough to fully recall, tells me all I need to know about the quality.

“Some of us want more than sex,” I say defensively.

“Right, right,” Jacklyn croons. “Some of us want to sabotage any potential relationship because no man could possibly live up to our idolized version of our high school boyfriend.” She pauses, and my jaw falls open. “And by us, I mean you. If that wasn’t clear.”

“That’s not—” Is that really what she thinks? More concerning, is that really what I do? “I’m not…It isn’t like that!”

“Really?” Jacklyn looks me up and down before her eyes skirt pointedly around the room. “This”—she gestures at my piles of stuff—“isn’t you.”

“What? I’m packing for Iceland.”

“No, no, no. This isn’t packing. This is spiraling.” She sits up again, pulling her legs off my lap. “Where are your lists? Your carefully curated printouts on your locations? Your neatly folded stacks of freshly laundered clothing?” She picks up one wool sock that’s missing its mate, holds it aloft like she’s displaying a piece of evidence for a jury that will deliver a verdict on my love life. “This is clearly about Ben. You’re a goddamn mess.”

“Pffftt,” I sigh, but even at the mere mention of his name, my stomach clenches. “It’s not. I’m not. Why aren’t you at work anyway?”

“Turned in my article late last night and took the day off. Don’t change the subject.” Her stare is a laser beam scanning my brow, my cheek, finally shifting back to meet my eyes. “And don’t try lying to me, either.”

Left with no choice, I tell Jacklyn about my encounter with Ben Friday night, leaving out the small detail that I’ve replayed it over and over in my head a thousand times since. That I can’t seem to focus on anything else. That the thought of seeing him again tonight, of traveling across an ocean to cover this assignment with him, has me more nervous and on edge than I’ve been in my entire life.

Which is completely irrational because anything Ben and I shared is solidly in the past. That book is closed. This is a professional business trip and nothing more. A business trip that could define my entire career from here forward. This is not the time to get distracted by something that happened well over a decade ago, or a guy who has proven before that I never meant to him what he means to me. Meant to me.

This is the time to focus on my job. Which is exactly what I’m going to do. As soon as I remember how to pack.

When I finish my recollection, Jacklyn looks downright horrified on my behalf. “Oh. My. God. You’re going to Iceland with your sexy-as-hell ex—I’ve seen his photos on Insta, don’t try to deny it—who showed up at your parents’ house and remembered your birthday.” She tsks her tongue and shakes her head. “You’re so going to fuck him.”

“I am not!” Even the suggestion makes my face flame as if I’m fevered. My eyes drift about the cluttered room. “It’s fine. I’m fine. No worries at all. I have this situation under control.”

Jacklyn grabs my hand with an earnestness that makes me startle. “Listen to me, Mona Miller. I’ve heard you talk about this Ben guy more times than I can count over the years. I know what kind of hold he has on you. Fuck him, don’t fuck him. Just don’t get distracted and let him ruin this opportunity for you. I mean it.”

Jacklyn’s right, and her words echo the exact worry that’s kept me wide awake every night this weekend. “I won’t. I promise.”

She sighs and releases my hand. “Come on, let’s get you packed then. Less than twelve hours till wheels up and we know what a little freak you are about arriving to the airport three hours early.”

While Jacklyn mostly packs for me, I stand next to her and pretend to pay attention to what she’s stuffing in my suitcase, but my mind is elsewhere. I’m exhausted and restless at the same time. Even the deep-breathing techniques I learned in Jacklyn’s yoga class can’t seem to clear my mind or slow my heart to a normal pace.

Going to Iceland is intimidating enough. Throw Ben Carter in the mix and it’s a downright mindfuck. Jacklyn’s right; there’s too much at stake here. I can’t afford to get distracted, but I think I’m already there.

How am I supposed to pretend Ben is just any other professional coworker when he’s the boy I’ve known since before I had memories? The boy who slept over so often that my parents put an extra twin-size bed for him in Mason’s room so that he had a proper place to sleep. The boy who taught me how to drive when my father and brothers lost their patience at my ineptness and worrisome lack of depth perception. The boy who was my first kiss that summer, and then so, so much more—

Jacklyn snaps her fingers in front of my face, rescuing me from that dangerously nostalgic trip down memory lane. “Hey, are you even listening? Should I pack some sexy lingerie for you? Just in case?”

“God, no!” I reply.

Sexy lingerie definitely won’t be needed.

Chapter 5

Thanks entirely to Jacklyn packing for me, I make my self-imposed goal of arrival at JFK by six forty-five p.m. Now do I have the slightest idea what occupies the large suitcase I lug behind me in addition to my carry-on duffel bag and daily tote? Not even a little bit. However, planted there in the teeny-tiny overlapping sliver on the Venn diagram of mine and Jacklyn’s shared attributes is our propensity for extreme thoroughness and razor-sharp attention to detail. (Come to think of it, maybe her bedroom skills aren’t that big of a mystery after all.) Not that I’m displaying either of those qualities today. But they’re there; I swear it. Regardless, I have the utmost confidence that Jacklyn packed my belongings competently.

Thirty minutes later, after checking my bag and making it through the uncharacteristically short—yet always anxiety-producing—security checks, I move down the crowded terminal toward my gate, considering if there’s anything worse than the high-stakes pressure of standing in sock feet to collect your belongings while a New York TSA agent rushes you along. I’ve never developed the skill of sliding my sneakers on without having to retie the laces, and no matter how many friendly smiles or self-deprecating looks of apology I send their way, the TSA agents never seem to have anything for me in return other than a look of judgment and a nerve-racking Move along, please.

Sometimes I even have airport nightmares. Ones where I’m about to miss my flight because I’m stuck in the security line while one agent gruffly insists I place my duffel in a plastic bin, but another demands it go directly on the conveyor belt. I’m frozen in carry-on purgatory while both agents stare at me like I’m the world’s biggest idiot. I usually wake drenched in sweat.

Blowing a calming breath through pursed lips, I pass by a Dunkin’ Donuts and try to collect myself. At the very least, I should have an hour minimum before Ben’s arrival.

Ben.

As his image pixilates in my head, the absurd reality of the situation hits me with such force I stop in my tracks. Which is the exact wrong move for a busy airport terminal, and an elderly woman collides with my shoulder and knocks my tote bag to the ground. Letting out a string of curses, the older woman continues on her way while I bend to collect my bag and the items that have spilled onto the floor.

“So sorry,” I call in her direction. Despite my sincerity, my apology earns me only her middle finger in response. God, I love this city.

Flustered and sweaty, I arrive at my gate—or what will eventually be my gate once it’s remotely close to boarding time. Placing my belongings in one of the numerous empty chairs, I roll my head from side to side to release the coiled-up tension in my neck and shoulders. The best thing I can do right now is regain some semblance of control, and to do that, I need to sit down, open my laptop, and finally do some much-needed research on the enigmatic locale of Iceland. As a last-minute replacement, the itinerary and accommodations have all been hand-selected by Suki. Adventurous, up-for-anything Suki. Which means I desperately need to figure out what I’ve gotten myself into.

Research would likely be easier to accomplish in one of the swanky lounges I learned the Internationals at Around the Globe have unlimited priority access to thanks to Suki’s email. Yet another perk us Locals aren’t given. (Jacklyn was so pissed when I told her.) However, I am not the kind of loosey-goosey person who can relax with my eyes off the gate a mere two hours and twenty-seven minutes before departure. What if I got distracted by the free stuff and forgot about my flight? Not to mention, I’ve never had lounge privileges before (thanks, Cal), so I’m not entirely sure how to access it, and I certainly wasn’t going to embarrass myself by following up with Suki about something probably everyone knows. I mean, is there a list to get in that’s monitored by an airport bouncer? Would I need to show proof of my employer? Should I have brought a pay stub? No, thank you. I don’t need this added worry in my life.

Glancing around for the nearest charging station, my eyes skitter across the terminal, only to come to an abrupt halt on a familiar set of shoulders covered in the same charcoal gray utility jacket he wore outside my parents’ house Friday night.

Ben sits hunched over a well-polished bar with his hand curled around a crystal tumbler of amber liquid.

Well, fuck.

I could ignore him, but that would signify that I’m bothered enough to ignore him. And I am not bothered. At least not that he knows anyway. If we’re going to get through this trip together, and if I stand any chance of recruiting him to Around the Globe, then I need to be the friendly, affable, people-pleasing version of myself who Calvin thinks I am. I manage to pull it off every day at work, so how hard can it be with Ben?

With a huffy sigh, I gather my tote and duffel over my shoulder once more and make my way to the low-lit, classy-for-an-airport bar. No sports memorabilia or cable news stations in sight, only gleaming teak countertops, leather-upholstered stools, and bartenders in white button-ups manhandling shiny glass bottles as they mix alcohol-laced concoctions. Several customers are scattered about, including a rowdy group of bloodshot-eyed men in business attire who are absolutely plastered and undoubtedly up to no good. The seat to Ben’s right is open, so I slide onto the barstool and clear my throat.

Casting a side glance my way, Ben registers my appearance, and my pulse ramps up as he regards me with a clear jolt of surprise. Posture lengthening, he pushes away the tumbler of what I presume to be straight whiskey.

“Mona,” he says, “you’re early.”

“Not early.” I hang my tote on the back of my barstool, tucking my duffel under the bar with my sneaker. “Prompt. I like to be prompt.”

“I remember.”

A bartender approaches, brow raised in question.

Ben’s comments shouldn’t irk me the way they do, prickling underneath my skin like an itch I can’t scratch. The fact is, he did know me for a very, very long time. But the bitterness over the way things ended is still a tough pill to swallow. Maybe if he’d given me some explanation, any explanation, I wouldn’t feel this hostility toward him fourteen years after the fact. Because that’s all these feelings are: hostility, resentment, disappointment. For one more person in my life who decided I wasn’t that special after all. I know I shouldn’t hold a grudge all these years later, but whoever said Time heals all wounds was a goddamn liar.

I reply to the bartender’s unspoken question with a petty, “Nothing for me, thanks. I don’t drink on the job.”

So much for affable Mona.

The bartender gestures at Ben’s almost-empty glass. “Another?”

“I’ll just have water,” he says, properly chastised.

We sit in silence until the bartender returns and places a tall glass of ice water on a napkin in front of us.

“So,” Ben ventures, breaking the awkward stalemate between us, “are you ready for this?”

The question of all questions. Short answer: no. Perhaps that’s another reason I’m so defensive right now. I’ve been unfocused all weekend. Hell, if it wasn’t for Jacklyn, I’d probably be standing here with random belongings shoved in a Hefty trash bag. The staggering departure from my overly planned, thoroughly researched self is unsettling at best, truly disturbing when I consider the fact that I’m not sure I showered today.

I can’t blame Ben entirely though. While he has undoubtedly been occupying a large portion of my mind, there are numerous items fighting for equal attention. The result: My brain is bouncing from topic to topic like an overstimulating game of Ping-Pong. Iceland. Memories from my past. Calvin’s expectation of me to recruit Ben to the company. Writing the best goddamn article of my life.

All the noise overwhelms me, leaving me unable to focus on any single item.

Now, with Ben at my side, I glance his way and try to convince myself I’ve been overreacting by letting him affect me so acutely. The monster cannot be as scary when you look him in the eyes. The big, round, apple green eyes.

“Why wouldn’t I be ready?” I huff in a sharp tone because defensiveness is a real bitch to overcome.

Ben returns his attention to the bar and swallows a long sip of water. “Just making conversation.”

Fuck. I’ve got to do a better job at masking my resentment and immaturity. I’m a professional, damn it. I can do this. Softening my voice, I say, “Lovely day today, wasn’t it? Can you believe tomorrow is the first day of September? August just flew right by.” God. Now I’m talking about the calendar. Pathetic.

Echoing that sentiment, Ben flashes me a quizzical look. “Sure?”

Wiping my sweaty palms against my leggings—which I think I put on…yesterday?—I refocus once again. Since I’m clearly not getting any research on Iceland done, I can at least get a start on the recruitment effort. Which, if I’m honest, isn’t working well in my favor so far. If anything, my odd behavior has cast me into negative territory, and at minimum I need the pendulum to swing back in the direction of neutral. “Ben, can I ask you something?”

“Shoot.” He keeps his gaze straight ahead, so I twist on my stool and face his profile.

“Why Around the Globe? Why now?”

The question is one that’s been ping-ponging off the walls of my brain since Friday morning in Calvin’s office, never coming into sharpened focus until now. Benjamin Carter can have his choice of publications. Hell, with his Instagram following alone he could probably hawk a few products or start a YouTube channel and be set for life. Around the Globe is a well-respected publication and all, but for someone featured numerous times in National Geographic, something doesn’t add up.

“The assignment’s easy,” he states, matter-of-fact, as he fidgets with the cuff of his jacket. “Cal’s been calling for a long time, and it’s a short trip compared to most assignments I take on.” He lifts a shoulder in a halfhearted shrug. “Ten days and then I’ll be able to edit from Mom’s house while I finish getting things packed up.”

Since we’ve accomplished saying more than two normal sentences to each other, I take that as a positive sign and press further. “Are you looking to join Around the Globe permanently? Calvin seems pretty thrilled about you taking on this assignment.”

“No,” he scoffs with an air of condescension that raises my hackles. “This is a one-and-done kind of thing.”

Ben’s dismissiveness of my employer combined with his one-and-done wording plucks a deep-seated nerve, and just as I feared, my No Worries! mask slips out of place and crashes to the floor. “And why is that?” I demand, voice rising sharply. “Because the Benjamin Carter is too good for our measly publication? His high standards could not possibly be lowered to cavorting with such amateurs on a permanent basis?” Drawing looks from the glassy-eyed businessmen nearby, I stand and shove my barstool under the countertop, slinging the strap of my duffel bag over my shoulder in the process. “Or is it because you just can’t commit, Ben? You always were a one-and-done kind of guy, weren’t you?”

Fuck, fuck, fuck!

The instant the words leave my mouth I want to pluck them from the air and stuff them back in. Swallow them down with the stiff drink I admonished Ben for partaking in.

As for Ben, he stares at me now, eyes wide as a muscle ticks in his clenched jaw. “Mona, that’s not…” He hesitates, eyes shifting about as he looks exceedingly uncomfortable. “I mean…I’m not…Are we talking about—”

“Forget it,” I cut him off. “I have work to do before we board.”

Then I make my way across the terminal, slump into a chair facing away from the bar, and pull out my laptop. I better get focused real fucking fast. This article needs to knock Calvin’s argyle socks off his feet, because I’m pretty sure my recruitment effort just went up in flames.

* * *

Two and a half hours later, my short-lived attempt at distance is shattered as we clamber on board and locate our side-by-side seats in the main cabin. Around the Globe typically shells out the cash for first-class tickets for the Internationals, again something us Locals can only dream of from our seats in basic economy or, more often, the driver’s seat of a two-door budget rental car. However, there was a snafu in the rebooking process with the last-minute changes to the trip, so here we are among the masses, but at least we’re in an exit row with only two seats so there won’t be a stranger who has to suffer through our inevitable awkwardness.

After wrangling my luggage into the overhead compartment—because I refuse to let Ben help despite his impatient huffing at my back—I claim the window seat before it’s up for discussion. Ben carefully tucks his backpack beside my duffel and closes the compartment with a flick of his wrist. Then he’s in the ocean blue seat beside me, his thigh so close to mine they’re practically touching.

As a Local, I usually meet up with my photographer onsite, and one thing I hadn’t thought to worry about (until this very moment) is the unavoidable intimacy of traveling internationally with someone.

But it’ll be fine.

Separate hotel rooms, after all!

What could go wrong?

Unfortunately, Ben’s clean cotton scent doesn’t play fair, drifting into my space along with the smell of the cinnamon gum he feverously works with his jaw. My stomach flips in traitorous response at the specific familiarity of it all, and I know I’m a complete fool.

Ben stiffens in his seat next to me, and I wonder if he’s thinking some version of the same thing. Then again, he seems perfectly cool and completely unaffected by this trip together, so he likely isn’t thinking about me at all. He’s probably just uncomfortable in the main cabin seat when his broad, six-two frame is used to first-class luxury.

“Sorry about the seats,” I say, not wanting Ben to think Calvin doesn’t provide nice amenities for Around the Globe staff, even though for most of us he doesn’t. Despite my earlier offense at his seeming snub of my employer, the truth is I’m not even sure why someone as successful and well-known as Ben would ever choose to work for Around the Globe. So I’m already fighting an uphill battle here without putting Calvin’s faults on display. “I’m sure you’re much more of an enter-the-plane-and-turn-left guy, but there was a booking issue since we were last-minute fill-ins.”

“It’s fine,” he replies shortly.

Okay then.

Needing a distraction, I pull out the safety pamphlet from the seat in front of me and study it as if it contains highly guarded secrets of the universe. Next week’s lottery numbers. Who really killed JFK. Paul Rudd’s skincare regimen. All this and more could be in the palm of my hand and I couldn’t possibly pay more attention to it than I am this poorly illustrated instructional handout on how to use my seat as a floating device if shit gets real.

“Could you…put that away?”

Looking up, I see Ben staring at the sketches of doom in my hand. My gaze sweeps from his clenched jaw to his tensed shoulders and settles on his large hand—currently white-knuckling the armrest between us as if he may hulk out and rip it from its place at any moment. He’s nervous. Really, really fucking nervous. Nervous in a way that doesn’t have anything to do with me or this awkward situation we’ve found ourselves in.

“Ben?” I wait until he lifts his shifty gaze. “Are you okay?”

He swallows hard, blinking several times before answering. “I, uh, I don’t like flying.” His voice is barely more than a whisper, his breaths shuddered and uneven.

“I didn’t know you were afraid of flying.”

“Yeah, well, I’d never been on a plane when I knew you, so I didn’t, either.”

“But you fly all over the world,” I say, tucking away the safety pamphlet as the plane fills up around us. Takeoff shouldn’t be long now.

“I do it. Doesn’t mean I like it. But I’ll be okay.” The sheen of sweat glistening above his brow suggests otherwise. “It’s only this bad until we get in the air. I usually have a few drinks before each flight to calm my nerves but…”

But I was a petty bitch.

Guilt surges through me. “Oh shit. Sorry about that.”

“It’s fine. Just ignore me.”

Ben diverts his attention forward again, and after a moment I do the same, respectfully letting him suffer through his anxiety in private. The official safety demonstration begins playing on the screens in front of us, and an attendant briefly stops by our row to ask for verbal acknowledgment that as exit row passengers we’re willing and capable of assisting during an emergency. Ben manages a stiff “Yes,” but to be honest, I have my doubts.

Once the attendant is gone and the plane eases away from the gate, the strangled gasps at my side become impossible to ignore.

I look his way again, and Ben’s eyes are squeezed so tight that I can’t count the number of lines forming at his temples. Watching him struggle, my mind reflects on Ben as a small boy, those wide green eyes when he lifted the lid of that cedar chest and found me inside, the way he held out his hand and rescued me once when I needed it. The image is so clear it might as well have happened yesterday.

No matter the resentment I feel now, I have to help him because of then.

I press my hand against his forearm and he startles, those same brilliant green eyes opening to search mine.

“Take this off.” I tug at the sleeve of his jacket. “You’re sweating.”

With a stiff nod, he leans forward in his seat, and I pull his sleeve down his arm in our small, shared space, helping him strip down to his plain black T-shirt. I lay his jacket across my lap and lean forward to fish a bottle of water from my tote bag near my feet. I hand it to him, and he takes a long swallow before screwing the lid back on and tucking it in the pouch by his knee.

“Thank you,” he says in a low voice ridden with embarrassment.

As we gain speed down the tarmac, I keep my focus on Ben: the exaggerated movements of his throat as he swallows, the shallow rise and fall of his chest as he tries his damnedest to keep his anxiety at bay. And god help me, as a person with my own severe phobia, I can’t take it.

My hand leaves my lap of its own accord, hesitating only briefly before covering his on the armrest between us. At my touch, his surprised eyes bolt to mine, and if nothing else, I’ve at least shocked him out of his fear for a few seconds. “It’s going to be okay,” I say in my most reassuring voice as my fingers spread over his thick knuckles. “It’s going to be fine.”

Chest falling as he releases a measured breath, Ben keeps his apprehensive gaze trained on mine as he slowly turns his hand over and the soft skin of my palm meets the rough, calloused skin of his. My stomach drops into free fall, my heart simultaneously pounding and aching at the cautiousness in his expression that wordlessly asks if his actions are okay.

“You rescued me once when I needed it,” I remind him.

Our fingers twist together, and the plane lifts off.

Then we’re airborne, hand in hand, and Ben’s no longer the only one struggling to breathe.

Three hours down…ten days to go.

Everything is fine.

* * *

Once we reach cruising altitude and Ben breathes easier, I slide my hand from his grip, offering up a pacifying quirk of my lips when he looks my way. Circulation returning to my fingertips, I pull out my laptop and set it atop the tray table.

“Shouldn’t you get some rest?” Ben asks. “It’ll be eight a.m. Reykjavík time when we land, and we have a full schedule.”

A lesser-realized truth about the glamorous life of a travel writer is that we’re there to cover an assignment, not gallivant around at a leisurely pace as if it’s our own personal vacation. This is work. We’re there to learn the facts, see the sights, and quickly move to the next excursion. “I can’t rest. Other than glancing at our itinerary in my email, I’ve done exactly zero prep work. But you should sleep. One of us should be rested.”

“Ha,” he barks. “You think I’m going to sleep on this death tube hurtling through the sky?”

Smirking, I assess him. “Benjamin Carter—afraid of flying. I never would’ve guessed.”

He returns my smirk. “Mona Miller—more judgy than I recall.”

My attention is pulled to the beverage cart slowly making its way down the aisle, steered by a redheaded flight attendant with a bright smile, a fancy updo, and a set of hawkish eyes firmly attached to Ben’s face—which, understandable, it is a very good face. Eventually reaching our row, she asks in a saccharine voice, “Can I get either of you something to drink?”

Before Ben replies, I say, “Nothing for me, but he’ll take something strong. Whiskey preferably.” There, peace offering extended. So far, I’m nailing being back to affable Mona on the first hour of this flight.

The attendant begins riffling through the cart’s drawers with the earnestness of someone retrieving a fire extinguisher if the plane had just burst into flames. Although I suppose I shouldn’t think about fires and planes unless I want to end up in the same state as Ben. Once he has his stiff drink and not one, but two, packs of pretzels, the attendant reluctantly moves on, but not before pointing out the call button and letting Ben know that if he needs anything else at all not to hesitate to use it.

Diverting my focus back to my laptop, I open Suki’s email and click on the attached ten-day itinerary and start perusing. We’ll be driving Ring Road around the entire country, starting in Reykjavík, Iceland’s capital city and home to over sixty percent of the country’s total population. Although we’ll be staying in hotels and not roughing it in camper vans like many tourists choose to do—bless Suki forever for that decision—we’ll be constantly on the move, never staying in one town for more than a night or two. In addition to the loads of walking, hiking, and climbing I’m definitely not prepared for, there will be a lot of time spent in the rental car.

Just the two of us.

Alone.

Ben and me.

Me and Ben.

Cool, cool, cool.

Shaking that thought from my head, I glance over the notes she shared with me.

Suki’s Iceland Itinerary at a Glance

Southwest Iceland

Day 1:

- Arrival at Keflavík International Airport

- The Blue Lagoon (BIG-TIME jealous over here btw.)

- Drive to Reykjavík and explore Hallgrímskirkja and Rainbow Street

Day 2:

- The Golden Circle: Start in Þingvellir National Park and view the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates

- Geysir geothermal area

- Kerið Crater

- Gullfoss Falls completes the tour

- Head back to Reykjavík and explore the city’s nightlife

South Iceland

Day 3:

- Snowmobiling at Mýrdalsjökull glacier

- Skógafoss and Kvernufoss waterfalls

Day 4:

- Seljalandsfoss and Gljúfrabúi waterfalls (Sense a theme yet??? LOL. I swear each waterfall will be worth it!)

- Nauthúsagil ravine (You’ll need to climb a mini waterfall here, but don’t worry, there’s a chain for assistance. )

Day 5: Warning you now, this is a long one!

- Reynisfjara black sand beach (Watch out for sneaker waves.)

- Dyrhólaey Peninsula and Lighthouse

- Vatnajökull National Park—hike to Svartifoss waterfall

- Glacier Lagoon

East Iceland

Day 6:

- Stuðlagil Canyon

- Explore the town of Seyðisfjörður (Check out the Blue Church.)

North Iceland

Day 7:

- Dettifoss and Selfoss waterfalls

- The city of Akureyri (You can thank me later for getting the accommodations here approved.)

Day 8:

- Whale-watching excursion on the Skjálfandi bay in Húsavík

- Víti crater

- Grjótagjá cave

- Goðafoss waterfall

West Iceland

Days 9 and 10:

- Explore the Snæfellsnes Peninsula

- The Black Church of Búðir (Which you should be able to view from your window at Hótel Búðir.)

- The village of Arnarstapi

- Skálasnagaviti lighthouse

- Kirkjufell mountain

- Ytri Tunga beach

After perusing this itinerary, I realize it’s entirely possible I’ll be too exhausted to notice Ben is on this trip with me. Suki has included more attachments that further break down each location, but I’ll come back to those later. Right now, I scroll the main body of her email, and I learn several things. For starters, the average temperature for early September in Iceland has highs in the fifties, lows in the thirties. Which sounds completely reasonable until I read that the winds in Iceland can be totally rad. (Suki’s particular wording tells me I’m not likely to find them rad at all.)

Continuing on, I read that English is widely spoken throughout the country, and many Icelanders are fluent in several languages. Also, crime is almost nonexistent, with Iceland consistently ranked one of the safest countries in the world. (At least I need not worry about getting mugged and getting my ass kicked by the elements.) I let my eyes skim the rest of the document until they catch on one specific note at the end.

September is usually the first month the northern lights MIGHT be visible after the summer season. If the weather conditions are right and the solar activity is high, you could be lucky enough to see aurora!

Best of luck!

—Suki

Excitement shimmers in my chest like a confetti cannon exploded. The northern lights! The motherfucking northern lights!!

For the first time since I took this assignment, the noise of all the uncertainties and distractions quiets, and I feel blessed all the way down to my bones. This is everything I’ve ever dreamed of. And turning this opportunity into a permanent reality is finally within my grasp.

I cast a sidelong glance at Ben—currently alternating between sips of whiskey and small bites of pretzel—and make a silent vow to myself: I will not let this guy from my past somehow ruin my future.

Chapter 6

Tip #1 when visiting Iceland: Considering a trip to the Blue Lagoon with an ex you (maybe) still find attractive? HIGHLY INADVISABLE.

Approximately five hours later, I’m jostled awake as the plane touches down on solid ground. Lethargic and confused, it takes a few moments to get my bearings. My mind tells me I need to wake up because I’m on a plane to Iceland and wasn’t supposed to fall asleep in the first place. But my body tells me I’m so, so comfy and finally sleeping soundly for the first time in days and surely a few more minutes of rest won’t hurt. I’m covered up with the snuggliest blanket and the air around me smells like fresh laundry and my head rests on the most comfortable pillow.

Wait…

Barely opening my eyes, I register a few things about my current situation. One—my warm, snuggly blanket is Ben’s jacket, which covers my upper body. Two—that jacket is the source of the alluring fresh-laundry scent that has no doubt helped induce this possible coma. Three—and most horrifying of all—my pillow is no pillow at all! It’s a shoulder. Ben’s shoulder to be precise, and it’s comforting in a way I don’t care to think about.

“Mona.” Ben’s gentle, raspy voice coaxes me further awake as the lights flicker in the cabin. “We landed. You have to wake up now.”

Regretfully, I lift my head off his shoulder, my eyes performing a discreet sweep of his shirtsleeve to check for drool spots. Thank god it’s dry; there’s only so much mortification one can handle at a given time. Yawning, I arch my back and stretch my arms out in front of me as I wonder how it’s possible I slept through most of the landing. I’m not a heavy sleeper, so I’ll attribute this accidental blackout to the weekend of sleepless nights leading up to our departure.

Not Ben. It had nothing to do with Ben Carter or his oddly comfortable body.

Embarrassment warms my cheeks as I prepare to apologize for using his arm like my own personal body pillow, but when I glimpse his face, now a weird shade of palish green, those thoughts leave me.

“I don’t care for the landings, either,” he says wryly.

“Why didn’t you wake me?”

“You looked peaceful.” The plane slows to a taxiing speed, and Ben rolls his shoulder—likely sore from supporting my heavy head. “We’re on the ground now. Just give me a minute and I’ll be okay.”

“How long was I…” I gesture at his shoulder.

“Asleep on me?” A grin tugs at the corner of his mouth. “Only for the past two hours. Don’t worry, I put your laptop away when you first dozed off.”

Two entire hours? Oh. My. God. “I’m really sorry. You should’ve woken me up. That had to be really uncomfortable for you.”

“No.” The slightest shake of his head. “It was…fine.”

Coming to a stop at the gate, people around us fill the aisle in their overenthusiastic rush to deplane, one person’s oversized backpack even creeping into Ben’s already-small space so that Ben has to lean into my already-small space. When it’s our turn, Ben steps into the aisle and retrieves our carry-ons—this time I accept his help—then makes room for me to lead the way.

Keflavík International is a nondescript airport that upon first impression could be anywhere in the world. But as soon as we make our way through the sliding glass doors, I get my first glimpse of Iceland—or feel, rather—which comes in the form of a gusty wind that whips through my hair and has me unzipping my duffel bag in hopes Jacklyn packed my coat and wool cap within easy reach. The decision to wear thin leggings and a short-sleeved T-shirt on the plane was not my wisest one, but I wasn’t exactly thinking properly—or at all—at the time. My hand shuffles around until it lands on my new dusty-blue, fleece-lined raincoat and then my gray wool beanie (both courtesy of Mason’s unexpected birthday shopping splurge), and I’m reminded again that I love Jacklyn with my entire being.

Properly armored, I follow Ben to the line for a shuttle that will take us to our car rental dealership.

As we wait, I crane my neck in every direction, trying to glimpse some of the majesty of this place, but so far all I see is airport asphalt and neon car-rental signage in the distance. The only things of note are the gray, overcast sky concealing any trace of the sun and the winds that roar in short, angry bursts. I shiver.

Twenty minutes later, I sit in the passenger side of a Suzuki SUV, our bags loaded in the back, as Ben slides into the driver’s seat with a square gadget in his palm.

“What’s that?” I ask, buckling my seat belt.

“Portable Wi-Fi. It’s so convenient when the rental places have these. Now we’ll be able to use it wherever we go, not just in the car.”

“Oh right,” I say, even though I’ve never seen a gadget like that in my life. While I should be grateful for Ben’s travel knowledge, I’m mostly just annoyed. Clearly I’m the only one woefully unprepared for this trip while expert Ben is fine and fucking dandy and on top of his game. I bet he even packed his own bags.

Ben starts the engine, and I scramble for the notebook I already tucked into the glove compartment to make a quick note of this Wi-Fi travel tip. Pulling out of the airport lot, the GPS directs us to our first stop, the Blue Lagoon.

Located twenty minutes from Keflavík International, the pools of glacial blue geothermal water are a popular stop for tourists as soon as they arrive. While I may have snoozed more than intended on the flight, I did read up on today’s excursion before losing consciousness, so I have some idea of what to expect. Patrons relax in the warm waters enriched with silica, algae, and minerals—said to promote healing—set among some of Iceland’s best scenery. From the pictures I saw online, this is one of our activities I’m most looking forward to. Minimal exertion. Hot, healing waters. Breathtaking views. Yes, please.

As I stare out the windshield, more of Iceland rises into view as we make our way farther from the airport. The paved road we follow cuts through fields of flat, muddy brown earth, broken up on occasion by piles of black volcanic rock, casually stacked in the fields or filling a trench next to the road. While I know volcanoes are kind of Iceland’s thing, I’m still filled with an overwhelming excitement at the wonder of it all. It doesn’t look real. It doesn’t feel real. I pinch my arm. It’s fucking real.

“Have you been here before?” I ask Ben, keeping my focus on the landscape in front of me, not wanting to miss a single detail. “To Iceland?”

“No. It’s my first time.”

I’m pleased this is a new experience for both of us; it makes it seem like we’re on more equal footing here.

“It’s incredible already. Look, that’s real lava!” I point out the windshield to another stack of hardened ash, as if Ben doesn’t already see the same landscape I do. “La-va!” Exhilaration pumping through my veins, I risk a quick look at him, and he quirks his lips at the unbridled enthusiasm in my voice.

The drive is far shorter than anticipated, and soon we’re pulling into a half-full parking lot as I jot down a few more notes, knowing I’m not doing the descriptions proper justice. Tucking my notebook away, I hop out of the SUV and make my way to the back of the vehicle to gather the needed items from my luggage. Once Ben has his personal items together, he opens the door to the back seat to retrieve the camera equipment he’ll need, leaving me to go through my suitcase in private. Which is a relief because I don’t know where any of my items are specifically, and that’d be hard to explain if Ben were watching.

I can envision it now. Oh, sorry, give me a minute here because, you see, I didn’t pack my own stuff because I was too busy being a goddamn headcase over you for the entire weekend! LOL, right?!

That truth wouldn’t leave my mouth if I were interrogated by the CIA.

After locating my toiletry bag and an extra set of clothing, I pull out a swimsuit and gasp.

Ben glances at me questioningly over the back seat. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Everything. “It’s fine.” It’s not fine.

Earlier, I thought I loved Jacklyn, but now those feelings of fondness have quickly dried up. Evaporated. Vanished. Because the minuscule amount of material I grasp between my fingers is not my modest, professional, one-piece swimsuit. Instead, I’m clutching Jacklyn’s entirely immodest, completely unprofessional, two-piece black string bikini. I toss the stacks of clothing around, searching for another option, but discover the only other swimsuit she packed is a one-piece emerald green number with a deep V cut to the navel, which is somehow more provocative than the bikini.

I will have very, very strong words for her when I get home.

For now, there’s nothing I can do except shove the bikini in my tote bag with the rest of my stuff, rezip my luggage, and slam the back of the SUV closed. Ben rounds the corner with a complicated, professional-looking camera strapped over his shoulder, and we cross the parking lot to a sidewalk that snakes its way between walls of volcanic rock and vibrant green moss.

While Ben takes several photos of the picturesque entrance, I follow suit with my iPhone, snapping some selfies to rub in Jacklyn’s face before delivering the sternly worded lecture I’m already outlining in my mind.

Ben lowers his camera as I pose in front of the lava rocks with my phone held high to give myself the best angle. “Do you want me to do it?”

“That’s okay,” I say. “I’ve got it.”

“Of course,” he deadpans. “Why would you want a world-renowned photographer to take your photo when you can take…selfies?” He says the word like it’s an insult to his entire profession.

Scowling, I slip my phone into my bag. “World-renowned?” I roll my eyes. “Don’t be cocky. And I happen to like my selfies.”

“Come on,” he says with a bemused shake of his head. “Let’s go inside.”

At the welcome counter, we’re provided electronic bracelets that keep track of any purchases made during our visit and directed to locker rooms where showering is a must before entering the pools. I wash off, pull my wet hair into a high, messy bun—while great for the skin, the silica in the geothermal waters is not so great for the hair—and dress in the triangle bikini that shouldn’t classify as a swimsuit because no legitimate swimming could possibly be performed in these threads, not even doggie paddle. Then I make my way out of the locker room in lagoon-issued sandals toward the entrance to the pools with my arms folded across my middle, covering myself as much as possible. This place offers packages that include plush robes, but either Calvin didn’t opt for the added cost, or super fit Suki didn’t deem it necessary.

My insecurities quickly vanish from mind, however, when I reach the rectangular glass doors leading outside, and my breath leaves my lungs in a sudden burst.

If I thought the view on the drive here was unreal, or the photos on the website possibly misleading, well, the scenery stretching out before me is a goddamn masterpiece. Steam curls off seemingly endless stretches of placid, ice-blue water. Coal black lava rocks form varying-size stacks along the edges of the pools like sand dunes from another world. And in the far distance, moss-covered mountains stretch toward the silvery skies, demanding their own equal attention.

Drawn closer, I make my way through the sliding doors like an old-school cartoon character under the trance of a freshly baked pie, the spell I’m under broken only when I’m assaulted by the freezing air. And Ben’s voice.

“You coming in?” He waits inside the warm waters, his bare shoulders peeking above the surface.

“Um, it’s cold,” I say, and immediately regret it.

Dear god. It’s cold? That’s the best I’ve got?

But why am I procrastinating, anyway?

Perhaps it’s because walking into those steaming waters surrounded by the most romantic scenery I’ve ever laid eyes on—with Ben!—feels like a pretty huge mistake. Albeit a necessary one that my job depends on. Quite the conundrum indeed.

“Uh, yeah.” Ben nods at me, amusement crinkling the corners of his eyes as he grins. “That’s why there’s this massive expanse of geothermal water to warm you up. In fact, it’s kind of the whole point.”

“Right.”

As I continue to stand there motionless, Ben’s eyes track slowly down my body, and I remember I’m standing there in egregious display, practically naked in Jacklyn’s sewn-together pieces of string. A flush crawls up my chest, rising into my neck and settling into my cheeks. I spin away, ducking behind a large group of patrons as I abandon my flip-flops in the designated area at the side of the entrance. Turning back, prepared to hightail it into the water like I’m on an episode of Baywatch, I see the large travel group I’ve chosen to hide behind happens to be all retirement-age folks. Adorable really, if it wasn’t for the fact that moving with any type of haste is something they’ve also retired from.

At this point, I’ve been standing in Jacklyn’s barely-there rags in the frigid Iceland winds for far longer than desired, and my occasional shivers transform to nonstop trembles. I’m helpless to speed this process along, however, as the group of fifty-plus makes their way down the ramp and into the pools at the speed of baby sea turtles journeying to the ocean for the first time, spread out just far enough from one another to block off the entire entrance. Not going anywhere anytime soon, I fold one hand over the opposite fist and bring them to my mouth, blowing warm breath across my fingers to maintain body heat. (Also to provide discreet coverage of my nipples with my forearms as I’m certain they’ve never been this pronounced, and in public no less!)

From the comfort of the steaming mineral water, Ben spots my dilemma and struggles to contain the twist of his lips as he fights back laughter. I’m glad this is so goddamn amusing for him.

As I bounce on the balls of my feet, a small opening in the group appears, and I take full advantage. “Excuse me,” I chatter, contorting myself through the mass of bodies. “Pardon me.”

At last, warmth radiates upward inch by inch as I make my way deeper into the silky-smooth pools.

“About time you made it,” Ben teases as I make my way over to him.

Casting him a reproachful look, I sink to my shoulders and will my chin to stop quivering. “You wouldn’t have found it so entertaining if you were driving me to the hospital right now for hypothermia.”

“It’s forty degrees out and you were standing there for less than three minutes. I wasn’t overly concerned.”

“Clearly.”

I move past him to begin my exploration.

The lagoon isn’t all that crowded yet at nine o’clock in the morning, and we’re able to make our way around the pools with ease. Over the next hour, we grab drinks at a swim-up bar and partake in complimentary silica facial masks, allowing the grainy white silica to harden over ten minutes before scrubbing it off at a nearby freshwater faucet. Our conversation stays surface-level as we explore; safe exchanges like Hey, check out the view from this spot and This green drink isn’t very good and I can’t believe it isn’t more crowded.

But when we pass underneath a cement bridge and find ourselves in a private, semicircular alcove with not another person in sight, Ben turns to me and timidly asks, “Are you still warm enough?”

From the shift in the cadence of his voice, I know he’s about to delve into deeper conversation than I’m willing to go. “Yeah, I’m okay now.”

“Good.” A stilted silence falls around us as we stand in the pale blue water, steam curling between us, the dark skies overhead enhancing the spectrum of colors around us. I want to stop what I know is coming, but I don’t know how. “Look, Mona, I want to thank you for being so supportive on the flight over. It’s kind of humiliating the way I freaked out.”

There’s an unwelcome flutter in my chest as a pink flush surfaces over Ben’s cheekbones. “There’s nothing to be humiliated about. We all have our fears.”

Silence again ensues as Ben moves his arms back and forth through the water separating us, creating ripples across the surface.

As I wonder if I misread where this conversation was headed, he swallows and then blurts, “Do you think we could talk about what happened between us back then? After what you said at the airport, I’d like to clarify some things.”

The flutter in my chest transforms to a vise grip. The last thing I need is Ben thinking I’m still hung up on something that happened all those years ago. I don’t want his apologies. Or his pity. “No need,” I say, voice tight. “It was a long time ago and we were just kids. None of that matters now.”

There’s a flicker of skepticism in his green eyes before he blinks it away. “So, we’re okay?”

“Yeah, we’re good. No worries.” I deliver my go-to line affably but with a finality I hope is convincing to the one person who’s ever cared enough to tell when I’m lying.

He regards me with an expression that says he isn’t quite buying what I’m selling, but then the corner of his mouth tips into the slightest grin.

“What?” I ask, immediately self-conscious.

“You still have silica on your cheek.”

“Oh.” I locate a rough patch near my ear and scrub at it with my thumb. “Did I get it?”

“Almost.” Ben wades closer to me, hand emerging from the ice-blue surface. “Here. Let me.”

His fingertips press gently against the side of my neck to tilt my head, and the pad of his thumb lands at the hinge of my jaw, his skin warm against mine as he gently swipes at the patch of silica.

I want to pull away.

No, that’s a lie.

I know I should pull away, but my knees are too weak for movement, lest my legs give out completely and I drown right here in the most beautiful setting I’ve ever laid eyes on. What a publicity nightmare that would be for Cal.

“Ben…” The word puffs past my lips, intended as a warning but sounding more like a plea, as a new type of heat—or maybe an old one—awakens inside me.

“Almost got it.” Green eyes lift from my cheek, our gazes merging like two moths drawn to a flame, unable to resist the danger ahead.

I may not have seen Ben Carter for fourteen years, but the man grew up with me in such close confines that there’s no way he can’t read every single one of my thoughts when he looks at me like this. As much as I want to pretend he doesn’t know me anymore, we both know it’s a lie. The kind of connection we had doesn’t just go away, no matter the time that’s separated us. When he looks at me, really looks at me the way he does now, I know he’ll always see straight into my soul. The same way I see into his.

“Ben,” I repeat, seeming to have lost all other words.

He comes another step closer, still cupping my face, and those brilliant green eyes fall to my mouth.

I recognize this look. I’ve been on the receiving end of it many times before. As steam curls around us instead of between us now, the warm water only intensifies the heat building in my core.

But when Ben’s thumb grazes my lower lip, I plummet back to reality, and all the reasons this can’t happen burst into the forefront of my brain at once.

I jerk away from him, announcing, “This can’t happen!” way too loudly for the tranquil setting.

Moment effectively shut down, Ben’s arm falls back below the water’s surface as he quickly backsteps to put several feet of space between us again. Likely because I shouted at him. “What can’t happen exactly?”

“You were about to kiss me,” I proclaim. “That can’t happen.”

“You thought I was going to kiss you?” His brows pinch in confusion. “No, you just have more silica below your lip.”

Oh. Oh! “Oh…”

My hand darts to my mouth, and sure enough, the pad of my middle finger lands directly on the telltale sandpapery texture. What the hell do they put in this stuff, superglue?

“Oh,” I repeat, completely mortified. Honestly, mortified isn’t a strong enough word, but I don’t think a strong enough word exists for what I feel in this moment. “I’m so sorry. I thought you…Never mind.”

Ben stares at the water between us, refusing to look at me. “No, it was my fault. I mean, I’m sure it looked like I was going to—”

“Nope, no need to apologize. It was clearly my mis—”

“I mean, it’s not like that would be a huge reach, given our history.”

“Our history was fourteen years ago, Ben. So, yeah, pretty huge reach on my part.”

We fall into a silence so uncomfortable it makes my skin itch all over. Frankly, I blame the Blue Lagoon for my lapse in judgment, this place is practically an aphrodisiac for the eyes.

“You know,” Ben says timidly, “maybe we should just talk about it and get it over with.”

Nope, nope, nope.

Clearly, it’s time to establish some boundaries. For both our sakes.

I paste on my professional No Worries! smile. “I’m sorry about my reaction just then. That was uncalled for, and I clearly misinterpreted the situation. But I’m here to do my job, that’s it. Which means I don’t want to discuss the past with you. Not now, not ever.”

Ben eyes me with a wary expression like he doesn’t know the person delivering this speech. Which is exactly what I intended. “Mona, it’s me. You can let your guard down a little. We don’t have to pretend we don’t know each other in order to do our jobs.”

“Understandably,” I continue as if he hasn’t spoken, “I probably sent some mixed signals when I held your hand on the plane, and that’s completely my fault, but you rescued me once and I wanted to repay the debt. That’s all it—”

“Repay the debt?” he echoes, expression morphing into a mixture of hurt and incredulity. “Like saving you from that trunk when we were kids is something I’d hold over your head decades later?”

“No, that’s not what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean?”

“I…I just…”

Answering with the truth, that no matter how much he hurt me or how many years it’s been, there will always be a part of me that cares about him more than I should—well, that’s unacceptable. I shrug my shoulders instead.

“I should go take some pictures of the interior,” he says stiffly.

I drop my head as he moves away, leaving me all alone to curse the romantic enchantment of the Blue Lagoon.

Chapter 7

Tip #2 when visiting Iceland: Always beware of cyclists.

The forty-five-minute drive into Reykjavík passes in silence. Outward silence, at least. Inwardly, the lecture I’m giving myself is lengthy indeed. Not to get all Eminem in 8 Mile, but I have one opportunity to get this right. One. And already I’m fucking up big-time. I’m too distracted to attempt the detailed write-up on the Blue Lagoon I should be doing while the images are fresh in my mind. Although, who am I kidding? After that moment with Ben in those ridiculous blue waters, every nuanced detail will be ingrained upon my brain for eternity. Adding to my stress, I don’t imagine that accusing his star photographer of trying to kiss me was At! All! what Calvin had in mind for my recruitment efforts. God! Now I’m unfocused and unprofessional.

Forget a promotion. I’m so getting fired.

Closing my eyes, I rub at the pulsing pain between my brows. It’s a little after noon, and exhaustion is settling in rapidly. Risking a side glance over at Ben, I see his glazed eyes fixed straight ahead, face blank. If I’m this tired with a few hours of sleep (coma) on the plane, he must be completely wiped.

“Do you want me to drive for a bit?” It’s the first either of us has spoken since leaving the Blue Lagoon, and Ben startles at my voice, rapidly blinking several times.

“Thanks, but we’re almost there.”

He juts his chin forward, and I look back through the windshield to see the outline of a cityscape rising into view on the edge of the horizon, as if we’ve followed the yellow brick road to the edge of the Emerald City.

Minutes later, we’re driving into the heart of Reykjavík, and my eyes stayed glued to the passenger window as I take mental snapshots of my surroundings. Bike riders and pedestrians filling busy sidewalks—snap! Young kids in zipped-up jackets and caps pulled low playing various schoolyard games wherever there’s a swatch of open grass—snap! Colorful, artsy shops and cafés lining the streets, no corporate chains in sight—snap!

Then we’re turning into an underground parking garage, cutting the city out of view.

Once we’ve checked into our low-lit, sleekly decorated hotel, we take the elevator to the fourth floor and follow the dim hallway to neighboring rooms. Stopping outside our side-by-side solid-black doors, Ben flicks his wrist over and checks his watch. “Meet you downstairs at four?”

“Sounds like a plan.”

Ben nods and disappears into his room, likely grateful for the four-hour reprieve from me.

Unlocking my door with the key card, I maneuver my luggage into the room that I’ll call home for the next two nights. I abandon my belongings in a heap by the door, cross the black laminate flooring as I flip off my shoes and strip off my clothes, pull the heavy gray curtains together until they block out most—but not all—of the daylight, and crawl into the plush queen-size bed in my bralette and underwear.

Just as I close my heavy lids and give in to the exhaustion of travel, a high-pitched beep sounds from somewhere in my room. I open my eyes and sit up, searching for the source.

Another beep, louder this time.

What the fuck?

Climbing out of bed, there’s a third beep, and then a fourth, each shriller than the last. Then the beeps come faster and more insistent, and I spin circles in my underwear and debate what to do. I flip the switch on the bedside lamp. Nothing happens. I try the switch on the wall for the overhead. Nothing happens there, either.

If this is some type of hotel evacuation, I should probably have clothes on.

I hastily dress in my abandoned pile of clothes once more and head out into the hallway, fully prepared to be met with others who must be hearing the same piercing beeps. But outside my door, it’s perfectly quiet. No beeps. Not another person in sight.

Does the fire alarm sound only inside the rooms? That doesn’t seem up to code.

Exhausted and confused, I eye Ben’s door. The last thing I want is to talk to him right now, but I don’t think I have a choice.

Burying my pride, which, let’s be honest, at this point is already halfway in the grave, I walk to his door and knock three times.

When he eventually appears, it’s in gray sweatpants and a plain white tee, rubbing at his eyes as if he’d already fallen asleep. “Hey,” he says, voice raspy. “What’s wrong?”

“Is your room, um, beeping?”

His blank face stares back at me. “What?”

“Is your room beeping?” I curtly repeat. It’s a simple yes-or-no question.

“What? Beeping? Why would my room be beeping?”

There must not be an evacuation, so I guess this is a me problem. “Never mind,” I mutter, and turn back toward my room, prepared to suck it up and call the front desk for assistance. If I can figure out how to work the goddamn phone.

“Mona,” Ben’s tired voice calls from behind me. “You put your key in the key slot by the door, right?”

I squeeze my key card in my palm and glance back over my shoulder. “Key slot?”

Ben’s eyes narrow, arms crossing over his chest as he stands watching me from his doorway. “Yeah, you know how some hotels have the key slot that controls the appliances in your room? Nothing works if the key isn’t inserted? That might be the source of your beeps. There’s probably a limited amount of time you have to insert your key once you enter the room.”

I blink at him a few times. Never in my life have I stayed at a hotel that had this feature. Then again, this hotel is far nicer than the ones Calvin approves for us Locals. I force a self-deprecating grin, a nonchalant shrug of my shoulders. “You know, now that you mention it, I know exactly what you’re talking about.” Lies! “I must be really jet-lagged.” I scan my key card and push my door open when it flashes green. “Thanks for the reminder, though. Sorry I woke you.”

He nods and says, “No problem,” then disappears back into his room.

Back inside my own room, I locate the key slot that I hadn’t noticed before on the wall next to the door, slip my key card into place, and watch the circular red light switch over to green. Then I crawl back in bed and pull the covers up to my chin, wondering how I’m going to keep up my world-traveler facade throughout this entire trip, until I eventually fall asleep in a blessed, beep-less silence.

* * *

The streets of Reykjavík echo the soundtrack of a vibrant city. Chatty pedestrians. The bustle of outdoor cafés. Tinny bicycle chimes whizzing past us on the sidewalk. I love it all so much it’s a physical transformation that takes over my body. An expanding of my heart as my blood pumps faster, a change in my gait as I quicken my pace and practically skip down the sidewalk, a wide grin pulling at my cheeks as I commit to memory every detail of this incredible city.

Pulling my teal pea coat tight around myself to fight the winds, I round a corner and am met with the sight of Hallgrímskirkja—Iceland’s largest and arguably most recognizable church. The architecture is equally stunning and unique, designed with concrete, hexagonal columns increasing in height as they near the center of the structure. In the middle, a clock tower rises toward the gray clouds above, forming a steepled apex topped with a cross. I recall in Suki’s notes that the specific design pays tribute to Iceland’s basalt columns, one of the country’s trademark elements found at numerous popular locations, many of which are on our itinerary.

“Ahh-maaa-zing.” The word stretches past my lips in reverent praise to the travel gods.

“Did you expect anything less?” Ben reaches for the camera strapped across his shoulder.

Frankly, it makes me anxious that his very expensive camera just bounces at his hip like it’s no big deal, but whatever. Not my business. Having worked with photographers frequently—although I imagine snapping pictures at a competitive disc golf tournament is not quite the same as photographing the breathtaking sites of Iceland—I’ve become accustomed to assisting when needed, offering an extra hand while they switch lenses and so forth. So while Ben holds his camera in one hand and reaches back to unzip his backpack with the other, I generously offer, “I can hold that if you need me to.”

“No, thanks. I got it.”

Well then.

The response was casual enough, but I feel the sting of dismissal anyway. Photographer Ben who wears his camera so carelessly doesn’t even trust me to hold it for him. Fine. That’s fine. I have my own work to do anyway. Leaving him to his own stubbornness, I find a nearby bench and plop down, pull my notebook and trusty Pilot G2 from my tote bag, and begin to jot down notes on the architectural masterpiece in front of me.

When it comes to the articles for Around the Globe, Calvin prefers we writers stick to informational facts only. But I prefer to tread a carefully curated line that’s more informative substance with an added personal touch, because I firmly believe no one wants to read a slew of stated facts like a research article with no heart. I am, however, unwilling to state my outright opinion on whether a reader should spend their time and hard-earned money to visit a specific location or skip it, since it’s all incredibly subjective. So instead, I include a mix of what the reader can expect (facts) and how the site made me feel (personal touch). Then the reader can do with that information as they please. (Maybe decide to skip the Tri-City Hot Sauce Festival.)

Sitting on a wooden bench in the heart of Reykjavík, staring up at the stunning church before me, the immediate feeling that sweeps through me is insignificance.

Not in the negative connotation of the word, though. Not in the way I sometimes feel insignificant within my own family, or the way it took seven years of chasing fluff pieces to get a glimmer of opportunity within my company, or in the way my life can feel small and quiet compared to others’.

Here in Iceland, I feel insignificant in the best way. There’s an entire world before me that functions every single day, cities—some of which I’ll see, some of which I’ll never even know exist—filled with people all doing their best to survive, languages spoken around me I’ll never understand, yet the commonality of the human experience is immensely beautiful and comforting on a level I don’t have words for.

This is it, I think, watching two college-age youths holding hands pass me by, one throwing their head back and laughing at something the other said as they head into a restaurant. This is why I want to see the world, why I need to see the world. Because maybe if I search hard enough, I’ll find the little piece of this world that’s just for me, where my puzzle edges don’t need to be forced into place anymore.

The cool wind blows through the ends of my hair, and I close my eyes and breathe in the scents of the city. The smell of bread wafting from a nearby restaurant on the corner. A whiff of cigarette smoke carried on the breeze. Someone’s floral perfume as they pass by on the sidewalk. It’s the last one that sends my mind running back to the past instead of staying rooted in the present, and I’m hit with a specific childhood memory that I haven’t thought about in ages.

It was summertime, still several weeks before my fifth birthday, and I lay in bed one night flipping through a picture book I’d checked out of our local library earlier that day. I still recall the photos of elephants and giraffes and lions from safari in South Africa, and how even that young I felt the need to go everywhere, to see everything.

My mom knelt beside my bed—I hadn’t noticed her come into my room until her floral perfume drifted over me as she pulled the book from my hands and placed it to the side. She needed to talk to me, she said, about an idea she wanted me to consider. She was thinking about starting me in kindergarten that fall along with my brothers, despite my fifth birthday falling weeks after the deadline.

That hadn’t been the plan. The plan was that I was finally getting a whole year of my mom’s undivided attention while my brothers were off at school all day, something I’d looked forward to for months. We’d take trips to the library, and the mall, even just running errands…it was going to be just the two of us.

I talked to the principal, she told me that night, changing everything in an instant. We both think you’re ready. You’re so mature for your age. And you’re so smart. What do you think?

It was hard to be upset amid her praise, and I always wanted to please her. So, I nodded my head and smiled, going along with it.

I’m so proud of you, she’d told me, her smile filling me with warmth as she stroked a hand over my hair. I never have to worry about you, Mona. You know that?

Even at four years old, it didn’t feel like a compliment. But my mom never noticed how quickly my smile faded, because she was already out the door.

“You ready, Mona?” Ben’s voice calls from behind me, and my eyes snap open to the lively city in Iceland once again.

With one last glance at Hallgrímskirkja, snapping the sight into my mind like another Polaroid added to the memory book, I tuck my notebook into my tote bag and stand. “Yeah. Let’s find some food. I’m fucking starving.” Then I do my best to forget the sudden, grossly vivid memory and the simmering pang underneath my rib cage it left behind.

Ben and I walk along Rainbow Street, filled with local shops and restaurants, as we scope out something to eat for dinner. As the name suggests, the bustling street is painted in stripes of color like a rainbow, originally done once a year as a symbol of diversity during Pride celebration until the city made it permanent in 2019. Pride is one of Iceland’s largest celebrations of the year, attracting visitors from all around the globe, and this lively street will definitely make my article.

Ben maneuvers around me, searching for the best angle to take photos of Rainbow Street with Hallgrímskirkja looming in the background, and I pull out my iPhone and snap a few more selfies of my own, earning me another scowl of disapproval from Mr. World-Renowned Photographer.

Eventually, we find a seat at an outdoor table at a place named 101 Reykjavík Street Food and place identical orders of fish and chips, probably because it’s the first thing listed on the menu. Once our waitress is out of earshot, I audibly groan.

“I literally don’t remember the last time I ate,” I bemoan, resting my elbows on the wooden tabletop to support my famished body.

Across from me, Ben’s glazed eyes and slumped posture suggest he’s pretty depleted as well. “For me it was the pretzels on the plane. I’ve been hungry since the Blue Lagoon, but exhaustion won out over eating.”

I know what he means. Despite the nap I took after the whole beeping debacle, exhaustion is quickly setting in again.

“So,” Ben says, changing the subject, “what’ve you been up to for the past fourteen years?”

Anxiety hits me. Hard. “I told you I don’t want to talk about the past.”

His hands shoot up defensively. At the table beside us, a young couple animatedly laughs as a tiny bird lands near their table and struggles to steal an abandoned French fry. “I’m not asking about our past,” he says, refocusing. “Just what you’ve been doing all these years since. That’s all.”

I clear my throat, prepared to keep my response casual and surface-level, easy and breezy. “Well, after you disappeared from our lives”—Shit! That isn’t surface level at all!—“I mean, uh, after we last talked, I finished my senior year, studied journalism in college, then was lucky enough to land an internship with Around the Globe. That about sums it up.”

He watches me quietly for a moment, those daunting green eyes searching my expression for any tells. “Mona, I never intended to—”

“It doesn’t matter now, no need to discuss it.”

Ben leans across the table onto his elbows. “I think we do need to discuss it.”

“No.” The hardened edge in my voice takes me by surprise. I know it catches Ben off guard, too, when he leans away from the table and blows out a long exhale. I let a heavy beat of silence pass then say, softer, “Why photography?”

“You first,” he volleys. “Tell me all the places you’ve traveled with Around the Globe.”

The waitress brings over cardboard baskets filled with fish and chips, providing me a needed reprieve from this conversation. I can’t bring myself to admit to someone who’s traveled the world multiple times over that, despite my job title, this is my first international trip. Especially when I used to tell that same someone how I couldn’t wait to get out of Hudson Springs and see the world. Late on those summer nights at the lake, we’d sit on the dock for hours with our feet dangling in the murky water below while I droned on and on about all the places I’d see first. Spain, Greece, South Africa, Argentina, Egypt, the Galápagos Islands, and (of course) Italy were all at the top of my extensive list.

Fourteen years later, I haven’t been to a single place I said I’d go.

Meanwhile Ben’s been out there living my dream, while I’ve been busy visiting not one but two different glass-blowing expos. In Scranton.

After assuring our waitress there’s nothing else we need at the moment, she glides away from the table, and I give a vague, “Oh, you know, here and there,” response to Ben’s question.

Luckily, since we’re both famished, conversation comes to a natural halt as we dig into our food like two contestants on Survivor. The first bite of fish is light and flaky, with a crisp batter that’s not at all greasy and feels like heaven in my mouth. 101 Reykjavík Street Food will be getting a glowing online review.

Within five minutes we’ve both shoveled the entirety of our dinner into our mouths, and I wipe my chin with a paper napkin as I say, “You didn’t answer. Why photography?”

Ben starts to reply, but a middle-aged man wearing a luminous smile and the same brightly colored T-shirt as our waitress approaches our table with a box of Icelandic chocolate bars and declares, “You finish your food, you get chocolate,” and hands us each a candy bar before moving on to the next table.

Chocolate for gluttony? I really do love this town.

I tear open the paper wrapper to indulge myself, but across from me Ben turns his chocolate bar over in his palm, expression fading to something vacant and far off. Deciding to hold off, I rewrap my chocolate and drop it in my bag. “Ben?” I prod.

Blinking up at my voice, he says, “You know my parents finally divorced senior year, right?”

I’d heard about the divorce before I left for college, but by that time Ben hadn’t spoken to me in almost a year. And the truth is, I didn’t know either of his parents all that well. I can picture his mom, Charlotte: youthful round cheeks and golden hair the same shade as Ben’s. Now that I consider her from an adult perspective, I wonder how old she was when she had Ben. She couldn’t have been more than early twenties at most. “I heard. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. My father was the prime definition of an asshole.” Years later and there’s still a bitter bite in Ben’s voice. “After he left, my mom was…different.” A muscle in his jaw ticks on the word. “Long story short, she got fired from her job, and we certainly weren’t getting a dime from my father. I needed to support us, and my summer job at The Boathouse wasn’t cutting it.”

I remember Ben waiting tables at the local restaurant in our hometown, a hot spot for the tourists who came up from the city during the summer season to vacation near the lake. More than the restaurant itself, I remember Ben’s casual uniform consisting of jeans and a navy tee with the restaurant’s logo screen-printed in white across the chest, so worn the lettering had begun to peel away. I used to trace that logo so often that I feel the phantom texture of it now, rough against my fingertips.

Ben fidgets with a paper napkin, meeting my gaze for only milliseconds at a time before blinking away. “As soon as I turned eighteen, I got a job bartending in the city to help pay the bills. It was at that bar that I met Dan O’Brian. Do you know his work?”

I shake my head, the name unfamiliar.

“He’s the best photographer I’ve ever known. Light-years ahead of anything I’ll ever do.”

Having seen Ben’s work, I highly doubt that, but I don’t say anything and risk getting him off track.

“Dan used to come in and sit at the bar whenever he was back home in the city. He didn’t have a lot of friends or family since he was always traveling, so we’d talk and trade stories and he’d show me photos from his trips.” The corner of his mouth quirks at the memory. “Here I was, this eighteen-year-old kid who’d never left the state of New York, seeing these incredible photographs of places I’d never even heard of.” He pauses, green eyes finally catching with mine. “And it reminded me a lot of you, actually. The way you used to talk about all the places you wanted to go someday…”

I reach for my glass of water, my throat suddenly swollen and tight.

“Anyway, this went on for months and months. Then one day the gods smiled down on me or fate intervened or, hell, maybe it was finally my lucky day. I still don’t understand why he did it, but Dan told me he needed a new assistant and offered to pay me more than I made bartending, even though I had no experience whatsoever. I started traveling with him the very next day and never looked back. He taught me everything I know about photography.”

Never looked back…

“Still, you must have had a natural talent for it,” I manage despite the sucker punch to the ribs I just took. “I’ve seen your work.”

He lifts a shoulder noncommittally. “I had a great teacher. And I guess maybe it was easier to find inspiration when I was able to escape my real life a few weeks at a time.”

I want to ask him to elaborate, but I’m not sure I have the right. I had no idea Ben was going through a difficult time, much less one he needed to escape from, while I was going through senior year and college without a clue.

“I, um, I didn’t know things were bad at home,” I say as delicately as possible.

“I didn’t want anyone to know.” A sudden gust of wind sends a few stray napkins scattering off the tables around us, but neither Ben or I flinch under the weight of this conversation. “Especially you.”

The chilly breeze whips around us in bursts, our connection broken only when the waitress sidles up to the table with a handheld device to process our payment, but as I retrieve the company credit card from my bag, I wonder what Ben meant by Especially you? And why do I get the feeling there’s a whole lot more to this story than he shared with me?

I sign my name on the receipt, and Ben stands from the table, effectively ending any opportunity for me to continue this conversation.

We walk in the direction of the hotel in silence, me racking my brain to recall if there were certain signs I missed back then. When I picture our nights at the lake, or our days making up excuses to sneak away from my brothers, I always see Ben with a carefree smile, his deep, infectious laughter wrapping around me like the warmest hug, the devilish glint in his eyes that I always hoped was for me alone. He didn’t seem burdened or stressed out. But did I miss it? Was I so enthralled by just being close to him that I totally missed it?

Lost in memories, I’m unaware of my surroundings until I step off a curb and suddenly there’s an arm around my waist jerking me backward as a cyclist whizzes by right before my eyes. An urgent “Mona!” vibrates across the shell of my ear, and the breeze from the close encounter blows my hair back across Ben’s face.

“Holy shit!” Breath rushes out of me at the near miss. “That was close.”

“Too close.” Ben’s raspy voice vibrates through me, his hand tucked inside my unbuttoned wool coat, long fingers splayed across my stomach, thumb absently stroking the edge of my rib cage. “Way to scare the hell out of me, Ems.”

Ems.

Perhaps Ben should’ve let the cyclist plow me over, because I might rather be lying crumpled in the street than assaulted by the stinging reminder of the old nickname he had for me. One that started all the way back in middle school, maybe even before that.

My family was going on a weekend camping trip because—thanks to my father and brothers—that’s the only kind of vacation we ever took. Ben wasn’t supposed to be there I don’t think, but he showed up at our door last minute with some clothes stuffed in a backpack and asked my mom if he could come along.

So Ben and I sat on the back row of my mom’s Honda Odyssey while Marcus and Mason sat on the row in front of us absorbed in their Nintendo Game Boys. Left with nothing to entertain ourselves but one of my notebooks and some glitter pens, Ben and I quietly came up with our own game. Let’s Trade Secrets, we called it. Not the most original name, but it got the point across.

We each wrote down one of our deepest, darkest secrets, then traded papers and decided which was worse. Ben’s secret was that he hated playing soccer, even though he played almost year-round on the same team as my brothers. My secret was my middle name, Mildred, after the lady who sewed all those quilts that my parents kept in that deathtrap of a trunk in their bedroom. The twins had always made fun of my so-called old-lady’s name, but Ben only grinned and whispered, Mona Mildred Miller. That’s a whole lot of M’s. The nickname stuck, but he never called me that in front of anyone else, only when we were alone. Another secret added to the list.

Hearing him say it now, after all these years, does things to me. Things that involve butterflies and weak knees and warmth spreading to places it shouldn’t. Things that make me close my eyes for the briefest second and lean back against his strong frame. And then when my mind finally catches up to my body, things that make me spin out of his grasp as if he’s suddenly electrified. Putting space between us, I blink several times in rapid succession, willing away all the things and lecturing my body to pipe down.

But Ben smiles down at me, unbothered. “Could you maybe be just a little less determined to send us to the hospital on this trip?”

“I can try,” I offer, “but I am a Miller.”

Then I’m laughing.

Laughing so hard I can’t stop. Laughing until I’m doubled over on the sidewalk clutching my achy ribs while tears stream down my cheeks. I don’t even know why I’m laughing, other than the almost-getting-smashed-by-a-bicycle endorphins.

“Why are you laughing?” Ben asks, but he’s laughing now, too.

“Because I’m in Iceland!” I exclaim, waving a hand through the air. “We are in Iceland, Ben. Me. You. Together. In Iceland. It’s absolutely ridiculous!” Then I laugh some more.

“Yeah, guess it is a wild turn of events, huh?” Ben echoes my sentiment but falls quieter.

“A wild turn of events?” I repeat. “I think that’s putting it mildly.”

Ben clears his throat as our laughter floats away, then switches the subject on me. “Your laugh,” he remarks. “It still sounds exactly the same. Just like I remember it.”

“Is that your way of saying I have some annoyingly high-pitched laugh you can’t forget or something?”

“No.” He shakes his head and shoves his hands deep in his coat pockets. “Nothing like that. It’s…nice.”

A streetlight flickers on above us. It’s a little past nine o’clock, but this time of year the sun won’t fully set for another half hour. When we start walking again, it’s a little closer than before, a little slower than before.

But as we part ways for the night at our neighboring hotel doors, Ben turns to me, face partially obscured in the shadows of the dim hallway lighting. “Just so you know, I’m really glad it’s you here with me, Ems.”

With a shy smile, he disappears into his room.

I’m really glad it’s me, too.

And that scares the hell out of me.

Chapter 8

Tip #3 when visiting Iceland: Make sure you’re at least in halfway decent shape PRIOR to departure.

Day two’s schedule is packed full and, frankly, pretty damn intimidating.

Nervous energy creates restless tingles down my arms and legs, my fingers furiously working the zipper on my jacket as we pull into the parking lot of Þingvellir National Park’s visitors’ center, situated at the exposed rift separating the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates.

There are many ways to explore the continental divide: a simple viewing from a lookout point, hiking one of the many trails around and/or between the rift, or—for those adventurous types who want to get their full money’s worth—scuba diving the glacial water of the Silfra fissure between the exposed plates.

Due to time constraints, Suki opted for a simple viewing from the lookout point at the visitors’ center—which, thank god, because if I had to put on a wet suit and scuba dive through freezing-cold water into a deep, dark crevice in the earth, I’d probably bail on this entire trip and hop aboard the first flight back to the States. Yes, I want to see the world. No, I don’t want to end up the subject of a Friday-night special edition 20/20 as a scuba-gone-wrong tourist piece.

I exit the Suzuki, dressed in what I hope is appropriate clothing for the day ahead: wool leggings under lightweight waterproof pants, new hiking boots (not even a tad broken in), thermal long-sleeved T-shirt, fleece-lined raincoat, and wool beanie. I’d decided I’d aced this test when I saw Ben at breakfast wearing the same pieces of attire—his boots scuffed and well-worn—but now that I’m out in the elements, my confidence wanes.

We cross the parking lot toward the welcome center with a gift shop and café, and once inside, we split up. Ben goes out to the viewing area to start taking photos, and I spend a half hour inside soaking in the informative displays and maps of the park.

Despite this being only my second full day in Iceland, I’ve already learned I could spend an entire year here and still not see everything this country has to offer. The tour of the Golden Circle we’ll be doing today is proof of that. We’ve got today only to make the circular trip of Iceland’s famous road chock-full of eye-catching scenery, and though I’ll be the one writing the article for Around the Globe, I’m glad it was Suki who had the responsibility of narrowing down the itinerary. As amazing as it is to be in the only spot in the world where one can view the Eurasian and North American tectonic plates aboveground, Ben and I are still on a time crunch.

After I’ve read the displays and purchased two coffees from the gift shop—hoping Ben still takes his black with just a pinch of sugar (and wondering what it says about me that I still remember this)—I make my way outside and follow the path to the viewpoint overlooking the tectonic plates and hiking trails below. People of all ages line the railing, snapping photos with their cameras and iPhones. I spot Ben off to the far left, away from the crowd, his camera set atop a tripod as he leans in to look through the viewfinder.

“Getting anything good?” I ask, sidling up next to him.

“See for yourself.” He scoots to the side and motions for me to take his place behind the lens. I pass him one of the to-go coffees as I take the spot he vacated. “Thanks.”

“No problem.” I lean in to view the photograph on the display screen and gasp.

The angle of the image showcases the crevice widely in the distance, narrowing in the foreground, creating the illusion the earth is actively splitting in two, the very ground beneath our feet crumbling away at any moment now. Dark, ominous clouds fill the sky above, the sun trying its best to break through the tiny cracks to no avail. Unease sweeps over and through me, and I feel as if I’m getting a private glimpse into Ben’s psyche by viewing the world through his eyes.

“That’s haunting.” Backing away from the camera, I peer up at him. “Your photos are so good no one is even going to read my article.”

“Not true.” He flips a lever on the tripod and slides the camera off, then settles the strap over his shoulder once more. “You’re a fantastic writer, Ems.”

“And you would know that based off what?” I tease. “My essays from high school?”

Something flickers over his face, but it’s replaced with a smile before I can identify it. “Yes, actually. In fact, I’m pretty sure your help with my essays is the only thing that got me through junior year English.”

Already uneasy, my stomach flip-flops at the resurgence of the buried memory of us sitting at my kitchen table, me marking up his paper on The Great Gatsby with my favorite red pen while he smiled goofily at me like it was the most amusing thing to watch me correct his work.

“You ready to head out?” he says, bending to collect his camera bag from the ground.

With Ben all packed up, we begin our journey to the next stop on our list. Ben stays quiet in the car while I jot down some notes, but once I click my pen and tuck my notebook away, he asks, “So, how’s the rest of the Miller family these days?”

“What? Are you telling me you haven’t kept up with my brothers on the many social media pages they love to post about themselves on?”

It’s true. Unlike me, Marcus and Mason are never shy about sharing themselves with the world. Mason’s Instagram is filled with daily mirror selfies with captions like #ERDOC, #MDLIFE, and #TRAUMA. One especially thirsty post featured him wearing only scrub pants slung low and a stethoscope around his neck, captioned #HEALER. (Jacklyn will never let him live that one down.) But for whatever reason, his page is wildly popular.

Marcus’s page is more domesticated thanks to Carrie, mainly featuring pics of the kids at soccer practice and sunrise views from inside the state park. Regardless, either of my brothers is easy enough to find information on, and maybe Ben never cared enough to utilize social media to check up on me, but I’d be surprised if he never once looked up the twins. God knows I’ve certainly checked up on Ben every few months (days).

Ben takes a bit to answer, and when I look over at him, he’s worrying his lower lip between his teeth. “Uh, no,” he eventually says, eyes shifting to something in the rearview mirror. “I don’t follow them.”

Well. There I have it, I suppose. He could have found any information he wanted within a few taps of the screen but chose not to. Instead, Ben moved on from all of us without ever looking back, leaving me burdened with guilt because I was the person who drove him away.

“Oh, well, everyone’s good,” I say, pushing through the sudden awkwardness filling the car. “Dad’s still working too many hours in the ER, but Mason’s also a doctor now and works there with him. Marcus is a park ranger upstate, married to a beautiful, intelligent woman who is way out of his league, and they have three adorable, but equally loud, kids. And Mom spends her days babysitting the grandkids after school and unsuccessfully campaigning for my father’s retirement.”

When I glance across the console again, Ben wears a crooked grin. “Mason’s a doctor? Never would’ve seen that coming.”

“Yeah,” I agree, picturing all three boys catapulting off the dock at top speed or free-falling from the rope swing tied to an overgrown tree limb extended over the lake. “Me neither.” I lift my coffee from the cupholder and hold it over my lap as it cools, tracing my middle finger around the curved plastic top.

Ben steers us through another roundabout—incredibly common in Iceland—and clears his throat. “We, uh, had a lot of good times back then, didn’t we?”

My stomach coils into a knot. “Yeah. We did.”

The car falls quiet again, and this time I choose the stilted silence as opposed to following this conversation into treacherous territory.

A few minutes later, Ben announces, “Looks like we’re here,” as we turn into another parking lot.

Here is the Geysir geothermal area, where set among fields of boiling mud pits and hot springs one can find the original Great Geysir as well as Strokkur. While the former rarely erupts these days, Strokuur remains active, spewing a cascade of water up to twenty meters high every six to ten minutes.

We follow a path on a short walk toward a fenced-in field where steam rises off pools of aquamarine water, ranging in size from small puddles and trickling brooks to larger pond-like springs. Cutting through the field, careful not to stray beyond any roped-off areas and risk sinking into bubbling mud, an eruption in the distance grabs my attention as a stream of water blasts skyward and then plummets back to the earth.

“And that would be Strokkur,” Ben says.

Again, the thrill of a brand-new world stirs something unfamiliar inside of me, and I turn to Ben with barely contained glee. “This is so fucking cool!”

Smiling back at me, his eyes flash with enthusiasm. “Yes. Very fucking cool.”

“Come on.” Without paying attention to what I’m doing, I grab his wrist and tug him in the direction of the geyser, intent on seeing it up close.

We make our way to the crowd gathered near Strokkur, as close as we can get without endangering ourselves, and stand side by side in expectant silence, awaiting the next eruption. Minutes later, it happens, and I startle as the spray rockets upward with a whoosh, then rains back to the ground in heavy droplets, ending as quickly as it began. Laughter bubbles out of me, mirthful and anticipatory, like a child playing with a jack-in-the-box for the very first time. I tilt my head up to Ben, who watches my reaction with that same crooked grin from earlier.

It’s then I realize I’ve been holding his wrist this entire time.

My eyes flicker down to our hands and back up, and I release him with a murmured, “Sorry.”

“No need,” he says, grin widening, “but I should probably get some work done.”

“Yeah, of course. I’ll just be right here.” Suffering through my own embarrassment. Yet again…

Ben goes off to do his photographer thing, but I stay planted near the geyser, waiting through several more cycles and trying unsuccessfully to time each one. Even knowing it’s coming, the eruption startles me every time, and I laugh like a fool over and over again.

Eventually, Ben returns and points to a steep, muddy hill in the distance. “I need a better angle. You up for a hike?”

“Well”—my eyes track up the dirt-covered incline—“I suppose that’s what these hiking boots are for.”

Halfway up the hill (if I’m being extremely generous) I’m convinced I’m dying. My calves have never burned like this in my entire life and my lungs are in danger of rupturing inside my chest. My brand-new, not-broken-in hiking boots are squeezing the life out of my swollen feet, and a trickle of sweat rolls down my lower back (in Iceland!).

“Ben,” I gasp, coming to a stop. “This is literally the end of my life.”

Not out of breath in the slightest, Ben has the audacity—and oxygenation—to chuckle at my declaration of doom. “Not much of a hiker, huh?”

“I think…” Leaning forward, I rest my hands on my knees for support. “…that’s glaringly apparent right now.”

Hands on his hips, Ben glances back up the hill (mountain), then back at me. “We’re not even halfway there yet.”

“Yeah, I’m aware, Ben. Thanks.”

Taking hold of my elbow, he guides me to the side of the muddy trail, out of the way of the other hikers. “Why don’t you wait for me here?”

“No, I don’t want to wait here,” I protest. “I have to write a detailed article on this trip. How am I supposed to do that if I can’t complete the first slightly difficult hike?”

My gaze shifts over Ben’s shoulder to a group of teenage youths laughing and roughhousing on their way up the incline from hell. Not a single one looks slightly bothered. One especially smug kid even walks backward so he can face the group while he tells a story I’m certain must be downright riveting. Fucking youths. Is it awful of me to hope he trips on a rock?

Ben follows my line of sight, then steps in front of me to block my view. I know what he’s doing, and it makes me feel even more pathetic. “Listen, this hike wasn’t on the itinerary. This is just me wanting to get a better view of the fields for my photos. You shouldn’t feel like you have to do this.”

“My dad and brothers would be oh so proud,” I sarcastically mutter under my breath.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“We still have a lot on today’s agenda. We can’t have you dying already.” Ben says it with humor, an attempt to lighten the mood while letting me off the hook.

I’d keep arguing with him if I had the breath. But he’s right about one thing, we do have a lot left to see today, and though he’s too polite to say it, we don’t have time for me to slow us down. I sink to the muddy earth in a heap, not caring that I’m dirtying my new hiking pants. “Yeah. I’ll just wait here then.”

Ben nods and continues on his way.

I sit at the side of the trail, crisscross style, watching countless others pass me by, knowing full well they look at me with pity and probably whisper to their companions about the poor girl who couldn’t make it up the hill.

My first full day of excursions in Iceland and I’m failing miserably.

* * *

Continuing our tour around the Golden Circle, we make the drive to Kerið Crater, which is exactly what it sounds like, only much, much larger and deeper than I could have fathomed. Ben and I tread over ground-up rock as we walk the rim first, my fear of heights and shoddy depth perception keeping me an overly safe distance from the edge. Then we trek down a ridiculously long set of wooden steps to the floor of the massive crater, where a stunning aquamarine lake is encircled by the rusty red canyon. There’s a bench at the edge of the still water, and we sit for a while, somehow managing to be the only two people on earth at this particular spot at this precise moment in time. Neither of us speaks, and it’s the most therapeutic silence I’ve experienced in years.

But the problem with silence is that it allows the mind to wander, and I find myself again ruminating on the vivid memory of my mother that I recalled at Hallgrímskirkja. I have no explanation for why this specific memory is suddenly invading my psyche and leaving me unsettled after all these years. Maybe it’s this trip. The culmination of childhood dreams and years of hard work causing me to reexamine everything that got me to this point. Maybe it’s the man beside me. The one person I can’t look at without thinking of the past.

I turn in his direction now. Ben stares out over the lake, eyes clouded over as if he’s as lost in thought as I am. Perhaps it’s the rippling blue water reminding him of a different lake, a different continent, a different point in time. Same two people.

“Hey, Ben.” I speak softly, hesitant to disturb nature. “Do you remember when we started kindergarten?”

“That came out of nowhere,” he replies in the same quiet, respectful cadence.

“I know. I was just thinking about my mom yesterday, and I had the strongest memory of the night she told me I’d be starting kindergarten with Marcus and Mason.” I fidget with the zipper on my jacket. High above us, a gull soars through the overcast sky. “I don’t know why I’m thinking about it now. Or why I remember it at all. Is it normal to have memories from four years old?”

“Probably if they’re significant enough. I have a few memories from back then, most of them I’d rather forget though.” I look his way again, but Ben keeps his gaze over the water. “Why are you bringing this up, Ems? I thought you didn’t want to talk to me about anything related to the past.”

I have made that perfectly clear, haven’t I?

“This isn’t really about our past, per se,” I justify. “It’s just that, you know, it wasn’t really fair to me, having to start school that young so she could get all three of us out of the house at once. I was four. Four!” The words pour out of me now as if this bench in Iceland is a couch in my therapist’s office. I don’t have a therapist, clearly a huge oversight on my part.

“But it was always, ‘Mona, you’re so smart!’ and ‘Mona, you’ll do great!’, but really it was an excuse to not have to take care of me for another year. Even if that meant I spent the rest of my years in school trying to keep up with my peers. Sure, I may have been smart enough academically, but socially, I was so far behind. I spent elementary school terrified to raise my hand or get called on in class, even when I knew the answers. Middle school feeling like nothing more than someone’s baby sister who snuck into the school dances. I was the very last person I knew to learn how to drive or to wear makeup or to kiss a boy—”

Ben’s head whips around as I realize what I’ve said. Flutters rip through my belly as those green eyes do that thing where they bore into my soul. Neither of us says a word. I know we’re both thinking about it, though; Fourth of July at the lake. But I don’t have the emotional wherewithal to go there, so I swallow hard and drop my head to stare down at my hands.

“It’s just,” I continue on, glazing over my unfortunate mishap, “I don’t think I ever realized how much that one little decision upset me, or how it changed the course of my life fairly drastically. Now that I really consider it, it was the first time I remember just going along with what someone else wanted and never voicing what I wanted. And I think it set the course for the rest of my childhood. Perhaps even my adulthood.”

Again, it occurs to me that this is probably a rant best suited for literally anyone other than the man sitting on this bench with me. Internally, I cringe at everything that just poured out of me. “God, I probably sound so whiny and overdramatic.”

“No, you don’t.” Ben’s hand covers mine, just the briefest touch to still my own hand, furiously working the zipper of my jacket. Then he turns his full body toward me, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and lowering his head to catch my downcast gaze. “You want to know what I remember about kindergarten?”

I nod.

“I remember walking into Ms. Gomez’s classroom that very first day in my brand-new Batman T-shirt your mom bought for me so I could match the twins.” He smiles, adding shyly, “For bravery, of course.”

I smile back at him. “Right. Of course.”

“I remember the group of rowdy kids already gathered at the Play-Doh station. Your brothers the loudest of them all.” He huffs a short laugh. “In fact, I think they’d already established teams for freeze tag at recess.”

“Sounds right.”

“And then I remember you.” All traces of humor fade from his expression. “I remember the girl from down the street. Standing all alone near the bookshelves with tears in her eyes, looking overwhelmed but brave all the same.”

My vision goes wavy as my eyes burn, a thick lump forming in my throat. Because now I remember, too. I remember standing in the corner alone, unsure what to do while the teacher greeted more kids filing in. I remember some tearful parents hanging around the perimeter of the classroom, not quite ready to leave their precious little ones behind yet. My mother wasn’t one of them. And I remember Ben. He came over to me in his Batman T-shirt and worn-out Nikes, hair sticking up in every direction. Don’t be scared, Mona, he’d said to me then. I’ll stay here with you if you want.

And now it hurts to breathe. Each inhale a sharp, slicing pain through the center of my chest.

“We, uh, we shouldn’t talk about us back then,” I say, although I know it’s unfair because I’m the one who brought this topic up, but I’m a coward and it’s the only way I know how to stop this hurt.

Ben shrugs a shoulder and sighs, leaning away again. “I’m not sure I know how to talk about the past without talking about us, Ems. Our pasts are tied together.” He stands from the bench and walks off toward the water’s edge.

And that’s the thing about trying not to care about Ben Carter. I’ll never actually be capable of it. Because despite the one really bad thing he did to me, there was so, so much good that came before it.

Chapter 9

Tip #4 when visiting Iceland: Good luck mustering up the energy for the nightlife scene after a full day of Icelandic activities.

The absolutely devastating part of going down all those steps to get to the bottom of Kerið Crater is that one must return up all those steps. To my embarrassment—which is practically becoming a third person on this trip with us—I make Ben stop at least five times so I can catch my breath and let the burn in my calves cool.

And yet, is our itinerary for the day complete?

Suki says no.

We press onward to Gullfoss Falls to complete our tour of the Golden Circle. Despite the parking lot’s close proximity to the falls, my shaky thighs force me to wobble like a penguin, and even the smooth, paved path feels like a special kind of torture designed specifically for my ass.

But once Gullfoss comes into view, I see that we aren’t at just any old waterfall.

Gullfoss is a monster.

A crevice in the earth with water gushing over the edge of not one, but two separate falls, the combination creating a drop of over one hundred feet and a magnitude of such force it could sweep me and every tourist here away in all of zero-point-two seconds to never be seen or heard from again.

“This is fucking massive,” Ben echoes, camera perched at eye level.

The awe in his voice matches the awe filling my chest, and I know then that Ben understands my need to see the world in a way no one else in my life ever will. On this trip, I’m learning this photography thing isn’t just a career he stumbled into out of need, no matter how it started. I think he feels it, too, that deep-seated desire to see every place this world has to offer, impossible as it may be.

By the time we make it back to the hotel in Reykjavík several hours later, my body is on the verge of collapse. Maybe that’s a bit dramatic, but I do limp down the hallway before coming to a stop outside our hotel room doors. Before we part ways, I say to Ben, “Suki’s itinerary has us exploring the nightlife scene in Reykjavík tonight, but honestly, I don’t think I can leave this hotel again. In fact, I don’t think my swollen feet can even fit in normal shoes right now. I know at least three of my toes would start bleeding if I even tried.” Mason had warned me to break in my hiking boots before the trip, but with only two days to prepare, what was I supposed to do, wear them around the streets of Brooklyn?

Ben’s lips curl into an amused smile as I lean against my door, unable to support my own weight another second. “Well, we can’t have bloody toes, can we? What about dinner, though?”

He poses an important question. As tired as I am, I’m also fucking famished. This must be how elite athletes feel. “I think my dinner plans are going to consist of ordering room service and crying in the shower. But you should still go out. Don’t let me keep you from enjoying your night.”

Tilting his head, Ben appears to think it over for a moment and then says, “I’m not much of a nightlife kind of guy. Room service sounds great.”

Straightening as I push off my door, an involuntary whimper slips past my lips. I can only hope that a good night’s rest eases this full-body soreness and tomorrow I’ll wake miraculously feeling normal again. “I’ll see you in the morning then.”

Ben’s hand lands on my forearm, stopping me before I can limp into my room. “Would you, uh, maybe want to join me for dinner?”

“But…” I blink up at him. “Oh. You mean in your room?”

“It would just be two physically exhausted people having dinner together.”

“Right.” Right, right, right.

“I mean, if you don’t want to that’s completely understandable,” he says. “No big deal. I just thought it might be better than both of us eating alone.”

Ben sounds casual. So I should be casual, too. Because yeah, it’s totally casual. “Yeah, sure. Why not? Just let me shower and I’ll be over.”

Ben smiles and releases my arm, leaving a trail of goose bumps in his wake.

Super casual.

* * *

An hour later, I feel like a new person. Well, a new person with an aching lower half, double shin splints, and a blister on my little toe the same size as the toe itself. But at least I’m scrubbed clean, and the hotel hairdryer did a halfway decent job of drying my hair. I pull on yoga pants—no hard pants for this beat-up body tonight—and a loose tee, then dab a bit of concealer under my eyes, add a touch of blush to my cheeks, and slide a shimmery gloss across my lips. (Absolutely unrelated to dinner with Ben of course.)

At least that’s a portion of the case I present to myself in the mirror, along with phrases like, Who cares if it’s his hotel room? and It’s no different than having dinner with any other photographer. With a deep breath and a vow to myself that this meal will be purely professional, I pad into the hallway in a pair of flip-flops.

When the neighboring door eventually swings open after several knocks, Ben stands before me bare-chested with gray sweatpants slung low on his hips, golden brown hair still damp from the shower. Unable to keep my eyes contained to his face, my gaze sweeps over a body that is all lean muscles and deep ridges, like he’s an Olympic swimmer on the side or something. There’s a sparse patch of dark hair in the center of his chest, and on his inner right biceps is a shaded black tattoo of a camera. Not just any camera, his camera.

This is definitely no dinner with any of my other photographers. All of whom wear shirts to most engagements.

“Sorry,” he says in a rushed voice as I force my eyes back to his face. “I got distracted transferring today’s photos to my laptop and lost track of time. Come on in.”

I follow Ben inside his room—definitely not checking out the muscular planes of his shoulder blades or the fantastic curve of his ass.

Ben pulls out a clean black T-shirt from a meticulously packed open suitcase on a small sofa in the corner of the room and tugs it overhead. Averting my eyes, I focus on the desk along the far wall where images from Gullfoss Falls light up his laptop screen. I make my way over and lean forward for closer inspection.

“Shit, Ben. At this point, I don’t know why I bother journaling about these sites. I could write an entire book based off one of your photos.”

Over my shoulder, I see the self-deprecating shake of his head as he approaches. “You’re being too generous. Really. Those aren’t edited yet.”

“Still. They’re incredible.”

“And your article will be, too.”

Silence falls around us, but I break it before it gets too heavy by locating the room service menu and deciding what I want to eat. While Ben calls in our orders, I lean closer to the laptop screen and prop my chin in my palm, taking the liberty of clicking through a few more images, each one mesmerizing in its own unique way.

Finishing his call, Ben hangs up the phone on the bedside table and sidles up beside me. I glance up at him, wordlessly—and belatedly—asking permission to continue, and he nods. I take my time, studying each photo like I’ll be quizzed on it later. Then I reach the photos from Kerið Crater and pause on a black-and-white still that makes the air catch in my chest. Ben and I are seated on the bench in front of the rippling water, our backs to the camera as we stare out at the raw beauty surrounding us, our bodies tiny in comparison to the crater that engulfs us, but I suppose that’s the point.

“How’d you take this one?” I ask.

“Oh. My tripod was set up behind us. The camera works off a remote.”

I rise to my full height and turn to him. Ben scratches at his jaw, expression uncertain. For whatever reason, he seems embarrassed I’ve stumbled upon this image.

“I should’ve asked your permission before I took it. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. It’s gorgeous.”

His uneasy expression relaxes into a smile. “I’m glad you like it.”

My pulse kicks up several notches as he looks down at me, his fresh, soapy scent swirling in the air around us. I fight the urge to reach for him, to grasp his soft T-shirt between my fingers and pull—

Fuck.

Perhaps coming to Ben’s hotel room wasn’t the best idea after all. Who could’ve guessed?

Abruptly turning away, I make my way to the round, two-person table near the window, knowing I need to get control over myself before I let something reckless happen. Sinking into a chair at the table, I change the subject to something safe. Work. That tiny little thing I was brought here to do. “You know, if you worked for Around the Globe, you’d get all the best assignments. I’m sure Calvin would let you handpick your locations.”

Ben takes the seat across from me and studies me for a moment before asking, “Why do you keep bringing up me working there?”

“Do I?” Feigning innocence, I press onward. “I’m just saying, you had to be a little interested to take this assignment. And I know how much Calvin wants you at the company.” I briefly consider telling Ben the truth, that my promotion may in fact depend on his acceptance of a position at Around the Globe. But admitting to Ben that not only does Calvin deem my work unworthy on its own merit, but also that I’m not the world-traveling writer he thinks I am, well, that would be humiliating in a way I couldn’t handle.

“So you like working there then?” Ben asks. “It’s what you pictured all those times you told me about wanting to see the world?”

Oof. Well, this is a dilemma. “It’s a great job and I’m fortunate to have it,” I say diplomatically. And it isn’t a lie. I’m very well aware that a lot of people would love to have the career I’m blessed with. It’s one of the reasons I feel guilty for wanting more.

“That’s about as vague an answer as you could have given,” he presses.

I sigh, envisioning how to tiptoe around the things I’m not willing to admit to Ben and how to best phrase the things I am. “There are things that could be better, but I imagine that can be said of any job with any company.”

“Like?” Ben’s brow lifts, the faded scar on his forehead catching the light.

“You ever work somewhere that had the potential to be a dream job if it wasn’t for the management making you miserable?”

“No.” He huffs a laugh. “But bartending and The Boathouse weren’t really dream-job material.”

That’s right. Other than those two jobs as a teenager, Ben’s only traveled with Dan and then worked for himself. “Well, it’s kind of discouraging when a company feels like it would be the perfect place for you if it wasn’t for one person.” That’s the closest I’m willing to get to admitting my career failures.

“Is that one person Cal?”

“He’s made some decisions I’ve questioned.” Like not interviewing me before hiring Devon. Like expecting us Locals to be in the office Monday through Friday while the Internationals come and go as they please. Like allowing the whole building to become a fire hazard because he refuses to tell Shirley she can’t smoke inside. The list goes on and on…I don’t say this though.

“Well, you’re giving a ringing endorsement for working there, Ems.”

Shit. “No, really,” I amend, “it is a great job. I get to write for a living, which is a dream come true. And I get to see a lot of cool places and do a lot of cool shit.” There have been assignments I’ve truly enjoyed. I’ve been sailing off of Nantucket and gone on a cheesesteak crawl in Philly and learned how maple syrup is made at a Vermont sugarhouse. And because I am like other girls, I enjoyed the hell out of some apple-picking at a lovely orchard in New Hampshire on a crisp fall weekend. But I can’t tell Ben any of that without telling him all the places I haven’t been as well. I try a different tactic. “Wouldn’t you like more stability than being freelance?”

Ben taps his thumb against the wooden tabletop, sharp eyes suspicious as ever. “I like working freelance. No long-term commitments.”

The words land like a blow to my solar plexus, momentarily knocking the wind from me. But I recover quickly, dead set not to repeat another awkward airport scene. “Okay, but don’t you want to stay in one place for longer than a couple months? Be close to your friends and…significant other…if you have one?”

Why in the actual hell did I go there?

What’s worse, why in the actual hell have I never even considered Ben being in a relationship a possibility until right now?

Most pressing, why in the actual hell do I feel like I might throw up?

Ben’s fidgety thumb stills, his gaze never straying from mine. “Since I’m always traveling and my assignments can be lengthy, the friends I have are spread out all over the world. And do you really think I’d be sitting in my hotel room with you if I had a significant other?”

I’m relieved by the implication of his answer, very much unrelieved at the flash of heat that pulses between my legs. “Why not?” I venture innocently (at least that’s what I tell myself). “This is purely professional.”

Ben smirks and wets his lips with his tongue. “Ems, I think we both know there’s no way anything could be purely professional when it comes to me and you.”

I don’t know what he means by that, but I do know my heart skips a beat or seven.

“What about you?” he asks. “Anyone special back at home?”

Pulse throbbing in my throat, all I can do is shake my head.

There’s a knock at the door, and Ben sighs at the disruption, mumbling something that sounds like a curse under his breath. But he stands to answer it, and a hotel employee wheels in a cart with our dinner a moment later. Meanwhile I’m frozen in my chair while my heart beats a crescendo against my chest wall that could rival any award-winning drumline. But when Ben and I are alone again, he starts arranging our food on the table between us as if everything is perfectly normal. Perfectly casual. I take a few deep inhales and will my heart to slow the fuck down.

Much like the night before, as we each devour our food there’s not much conversation other than murmurs of indulgence and whispers of, Would it be okay if I stole a fry? (Because why did I ever choose sautéed veggies when I’m this hungry?) But my mind stays busy tripping over one thing, and surprisingly, it’s not these moments Ben and I seem to keep having, or the conversations we keep dancing around. There will be plenty of time to overanalyze those worries later tonight when I’m not sleeping.

Instead, what eats away at me is how lonely his life seems. Always on the road. A few friends scattered across the globe that sound casual at best. It’s such a stark difference from how enmeshed in the Miller family he used to be. He didn’t go a single day without hanging with my brothers; I’m certain of that. And I know he’s capable of deep connections, because he was my friend, too, my best friend if I’m being honest, and the times we spent at the lake together talking and trading secrets late into the night were some of the best times of my life. So who does he talk to now? I’m curious, but I’m also treading a delicate line here, so I decide to leave it alone for now.

After I’ve stolen at least half his fries and both our plates are spotless, I stand from the table and stretch my too-heavy arms overhead with a deep yawn. “I should go. Better rest up so I can get my ass kicked again tomorrow.”

Chuckling softly, Ben stands, circumventing the table to approach me. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You did great today.”

“Tell that to my broken body.”

For the briefest second, his eyes trail down my body and back up, and an infusion of heat sweeps through me, chasing his gaze.

Ben stops in front of me, close but still a respectable, professional distance away.

“Seriously,” he says. “We’re doing hard shit here. This isn’t easy for me, either.”

“Right,” I reply with a short, humorless laugh. “You weren’t even winded any of the times I made you stop to rest on that staircase from hell at Kerið Crater, and it wasn’t you who only made it halfway up that goddamn mountain at Strokkur.” I fold my arms over my chest, self-doubt again weaseling its way into my head.

“My assignments aren’t usually this outdoorsy,” I admit, hoping he doesn’t press this topic and I end up confessing the most strenuous physical activity I’ve previously endured for work was a tug-of-war contest at a Highland Games festival (in Connecticut). And my team lost. “I’m not Marcus or Mason. I don’t hike every weekend for fun. I don’t go out in the elements. Sometimes I need to take a breather during gentle flow yoga. How am I going to get through this trip? This is day two!”

“Hey,” he soothes, moving closer and gently grasping my upper arms. “Ems, you’re doing great. I promise. I am used to hiking, and I might have held it together out there, but I came back to this room and spent forty-five minutes just standing in the shower with my eyes closed. That’s the real reason I answered the door half-dressed.”

A small laugh puffs past my lips. “Really?”

“Really.” Ben smiles, his hands slowly stroking up and down my upper arms. Professionally? Of course! Casually? Certainly! “It’s entirely possible I lost consciousness in there.”

A deeper laugh this time, which makes my achy abdominal muscles burn. “Ouch.” I lay a hand over my stomach. “My body really fucking hurts.”

Ben laughs, too, a raspy sound that’s deeper than fourteen years ago but still familiar in a way that makes my chest fizzle like a firework. “Mine, too.” As he sobers, his expression morphs into something earnest, something resolute. “Ems, I really want to clarify something. About yesterday. At the Blue Lagoon.”

“Oh god, Ben, I’m so mortified by my mistake.” I drop my head to hide the heat of shame blooming in my cheeks all over again. “I am so, so sorry for misinterpreting…well, you were there, you know. And then yelling at you. And then insulting you. Basically just all of it. I’m mortified by the whole encounter and it was—”

“Hey, that’s not why I brought it up.” He tips my chin up with a knuckle. “I don’t need, or want, your apologies, Ems.” He bites his lower lip, hesitating. Then, “I brought it up because I wanted you to know that you didn’t completely misinterpret the situation.”

“Oh.” Everything around us fades away. The only things that exist in this world right now are me and Ben and my drumming heart that I’m certain he must be able to hear.

“I just—” He squeezes my arms, his thumbs trailing underneath my short sleeves. “I wanted you to know that I wasn’t about to kiss you, but it’s only because I wouldn’t do that without your consent. Not because I wasn’t thinking about it. And not because I didn’t want to.”

“Oh,” I say again.

“But I fully respect what you said about why it can’t happen. I get it. I just wanted you to know that you weren’t the only one who felt…” His mouth quirks. “Well, you were there, you know.”

Though I’m not certain what to make of the admission—he could’ve simply been as caught up in the romantic setting as I was—it still makes me feel better. He makes me feel better. But I shouldn’t be thinking about that, or whether or not he still wants to kiss me, because I know from experience that Ben Carter can also make me feel as if the world has been ripped from underneath me.

And it’s that thought, or memory rather, of my broken seventeen-year-old self that grounds me, and I pull away from him and take long strides toward the door. “It’s late and I really should go. Good night, Ben.”

I flee his room with no further explanation and return to my own, unsettled by my thoughts and feelings. I can’t deny the buzzing electricity between us, or the way my heart races and my stomach swoops whenever he’s nearby. But I also can’t ignore the way my brain screams at me all the reasons acting on that attraction would be detrimental to my future, personally and professionally. Most unsettling of all, though, is that despite how much Ben hurt me in the past, despite how many sleepless nights I spent crying over what he did to me, I still have a soft spot for him. One that’s expanding in size hour by hour.

I don’t wish to hate him, I just wish to be indifferent when it comes to Ben, and I’m afraid the fact that I can’t is going to be my downfall. Sure, I was a teenager when he walked out of my life. Under different circumstances, it’d be easy to discount the relationship and write it off as no big deal. A high school fling I should’ve been able to easily recover from. Forget even. Certainly not still feel the deep-seated hurt almost a decade and a half later. But when I lost Ben, I lost so much more than my first boyfriend. I lost my first true love, my childhood friend, and a part of my family all at once. I cannot lie to myself and pretend it didn’t affect me as significantly as it did.

Full truth: to this day, I’ve never loved anyone the way I loved Ben Carter.

Scarier truth: I don’t know if I ever will.

Throwing myself across the bed, I seek solace in the one person who may be worse at relationships than I am and call Jacklyn.

She answers immediately with a snarky, “Took you long enough to call.”

“Sorry, I’ve been busy.”

“Busy with Iceland or busy with Ben?”

“Jesus.” This was a mistake. “With Iceland. And by the way, I don’t appreciate your little swimsuit stunt.”

“So you’ve already gotten down to your skivvies with him?” Her voice is filled with such delight it may as well be Christmas morning. “How forward of you, Mona Miller!”

“I’m not kidding!” I snap, my voice sharp and shrewd. Immediately, I apologize. “Sorry, J. I’m so sorry. This trip is really fucking with my head.”

“No, I’m in the wrong here. I know this trip is stressful for you,” she replies. “Putting on my supportive best friend hat as of…now. Okay, tell me everything so far.”

So I do. I spend the next forty-five minutes recounting everything from the details of the incredible sites we’ve seen so far down to the mundane minutiae of what I’ve eaten each meal. Honestly, it just feels good to talk to someone. Someone I don’t have to worry about saying the wrong thing to or accidentally treading too deep into territory I no longer care to explore. Someone who knows me, but not like Ben knows me.

When I finish, I’ve rambled for so long I’m not even sure she’s still on the line. Until I hear her horrified voice say, “He shared his fries with you?”

“What?” I just told her about boiling mud pits and tectonic plates and a waterfall that could sweep me away, and she’s concerned about my French fry habit? “Why does that matter?”

“Oh, it matters. Tell me how it happened.”

“What do you mean? I asked if I could have a fry. He said yes. That’s it.”

“No. Tell me exactly how it happened.”

“I just did!” I say, exasperated. “I said, ‘Can I steal a fry?’ and Ben pushed his plate toward me, indicating that I could. So I ate a few. That’s it.” I leave out that I ate half of them. Three-fourths, if I’m honest.

“Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my—”

“The hell is wrong with you? It’s not like we each put one end in our mouths and met in the middle like a Lady and the Tramp moment. Why are you making this a big deal?”

“Because you ate off his plate! That is an intimate act!”

“No, it isn’t. I eat off your plate all the time.”

“And we are best friends,” she says matter-of-fact, as if I’m making her point for her. “There’s an intimacy in that.”

I fall silent, considering her words.

“All I’m saying is, you can’t expect to keep your head in the game if you’re going to fall into old familiarities with this guy.”

She’s right. Of course, she’s right. But also…“You’re the one who pulled the swimsuit trick.”

“ ’Cause, Jesus Christ, I’d rather you fuck him than share his fries!”

As odd as it is, I think I see my friend’s point. “Okay, no more fry sharing. I promise.”

“Good girl. Now tell me about these Icelandic men. Are they hot?”

Chapter 10

Tip #5 when visiting Iceland: The term whiteout doesn’t mean anything good.

The following morning, we have a two-hour drive south along Ring Road to Mýrdalsjökull glacier, where we will snowmobile to the highest point of the glacier, which happens to lie atop one of Iceland’s largest volcanoes, Katla.

Yep, Ben and I are going to snowmobile over a glacier on top of a volcano. So cool, cool, cool. Everyday stuff and all.

As much as I’m up for a new experience that doesn’t necessitate hiking, Suki may be nudging me even further outside my comfort zone with this one. Again, I’m left dreaming of pool boys serving me cocktails at a Tuscan villa or sailing through the calm waters of Lake Como with a glass of Pinot.

Oh, Italy!

Before I can fully home in on my anxiety over snowmobiling, however, I must first home in on my anxiety over another long car ride with Ben after I fled his room last night like he was highly contagious. Fortunately, journaling buys me Ben’s silence. Unfortunately, a heavy fog makes it impossible to view the mossy green mountains or the jagged coastline or anything other than the multitude of sheep within twenty feet of the road.

The first hour passes while I scribble down every possible detail of the sheep we pass: some with horns, some without, some grazing in groups, others lounging unbothered in the grassy fields, how fucking cute they are when they run, how one little guy hops (hops!) over a puddle in the most adorable display of animal agility ever witnessed. I even attempt a few sheep sketches in order to prolong my “work”—they are not good, and I will show them to no one. Ever.

Eventually, I’m left with no other choice but to close my notebook or risk filling all the pages with indistinguishable four-legged drawings that could be cat, cow, or alien life-form.

Two seconds after I do, Ben’s voice breaks the silence. “About last night…”

Shit.

“You left in kind of a rush. Did I do something wrong? Because the last thing I want is for you to feel uncomfortable on this trip.” He hesitates, and then, softer, “Uncomfortable around me.”

Uncomfortable? That’s the polar opposite of what I feel when I’m with Ben. And therein lies the problem. I’m sharing his fries when I need to be keeping my walls up, but he makes it so goddamn hard. This trip makes it so goddamn hard. I turn in his direction, and he tosses a worry-ridden glance my way. “I could never feel uncomfortable with you, Ben.”

Tension seeps from his shoulders as he says, “Okay, good,” and turns his focus back to the road ahead.

As the car falls quiet again, I study Ben’s profile—golden brown hair curling around the edges of a black beanie, pouty lower lip he worries between his teeth, three-day-old growth covering the sharp edge of his jawline.

Yeah, it’s not Ben I don’t trust.

It’s me.

* * *

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god.”

While not my most articulate declaration, they’re the only words I have as Ben and I sit in a bus with the largest wheels ever—like a monster truck, I imagine, although admittedly, I don’t frequent the monster truck scene—which drives us up the side of the volcano. We’re accompanied by two guides: Fridrik, a twentysomething blond with pale blue eyes who is intently focused on getting this monster bus up the volcano, and Natalia, a pretty twentysomething woman with wavy brown hair who sits in the row beside ours and fills Ben in on her entire life story. As for me, I’m too busy staring out the window at the steep incline of volcanic ash and murmuring Oh my god on repeat to partake in any real conversation.

Ben and I bounce along in our two-person bus seat, and a realization strikes me out of nowhere: I, Mona Miller, am a complete and total badass.

It’s a feeling I know won’t last, so while my endorphins are flowing, I soak it in by snapping a selfie in my bright orange thermal jumpsuit provided by the tour company and texting it to the twins to rub my newly discovered badass-ness in their faces. It’s still early in New York so fingers crossed I woke them up on their day off.

I’m zipping my phone back in the pocket of my jumpsuit when two specific words from Natalia catch my attention: northern lights.

Jerking my head around, I rudely interrupt Natalia’s story about the lights frightening her when she was a child. “Excuse me, but have you seen them yet this season? I want to see aurora more than anything while we’re here.”

“No,” Natalia says with a pitying tone. “It’s still early. Maybe in a few weeks.”

But I won’t be here in a few weeks, I want to plead with her. As if Natalia controls the solar flares or whatever science-y stuff determines the northern lights’ visibility. While it’s never guaranteed to see the lights anytime of year, everything I read online suggests the best chance is between September and April, so I’m not willing to give up hope yet.

“We’re here,” Fridrik announces from the driver’s seat, cutting the engine and exiting the monster bus without another word. Picking up my badass helmet, I follow Ben and Natalia down the aisle.

“Oh my god,” I announce one more time as I step down onto crunchy ice, the frigid air burning my exposed cheeks and nose.

We’ve arrived at the tip of the glacier, where solid-white sheets of ice ooze down over the gravelly, coal black mountain of ash like icing dripping from the top of a cake. The vibrant green peaks I’ve grown accustomed to are now rolling hills in the distance far below us, the wispy gray heavens the only thing above. My gaze collides with Ben’s, and again there’s a flash of excitement in his eyes that echoes the same sentiment within me.

Since it’s only the four of us—which I assume has to do with Around the Globe Media being the entity that booked this tour—the guides allow Ben to take some photos before we make our way over to a line of twenty-plus snowmobiles.

“Take your pick,” Fridrik says, moving his arm in a sweeping motion down the row.

“Wait.” I stop in place. “We’re each driving our own snowmobile?”

“This is a snowmobile tour,” Fridrik replies, matter-of-fact.

“Yes, but I thought we’d be riding with you two. The guides. The professionals who drive these things every day.”

“No.” Fridrik pulls on his helmet, already straddling his chosen vehicle. “We don’t drive guests. You sign up for a snowmobile tour, you drive a snowmobile.”

“These are two-seaters,” I add, scrambling for any justification as to why I assumed that I, personally, would not be driving one of these things.

“Yes.” Fridrik, who doesn’t seem to either realize or care about my increasing trepidation, says bluntly, “Sometimes our guests bring along children who are too young to drive.”

Is he purposely comparing me to a child?

“Ems,” Ben softly interjects. “Why did you think they made a copy of your driver’s license when we checked in?”

“I don’t know!” I bite out, anxiety turning to pure, unadulterated fear. “I guess I thought they wanted to make sure the name matched to who signed up. I didn’t think about it!”

“You can ride with your partner,” Natalia chimes in with an encouraging smile, and I know she’s only trying to be helpful, but riding with Ben isn’t the ideal situation, either. If Jacklyn lost her mind over sharing fries, I can only imagine what she’d say about sharing a snowmobile. “As guides we aren’t allowed to let you ride with us. It’s a liability thing.”

“Unless you wreck,” Fridrik corrects, and Jesus, why won’t this man shut up? “Or there’s an injury. Or any other emergent situation.”

I stand there, blinking back and forth between the row of heavy machinery and the three people all awaiting my response. I literally fled Ben’s hotel room last night, the last thing I need is to have to rely on him today. (Especially when “relying” on him involves him sitting between my thighs while I wrap my arms around his waist and hold him tight.)

“Give us just a second,” Ben says to the guides, then takes my arm and maneuvers me away from Fridrik and Natalia, both already situated on their snowmobiles with the engines purring. “What’s going on? You don’t want to drive your own snowmobile?”

“Fuck no,” I whisper sternly. “I’ve never even seen a snowmobile in real life before today.” My voice quivers as it increases in pitch, quite the departure from my badass self of a few minutes ago who confidently sent a group text to her brothers bragging about precisely how badass she is. Hopefully glaciers on top of volcanoes don’t get a good signal and the message didn’t go through.

“You remember Mr. Sumpter’s poor petunias I demolished when you and the twins taught me how to drive?” My mind flashes to the day I drove straight through my neighbor’s immaculate flower beds, not even tapping the brakes as I nearly took out his mailbox, too. Turns out, those concerns over my depth perception were, in fact, valid. And my reaction time wasn’t looking promising, either. When we’d eventually rolled to a stop in the middle of the front yard, I’d immediately burst into tears while Marcus and Mason started in on how Mom and Dad were going to be so pissed if I’d damaged the car. Ben whipped around in the passenger seat and promptly told them to shut the fuck up and that they weren’t helping matters. We all climbed from the car to survey the damage right as Mr. Sumpter appeared on his porch and demanded to know what had happened. I’d started to speak up, but before I had a chance, Ben took the blame for me. He spent the next two weeks of his summer replanting those beds to Mr. Sumpter’s satisfaction. “What if this turns out even worse? I don’t even drive a car on a daily basis, much less one of these…vehicles on skis! What if I go too fast and slide right off the volcano? Or—oh god!—into the volcano?”

“Okay, Ems. It’s okay. Just breathe.” Ben averts his gaze over my shoulder and calmly tells Fridrik, “We’ll ride together.”

As much as I didn’t want this scenario, I’m also so relieved it’s Ben here with me that I could cry. This trip is pushing me beyond my limits, and while part of me is grateful for that—a very, very small part I can’t seem to summon at this particular moment as we approach the snowmobile behind Fridrik and I climb aboard—I also can’t imagine how awful it would be to face these situations with someone I hardly know. It’s a blessing and a curse; I trust Ben to keep me safe physically, but relying on him again could break me emotionally.

Right now, I don’t see another choice.

Since we’re amateurs—and therefore much more likely to crash, according to our candid tour guide—Fridrik offers to transport Ben’s camera for us “just in case.” Then we’re fastening our helmets and Ben’s sliding onto the seat between my thighs and the engine is purring to life underneath me. As I swallow down my rising nerves and tighten my grip around my designated “oh shit” handles, we inch away from the row of snowmobiles, Fridrik leading in front of us, Natalia following behind.

To my pleasant surprise, the trail is well traveled and smooth, and we start out at such a slow pace that I’m able to relax enough to enjoy the views around me, the scene like something out of a fever dream. Before long we pull off to the side of the trail and cut our engine as Fridrik hops off his snowmobile several yards in front of us.

“I want to show you something,” he says, approaching us with Ben’s camera in hand.

Ben climbs off first and then offers me his hand as I do the same. Leaving our helmets behind, Ben takes his camera and we follow Fridrik and Natalia as they lead us on a short, steep hike over rolling hills of crushed black rock until we reach a peak with a panoramic view overlooking the vast, contradictory snowscape below.

Glacier meets charred earth in the land of fire and ice.

“Holy shit,” Ben says from beside me. “This is the most incredible view I’ve ever seen. Ever.”

The wonderment in his voice stirs a similar enchantment within me. After the sights of the past two days, I’m convinced one could parachute into Iceland at any random location and be surrounded by the most gorgeous scenery they’ve ever laid eyes on.

After a few moments of stunned silence as we absorb the untouched beauty of the miles upon miles that lie before us, Ben starts taking photos, and Fridrik uses the opportunity to fill me in on a subject I never knew until right now I have no desire to learn about—glacial crevasses. Adding a renewed spike to my momentarily subdued anxiety level, Fridrik goes into explicit detail about people who have fallen into these crevasses and become trapped between walls of ice, their body heat and each breath they exhale melting the ice just enough for them to slip deeper and deeper, the walls becoming tighter and more compact until they can no longer expand their chests to take a breath, eventually leading to a freezing, suffocating death. Now, I’m no professional tour guide like Fridrik here, but maybe such vivid, informative stories should be reserved for the monster bus ride back to base camp.

Sensing my unease (perhaps from the way I suddenly grab his wrist and squeeze so tightly I’m sure my nails leave crescent moon indentions in his skin), Ben interrupts story time with Fridrik by asking him to take our picture. Then he passes his camera off to our guide and puts his arm around my shoulder. I’m not sure if I smile or grimace into the camera, but at least Fridrik is no longer detailing the many ways to die on this glacier/volcano.

Once we hike back to our snowmobiles, Fridrik utilizes his special skills to send my blood pressure skyrocketing once more with one single sentence. “If you lose me in a whiteout on the way up,” he says calmly and casually as we refasten our helmets, “stop where you are and wait for me to come back and find you.”

Whiteout?

That doesn’t sound good.

“Ben, what does he mean by that?” Unfortunately, my question gets lost on the whipping wind as we lunge forward.

It’s not snowing.

How would we have a whiteout if it’s not actively snowing?

As we make our way higher up the glacier, it dawns on me.

Fog.

Within minutes we’re ascending into a dense, heavy vortex, our visibility narrowing until any view of the far-reaching landscape from only moments ago is eliminated. Instead, the only thing I see in front of us is the distant taillight of Fridrik’s snowmobile—a blip of red surrounded by white. Sheer, all-encompassing white. I’ve spent the majority of my life petrified of the dark, and it turns out this is just as bad.

A cold sweat breaks out across the back of my neck. Everything’s too tight: my helmet, my jumpsuit, my throat. Suddenly, I’m leaning into Ben’s back and shouting, “I don’t like this anymore!” at the top of my lungs. Between our helmets and the wind, I doubt he hears me, but I’m in full panic mode now. I scream again, “I want to go back! Take me back! I don’t want to do this anymore!”

Ben’s right hand stays gripping the handlebar to steer us, but his left hand reaches back and lands on my outer thigh with a squeeze of reassurance. From years of deciphering each other’s body language, I know he’s telling me that he’s got me. That it’s all going to be okay. That he wouldn’t let anything bad happen to me. Logically, I know that’s the best he can do in this situation. Stopping abruptly would put us in far more danger of losing our guides than to keep going with Fridrik’s snowmobile in sight. But that doesn’t stop my legs from trembling or my lungs from struggling for air in this too-tight helmet.

I scoot as far forward in my seat as I can go, releasing the handles at my sides and wrapping both arms around Ben’s waist instead. I cling to him like a backpack, and he releases my thigh to press his arm over the two of mine wrapped around his waist, holding me securely in place and slipping his gloved fingers between mine. I concentrate on slowing my breaths until the flash of red up ahead comes closer, indicating Fridrik has come to a stop. We pull up beside him a moment later, and Ben cuts the engine, but I don’t let go of him.

“This is it!” Fridrik states triumphantly.

Ben twists his body around and removes my helmet before removing his own. I still don’t let go of him as I pull deep gasps of air into my lungs.

The visibility up here is less than twenty feet max in any direction. It’s completely disorienting. If we were to be separated from our guides, we’d never find our way back. We’d die up here with no inkling of which direction was the way down, most likely falling into a glacial crevasse while we searched.

“The highest point of the glacier!” Fridrik continues, so proud and so oblivious. “Please take all the photos you want.”

Natalia pulls up beside us and flips her visor up, and I squeeze Ben tighter, silently conveying that I will murder him in a gruesome manner if he gets off this snowmobile to spend a second longer than necessary in this solid-white world.

“There’s not anything here for me to shoot,” Ben says to my utter relief. “No visibility.”

“Just one of you two then,” Fridrik insists.

Ben hesitates, seemingly torn between getting me out of here as fast as possible and not embarrassing me by pointing out my fear, then passes the guide his phone and slings an arm around my shoulder so it looks less like I’m now adhered to his skin. Again, I grimace into the camera. These photos are sure to be some of my best.

“Fridrik,” Natalia says as he snaps at least fifteen different shots, “I think our guests here would like to get back to civilization.”

Thank god for women who can decipher each other’s body language.

“You don’t like all the white?” Fridrik asks, seemingly baffled as he motions around us.

Finding my shaky voice, I say, “I do not like it, Fridrik. I do not like it at all.”

Taking the not-so-subtle hint, Fridrik hands Ben’s phone back and says to him sinisterly, “Since it’s just us, we’ll go as fast as you want on the way down.”

We fly back down the glacier at a speed I am certain is not approved for this “beginner’s tour.” Regardless, I’m fine with it because the sooner we emerge from the fucking clouds so I can see the world again, the better.

Soon, the opaque fog transforms to a transparent mist as visibility returns like a veil being lifted, and I breathe a little easier as my fear abates along with the fog.

And yet…I still don’t let go of Ben.

Chapter 11

Tip #6 when visiting Iceland: Sometimes you just have to say, Fuck the itinerary.

We skip lunch—honestly, how could I stomach food after the duress I just experienced?—and drive the twenty-minute journey to our next stop, Skógafoss waterfall and its lesser-known neighbor, Kvernufoss. Skógafoss is up first, and according to Suki’s notes, if we take the wooden staircase located to the side of the waterfall, we’ll be rewarded with hiking trails that follow along the river and offer amazing views of Iceland’s coastline.

We turn into the parking lot, my eyes immediately landing on the waterfall in all its glory. Equally glorious: how close the parking lot is to the falls.

Then I notice the staircase weaving its way up the right side of the falls, filled with people resembling the miniature mountain climber from the cliffhanger game on The Price Is Right as they make their way to…where exactly? Heaven? I quickly flip back through Suki’s notes I printed out at the hotel and shoved in my notebook.

Listed in a print so small I must have overlooked it is a sentence that fills me with dread:

The staircase at Skógafoss has approximately 500 steps leading up a steep incline, not for the faint of heart.

It’s official: Iceland is trying to kill me.

Before we get out of the car, my phone chimes several times in a row as a barrage of text messages suddenly pour in. I unlock my screen to catch up on a whole thread of responses to the photo I sent my brothers when I was feeling good about myself, pre–panic attack.

Marcus

I don’t know what you’re about to do in that jumpsuit but I’m guessing it isn’t a knitting convention.

Mason

Now show some respect, this is our baby sister we’re talking about here. It’s definitely an ice sculpture contest.

Marcus

Maybe she’s even a guest judge. LOL.

Mason

Can you even imagine? Tomorrow her schedule is jam packed with a hot cocoa tasting AND a smores festival. How will she manage?

Marcus

Speaking of smores, Dad mentioned a camping trip this weekend. You in, Mase?

Mason

Trying to get my Sunday shift covered. Will get back to you. You bringing the kids?

Marcus

Yeah but we’ll have to come up after Ava’s recital Friday night.

The messages continue on, but I don’t bother reading any more. Instead, I mute the notifications and zip my phone in my jacket pocket with a huff of annoyance. I don’t know why I expected anything different; my brothers’ responses are one hundred percent typical. Downplay anything related to me, then change the subject and make it about them. I know they don’t do it maliciously. Hell, they probably don’t even do it consciously. Besides, the sentiment of their jokes isn’t misguided. I failed miserably at snowmobiling. I’m failing miserably on this entire trip so far. Maybe the weekend festival circuit is all I’m cut out for after all.

“You okay over there?” Ben asks, eyeing me with concern as I forcefully yank on my gloves.

“I’m fine. It’s just Marcus and Mason and how they always—” I stop short when I realize I’m oversharing. Again. “Never mind. It’s nothing. Let’s just go.” Then I hop out of the car before he says anything else.

We make our way close to the falls, Ben with his backpack of camera gear and me empty-handed. I should at least offer to carry the car keys in one of my multitude of pockets. Then again, I don’t need the added weight if I’m going to attempt the staircase to the stars.

Like everything else I’ve seen in Iceland so far, Skógafoss is jaw-dropping, the river carving its way through mountainous hills before plummeting over the cliff’s edge. At the bottom, the falls coalesce into a shallow stream that Ben now wades into in search of the perfect spot, one that will shift the focus just so and make the photograph Benjamin Carter–worthy. Reaching the middle of the stream, he crouches down and frames his shot, then unclips a short tripod from his backpack. He spends a few minutes getting it all set up, submerging the tripod in the slow-moving stream with the camera’s lens resting just above the water’s surface.

As beautiful as Skógafoss is, it’s Ben I can’t look away from.

I’m fully engrossed watching him in his element. Crouched over his camera, attention solely focused on the task before him, dexterous fingers adjusting the lens just so. I always was a goner for Ben’s hands. The rough patches on his palms. The map of veins spread over the back that I’d trace my fingers over. The way he’d sneak one of those hands under my blanket whenever we were watching movies with my brothers that summer, teasing his fingertip up and down my palm until I finally relented and twined my fingers with his and forgot what movie we were even watching. Ben always had a way of making me lose track of everything but him, and as he sloshes back through the stream toward me now, water kicking up at his heels, I haven’t the slightest clue how much time has passed.

“Let’s check out the top.” He juts his chin in the direction of the staircase I’m certain to have nightmares about.

Excellent.

Hundreds of steps later (literally), I. Am. Wheezing.

I’m also forced to hobble on stick-straight legs or otherwise they jiggle uncontrollably (flexing knees something of my past now), and I’m certain the blister on my toe has spread to encompass the entire side of my foot.

Iceland doesn’t play.

Now sweating, I strip off my jacket and haul my trembling body to the side of the trail where there’s a rock waiting for me to sink upon, while Ben—who had the decency to blow out a long breath at the top of the stairs like he was affected, too—makes his way to the viewing area at the top of the falls to do what he does best.

Glancing around from my rock, I must admit the scenery up here in the heavens is magnificent, just as Suki said it would be. The rolling mountains are cut in two by a deep ravine and flowing river, the skies the same foreboding shades of gray we’ve witnessed every day of our trip so far. In the distance, the ice cap of Mýrdalsjökull gives off a fantasy vibe akin to something out of Game of Thrones or The Lord of the Rings. Admittedly, I’ve never watched either, but the assumption feels right.

What doesn’t feel right, diverting my attention back to Ben, is how close he is to the edge of the drop-off into the ravine. No longer at the viewing platform, he’s now positioned on a jutting ledge to capture the river streaming through the hills of the ravine before it plummets over the falls. Anxiety stirs as I keep Ben in my periphery and instead focus on a line of tourists off to my right as they climb out on a different, even-more-perilous-looking cliff and sit with their feet dangling over the edge to snap selfies.

I don’t like any of this one bit.

There aren’t any guardrails to prevent people from doing anything reckless, only a few shin-high ropes one can easily step over. If someone really wants to be the person who falls off a cliff here in Iceland, they’ll let you do it.

Ben glances in my direction, appearing to search the landscape behind me. With a frantic wave, I get his attention and then motion him over to me, but he doesn’t budge. Instead, his brows lower in question, so I march two fingers over my open palm to pantomime a man walking over the edge of a cliff and falling to his abrupt demise in a morbid, unprompted game of charades.

“You’re too close to the edge,” I mouth.

With a dismissive grin, Ben shakes his head like my concern is amusing and then kneels (kneels!) on the ledge to get more shots as the fierce winds ripple his black windbreaker.

I cannot watch.

Averting my eyes, I concentrate on the stream of hikers as they spread out over the trails leading into the distance, my anxiety building with each passing second as I can only hope not to hear anyone’s horrified screams about someone (Ben) falling over the edge.

After what feels like forever and then some, Ben’s backpack lands at my feet with a heavy thud.

I look up, and he’s standing over me.

Alive.

And smiling.

The audacity.

“You scared me!” I exclaim, my pent-up worry transformed to anger. I’m not even sure why. All I know is that water lines distort my vision and make everything wavy. “You were way too close to the edge. You could have fallen over!”

Fully perceiving the depth of my fear, any amusement falls from Ben’s face. “Hey, Ems, it’s okay.” Sounding as surprised by my emotion as I feel, he kneels in the dirt directly in front of me. “I was at least six feet from the edge. I’d never be careless, okay?”

A tear spills down my cheek, and I rush to wipe it away but it’s too late. Now my anger mixes with embarrassment, and I…I don’t know what’s taken hold of me. I don’t even know what I’m crying about; if it’s Ben and the resurfacing memories of our past, or the resentment I’ve been feeling toward my family lately, or if it’s the pressure of this trip being my only shot at my dream career and the fear of fucking it all up—because today has definitely been one giant fuckup. Whatever the reasons, it’s only day three and Iceland is kicking my ass physically, mentally, and now emotionally, too.

“Come on.” Ben lays a hand on my wrist, and god, how I wish I could trace the familiar web of veins there, even just once. “Let’s get you some food and get to the hotel.”

I shake my head as another tear betrays me. “We can’t. We’re supposed to explore these trails, and we still have Kvernufoss on the itinerary for today.”

“Hey, Ems.” Ben rises from his crouched position and extends a hand down to me. “Fuck the itinerary.”

I let him pull me up off the rock, then force myself to release the hand I’ve held for comfort countless times before, that I long to hold for comfort now.

“Yeah, okay. Let’s go.”

* * *

It’s well past midnight as I toss and turn in my comfy, king-size bed at the suites we checked into this evening after my mortifying display of emotion atop Skógafoss. Ben hadn’t said anything about my breakdown as we picked up dinner to go from a local café and then checked into these spacious, apartment-like suites situated about ten minutes from the black sand beaches of Vík. Complete with a kitchenette, living room area, and a full wall of glass overlooking the southern coastline, the suites are both incredibly luxurious and easily roomy enough for more than one person. Except the whole one-bed thing. Even if there were two beds, or even two entire bedrooms, there’s no way Calvin would ever open himself or the company up to any kind of liability if something untoward occurred by having two employees share the same suite.

Therefore, I lie in my extra spacious bed, in my extra spacious room, alone and unable to sleep. After we’d checked in, Ben and I went our separate ways. I think he knew how humiliated I was over my behavior for, well, the entire day, if I’m honest. Freaking out on the snowmobile. Coming to tears at the sight of Ben on the edge of that ravine. I feel like I’m losing my goddamn mind.

What I need is sleep. That’s what I’d told Ben anyway when we’d parted ways at my door. But now it’s hours later and all I can do is roll from one side to the other and overanalyze this situation a little more. The best I can come up with is that I’ve missed Ben more than I could’ve imagined. I never would’ve thought it possible to miss someone this intensely after fourteen years of them not being in my life, yet here I am, a personified mess of wistful nostalgia with a Ben-shaped hole in my chest.

I suppose when someone is a part of your everyday life for the entirety of your childhood and adolescence, you never really get over their absence when they’re gone. In a way, Ben was the first person I ever lost. And when someone means as much as he did to me, should I be surprised I’m feeling this emotional at his sudden reappearance?

But it’s also more than Ben. Something about this trip is making me reexamine my entire past, and after today’s text thread with the twins, I find myself thinking about my mom more than ever. I’ve always understood that I’m fundamentally different from my brothers and my father, and that’s okay. But my mom isn’t like them, either. She isn’t loud or thrill-seeking or always determined to be the center of attention. So why weren’t the two of us closer? And why did she seemingly never care to be?

I turn again, the starchy sheets sliding over my mostly barren legs as the triangle of light spilling out from the bathroom flickers twice and then shuts off for good. I freeze in place, plunged into unexpected darkness. The neon green digits on the alarm clock have also disappeared, confirming my worst fear: a power outage. My blood runs ice-cold within an instant. Numbness starts in my toes and spreads up through my legs. Nausea turns my stomach. I’m no longer in a nice hotel in Iceland. I’m nine years old and trapped in an antique trunk in my parents’ bedroom.

My throat swells tighter with each passing second. Something about this hotel comforter is too similar to the old quilts stacked in that chest, and suddenly there’s a fifty-pound weight pressing directly on my sternum. I don’t know what to do. At home I keep a hefty supply of battery backup night-light plug-ins for this very reason. Here, I’m caught completely off guard in an unfamiliar environment. White-hot panic compresses my body like I’m stuck in one of those glacial crevasses Fridrik described.

“Ems?” Ben’s muffled voice outside my door comes at the same time as his heavy knock. “Ems, it’s me. Come open the door.”

A small relief. I want to do what he says. I really do. But I can’t move.

“Listen to me,” Ben says, calm but commanding. “Reach for your phone on the nightstand. Turn on the flashlight. Come open the door.”

It takes me a minute to comprehend his words over the whooshing in my ears, but then I manage to move my quivering hand toward the nightstand, and when it lands on my phone, the screen lights up. It’s not enough light, but it’s something. Moving quicker now, I unplug my phone from the charger and flip on the flashlight feature. Light spills over my immediate surroundings. Fluffy pillows. White down comforter. Espresso-colored nightstand. Not the inside of that old chest.

I find the courage to push back the covers and sprint toward Ben’s voice like my life depends on it. Throwing the door open, I catapult my shaking body straight into his arms without warning.

Caught unprepared, Ben stumbles backward a few steps before managing to steady us, his arms wrapping around my waist, his voice soft and steady near my ear. “It’s okay, Ems. You’re okay.”

These suites open directly to the parking lot, and dressed in only a thin T-shirt and loose pajama shorts, the frigid night air is a refreshing shock to my clammy skin, despite my full-body shivers.

“Come on. Let’s get inside.” Ben walks me backward into my room while I refuse to let go, sticking to him like a refrigerator magnet. He takes my phone from my hand and lights the way as he closes the door and maneuvers us farther into the room until we reach my bed. Then he tosses the phone onto the comforter with the beam shining toward the ceiling, providing us a small circle of low light. “See? You’re okay.” His hands spread wide over the middle of my back, holding me close. “The power outage probably won’t last long.”

I pull back enough to look up at him. “Thank you for coming.”

The corner of his mouth lifts, his eyes soft. “Of course.”

His grip loosens as he likely expects me to let go of him now, but I don’t. Instead, I give in to the overwhelming urge to rest my forehead in the space where his neck meets his shoulder. As soon as I do, his forearms are around me again, squeezing me tight. We stand that way for a long moment, the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest soothing me better than any lullaby.

Awareness creeps in as my fear slowly abates, and I distinctly feel where every soft curve of my body presses against the taut muscles of Ben’s abs and chest. Adrenaline surges through my bloodstream, but for an entirely different reason now. My pulse throbs in places it shouldn’t.

“This is embarrassing,” I say, but my voice doesn’t sound embarrassed at all. It sounds breathy and aroused. “I think this day was designed by the gods to showcase every fear and weakness I have.”

“Don’t be embarrassed.” Ben’s fingertips sink into my achy muscles, applying a delicious pressure as they slip lower down my back. “You witnessed my fear on the flight over.”

“Yeah, but that was one thing. This entire trip is kicking my ass.” Maybe it’s because it’s the middle of the night, in the dark, in a moment that feels more dream than reality. Or maybe it’s because I’m in Ben’s arms with my face hidden against his T-shirt. Whatever the reason, it’s all too easy to drop my guard and let the words flow. “I had a panic attack on top of a glacier. I cried literal tears because I thought you might fall into a ravine and be swept over a waterfall.” At this, his hands, now hovering on my hips, give a gentle squeeze. “And now, I’ve narrowly avoided my second panic attack of the day because I’m afraid of the goddamn dark.”

“Okay, so you had a panic attack,” Ben says, unfazed, hands on the move again as he trails the tips of his fingers up my rib cage. A slow shiver rolls from my shoulders to the base of my spine. I don’t know what game we’re playing here in the dark, but I do know that our words and our bodies are having two entirely different conversations. “But how many people get to say they had a panic attack on top of a glacier on top of a volcano?”

A soft burst of laughter takes me by surprise, slipping past my lips and getting absorbed into Ben’s shirt. I unclasp my hands at the base of his neck, allowing my fingers to slip into the soft hair above his nape and gently tug. Now it’s his turn to shiver.

“The important thing is that you aren’t letting your fears control you.” His breaths are labored, and I watch the movements of his throat as he swallows hard. “You’re out here doing it anyway. Do you know how brave you are for that?”

“I don’t feel brave,” I whisper, sliding the hand that isn’t buried in his hair slowly down his chest and over his abs, reveling in the way each muscle contracts under my touch. He doesn’t stop me; I only stop myself when I reach the waistband of his sweatpants. “I feel like an impostor.”

“I think everyone feels like an impostor sometimes.”

Fingertips trail down the sides of my hips and my breath hitches.

All those years ago when things first started between us, it didn’t take long for me to discover that Ben Carter loves physical touch. Innocent touches like holding hands under the blanket, sitting close enough on the dock that our elbows grazed, or running my fingers through his hair when he’d lie with his head in my lap. Then later, not so innocent touches when he’d sneak between my sheets, those hands I loved so much on a mission to learn every part of me.

Now we’re two touch-starved adults on the verge of losing control. I’m pretty sure we already blew past the line where tomorrow we can pretend this was all just friendly, platonic behavior. And that thought is officially confirmed when his hands squeeze the back of my bare thighs, deliciously hard, and I can’t disguise the sharp inhale I pull through my clenched teeth.

“Too rough?” he whispers, lips grazing the shell of my ear in the only verbal acknowledgment of our physical actions.

I shake my head against his collarbone. “No, just give me a second.” Then I count five full Mississippis to get my breaths under control before I continue with our ruse of a conversation. “I’m not like you, Ben. You have this incredible gift, but I’m just ordinary.”

“Ems, you’ve never been just ordinary to me.”

His words aren’t loud or emphatic. They’re simple. They’re honest. And they steal any remaining thoughts I had as I let them pour into me. Let them swirl through my chest and make my heart dance. Let them flow down into my belly and send my already-worked-up butterflies into a frenzy. Let them seep into me, bone-deep, because I know Ben Carter always means what he says.

“Ben.” His name comes out as a whisper, a plea. I lift my head away from his shoulder, our gazes finally colliding. His eyes—pools of colorless intensity in the dim light—pour over my face. He reaches up and cups my cheeks, his palms rough and warm and everything good.

He leans forward.

In that moment, I forget all the heartache he caused me. I forget my seventeen-year-old self crying on the bathroom floor while the shower drowned out the sound of my sobs. I forget that I was unable to eat or sleep for weeks. I forget the all-consuming worry of wondering if I’d ever see or hear from him again; the realization after days turned to weeks and weeks turned to months that the answer was an emphatic no.

The only memory I seem to recall as Ben tilts my head to the side, edging closer, is how he used to kiss me. How he always tasted of cinnamon, and how he held my face in his hands, just like he does now, gentle and reverent, like I’m a precious jewel he’s scared of breaking. How his lips were soft but confident, his mouth capable of transforming my body with a want I didn’t fully understand back then.

I wonder if kissing Ben now would be as good as it was then.

I’m terrified it might be better.

My eyes flicker to his mouth before falling closed, my heartbeat pulsing in my throat.

But instead of feeling the press of his lips against mine, there’s a low-pitched hum, and Ben’s hands promptly fall from my face. When I open my eyes, the room is softly illuminated by the bathroom light once again, the power outage over.

“Christ, Ems, I’m sorry.” Ben steps away from me and paces in front of the bed, burying his hands in the disheveled hair I twisted between my fingers moments ago. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s fine,” I say, even though sorry isn’t at all what I want to hear right now. “No worries.”

“No, really, I am sorry.” He stops pacing and faces me. “You were scared and upset, and I came on to you.”

“No, no, please don’t do that. The last thing I need tonight is you treating me like I’m some damsel in distress you took advantage of. I’m capable of saying no to something I don’t want, and I was touching you just as much as you were touching me.” I lift a shoulder. “And nothing really happened so it doesn’t matter.”

He blows out a gusty sigh. “This is difficult, you know?”

“What is?” I ask, because I’m not sure it’s difficult for him in the same way it’s difficult for me. Maybe we’re both reliving our past, but unlike me, Ben isn’t a complete mess who’s incapable of doing his job.

“This.” He motions a hand back and forth between us. “Being around you again after all this time. It brings back a lot of…memories.”

“Good or bad ones?”

“Honestly? Both.”

He’s definitely not wrong about that. “Look, it’s fine. Really. We got a little carried away tonight, but it’d be impossible to share the history that we have and not get a little nostalgic. That’s all it was.”

Nostalgia does not equal getting handsy in the dark.

Ben lifts a brow as if reading my mind.

“Really,” I say with a smile, voice entirely more assured in my answer than I feel. “Now you should probably go, and I’ll see you in the morning.”

I make my way to the door and pull it open. Cold air sweeps in on the breeze and cools my flushed skin.

Ben passes me on his way out, expression indecipherable.

After I close the door behind him, I collapse against it and close my eyes, my confident smile quickly fading.

Chapter 12

Tip #7 when visiting Iceland: There will come a time when you have to put away your fears and just do the damn thing.

Day four starts at sunup, which in early September occurs before six a.m. We have some making up to do for yesterday—thanks to me and my unnecessary emotional breakdown(s). But I’ve vowed to do better today, so as I finish off a granola bar, I silently repeat the mantra I’ve mentally prepped myself with all morning: Today will be a day of yeses.

From the parking lot we stand in now, a trail leads off into a gorge, and we will climb a fence (according to Suki, there’s a ladder so no need to fret) and embark upon a short hike to the lesser-known gem of Kvernufoss, which I forced us to bail on yesterday.

Ben didn’t mention our inordinate amount of touching or the almost-kiss in the dark on the drive over this morning. Not even so much as an utterance or slight reference was made to any part of last night. Nothing. Nada. And it doesn’t bother me one bit. Because that’s exactly what I wanted anyway.

I stay lost in thought for most of the hike (not about Ben or the almost-kiss at all!), but when Kvernufoss edges into view, I automatically decide it’s my favorite of the spots we’ve visited so far. There are a few reasons. One—I don’t feel like I’m dying by the time we reach it, a welcome turn of events. Two—the way the waterfall is tucked away amid the twists and turns of the grass-covered gorge makes it feel like a secret hiding place. Three—no one else is around at this early hour other than Ben and me, so we have this magical little spot all to ourselves.

We continue down a gravel path until we reach a small hill centered about a hundred yards away from the falls. Ben drops his backpack and gets to work. To feel less like an impostor, I brought my own backpack along today, even though the only things in it are my notebook and another granola bar. I find a cozy spot nearby and take a seat on a rock (my Icelandic chair of choice) and start writing another description that will never properly convey the charm of this place.

Several minutes later, and at the distinct bleating of three sheep up on the hill, I look up to find Ben watching me stoically, cheeks red and breath forming a puffy cloud with each exhalation. For a split second, I think he’s going to say something about last night. Then something shifts in his expression with the clench of his jaw, and he says, “Come on, let’s get closer,” and slings his camera haphazardly over his shoulder.

We take a narrow trail that leads behind the waterfall, and Ben offers me his gloved hand whenever we encounter slippery rocks. Each time my fingers curl around his, he gives my hand a little squeeze, and I don’t know if it’s intentional and meaningful or if I’m just overanalyzing things again.

Cold sprinkles sting my cheeks as we reach our destination—a muddy pathway between the hollowed-out canyon wall and the sheet of cascading water forming the underside of the falls.

Looking back through the water, prisms of colorful light float through my vision as the morning sun catches the falls at all the right angles. Farther beyond, the tall grasses on the hills of the gorge sway in the gentle breeze, and my three sheep friends fill their bellies till their hearts’ content. It’s like I’ve been transported into a fairy-tale storybook.

Enchanting, that’s the word I’ll use in my article.

Suddenly I’m jittery and wired, my inhibitions carried away with the breeze. I think I might be travel-high. “Take my picture,” I say to Ben on impulse.

“Really?” His narrowed eyes reflect surprise mixed with uncertainty, as if he, too, is questioning if I’m high.

“Yes, really.” I put on my best faux-haughty voice. “Capture me like an influencer, Ben.”

A dimple forms in his left cheek as he laughs, and now I’m more than travel-high, I’m fucking soaring.

“Okay, okay,” he says, shaking off his laughter to match my faux attitude. “What are we hawking?”

“Hmm…” Tapping my chin, I glance down at my rain jacket, hiking pants, and mud-covered boots. Not many options here. “I suppose these hiking boots. The caption could be something like, ‘Your feet will take you on the journey of a lifetime. Support them as they do. Link in bio.’ ”

Ben bites the inside of his cheek, trying to keep his smile at bay. “Perfection. Come here.”

My stomach somersaults approximately three times as I walk to him, and then twice more when he tugs on my wool cap and adjusts my braid over my shoulder. Wisps of damp hair blow against my cheek as the wind picks up, and a cool shiver rolls down my spine, notch by notch. This is the closest I’ve come to Ben since last night, and memories of our almost-kiss replay in my mind. Ben’s sharp, green eyes meet mine again, and I know he’s thinking about it, too.

He clears his throat before the moment can linger. “Follow me.”

Ben helps me over a few large, slippery rocks as we near the edge of the path and close in on the underside of the falls, and I squeeze his hand a little tighter as nerves vibrate from my fingertips to my toes. Another point in Kvernufoss’s favor: From our spot behind the falls, we’re not that high up. If I fell over the edge, I wouldn’t necessarily die, probably just break a femur or tibia or something.

Stepping onto the final boulder, Ben pulls me up behind him, then asks, “You okay?”

And this time, despite my fear, I confidently look him in the eye and say, “Yeah, I’m okay.” Because I’ve already decided today will be a good day. Today I’ll ignore the voice in my head telling me I’m not cut out for this. Today I’ll be the Mona Miller I’ve always wanted to be.

Ben turns me to face the waterfall. “Put your arms in the air,” he says at my back.

“Like this?” I stretch my arms straight up.

His deep burst of a laugh puffs warm breath onto the back of my neck. My skin pebbles. “No. Like this.” He tugs on my arms until they’re lowered out at my sides. “Now tilt your chin up.”

I do as he says, imagining how this must look from behind. In the photo, my back will be to the camera as I stand on a boulder facing the underside of a magnificent waterfall, the earthy greens and browns of the gorge in the background, my arms outstretched as if I’m embracing the entire world and anything it could throw my way.

Ben moves away from me, and I hold my position while he gets into place. “All right,” he says, camera already clicking away, “on the count of three, say ‘influencer,’ ” and I hope he manages to get a few good ones before I erupt with laughter.

* * *

Iceland is one big island of waterfalls. More than ten thousand, by some estimates. And today feels like a competitive waterfall treasure hunt (minus the fun clues, sadly) as we rush from site to site, trying to squeeze in as much as possible while also allowing time for Ben to pull over and take photos when we happen upon an incredible view we hadn’t planned for (which happens A LOT). Normal tourists might linger at each of the places for hours, but Ben and I don’t have that luxury. So we speed through tourist favorite Seljalandsfoss falls and the lesser visited Gljúfrabúi waterfall to ensure we have ample time at our last official stop of the day, Nauthúsagil ravine.

Admittedly, this one makes me nervous. To reach the main event—a tall, skinny waterfall tucked away in a small alcove deep inside the ravine—we must hike through a river and then scale a smaller, prequel of a waterfall. Not to be concerned though—according to Suki—because there’s a metal chain to assist us in our climb. Up the waterfall.

So, No Worries At All!

As we exit the SUV, I’m haunted with memories from eighth grade when I attempted to climb a rope in gym class (not by choice). It did not go well, and I’m afraid this might be an equally traumatizing experience. It certainly doesn’t help that the most arduous activity of the day is also the last, when my body is tired and depleted. Come to think of it, eighth-grade gym was at the end of the day, too. Obviously, that must have been my hindrance.

Anyway, it doesn’t really matter because this is the day I prove to myself I can do this job just as well as Suki or any of the other Internationals. A day where I embrace every challenge Iceland throws my way. A day where I’m unstoppable, damn it.

“You ready?” Ben asks as he switches the lens on his camera at the rear of the SUV.

“Yes!” I reply way too enthusiastically after my internal pep talk.

Ben shoots an odd look at me before carefully tucking away the previous lens in its devoted section of his camera bag.

“Just hyping myself up. Ignore me.”

Slamming the lift gate closed, he slings the backpack over his shoulders. “You’re impossible to ignore, Ems. Always have been.”

He sets off toward the entrance to the ravine while I lag behind and pretend those words didn’t send my stomach into a state of free fall. Then I quickly compose myself and rush to catch up to him.

Entering the ravine, I tread over the slippery stones, keeping one hand on the rock wall next to me for balance. We hike for what feels like an uncomfortable amount of time to be wandering deeper and deeper into a ravine with no one else in sight. Just as I open my mouth to ask Ben if he’s sure this is the right way, the “mini waterfall” comes into view.

And, okay, it doesn’t look that intimidating. Taller than me, sure, but not the sweeping cascade of water I’d pictured in my head.

Up ahead, Ben turns. “We need to cross here,” he says, and points to the opposite side of the ravine. Strung along the far rock wall is a thin metal chain.

Crossing the stream isn’t difficult. The water isn’t very deep and thanks to my not-broken-in, blister-inducing waterproof boots, my socks and leggings stay dry. Reaching the opposite side is when footing becomes harder to find along the ravine wall. Hence the chain. I copy Ben’s movements, taking hold of the chain in both hands and hauling myself up along the cavern wall, toes and ankles turned outward as my face is brought within inches of cold, wet rock.

“You good?” Ben asks, looking back to check on me.

“Yup. Do this all the time.”

He huffs out a short laugh before stepping his way forward to the side of the falls, where the water is a slow trickle. Then Ben scales the mini waterfall, barely touching the chain I cling to, in all of five long, upward strides.

By the time I reach the bottom, where Ben stood seconds ago, he’s looming over me from above. “You’ve got this.”

Nodding my head, I repeat, “I’ve got this.”

Allowing the chain to slip through my fingers until my grip is just above my head, I wedge the toe of my right boot into a crevice in the rocks. I push down, making sure there’s enough leverage to hold me, then maneuver my left foot onto a different rock a little higher up. Continuing this slow-but-upward trajectory, I move my hands up the chain, testing each foothold before trusting it with my full weight. When my upper body summits the edge of the waterfall, Ben offers me a hand to help me the rest of the way. But I don’t take it.

“I’ve got it,” I say, determined.

Carefully, I release the chain and use my palms to push off the rocks at my waist and get a knee over the ledge. When I’m standing again, I dust my wet, muddy hands off on my hiking pants.

Looking up, Ben’s smiling at me as if I just medaled in a triathlon. “You did great, Ems.”

“Thanks,” I say casually, but I’m certain from the way my cheeks stretch tight that I’m beaming brighter than the fucking sun.

I climbed a waterfall in Iceland!

Scaled that motherfucker like it was nothing!

Granted, it was a mini waterfall. Still, I’m going to revel in these endorphins for the rest of the day. I feel just like Bear Grylls.

By the time we reach the waterfall we came to see, I’m practically hopscotching over the river stones. And what a beauty this one is. Walls of moss-covered rock form a circular alcove, and broken sunlight streams in through the opening far above our heads. Freshwater pours like a faucet over the far wall, forming the stream that pools at our feet.

“Now, this place is amazing,” I declare. “I’m so happy I made it.”

Ben holds his camera in one hand while he watches me. “Can I take your picture?”

“Right now?” I glance down at my waterproof jacket and pants, covered in dirt and other naturous debris. “I don’t know, I think my influencer stage has passed.”

Ben’s mouth twitches. “Well, that was short-lived.”

“Ah yes,” I say lightheartedly, “but all good things must come to an end.”

His grin falls away as intensity builds in his gaze. “Maybe that’s true. But maybe, if you’re lucky, you can get them back.”

My breath becomes trapped in my chest. “I’m, uh, kind of a mess,” I manage.

Ben shakes his head, expression now unmistakable. His eyes are dark green pools of heat, and he’s biting his bottom lip like he wants to do things to me. All the things. “You’re so fucking beautiful right now.”

My stomach swoops in a nosedive worthy of an aerial flight show. “Please. I just hiked through a ravine and up a waterfall,” I say, deflecting his compliment. “I’m soaking wet and covered in dirt.”

Ben moves closer, and the air is instantly thick and heavy, almost unbearable, unbreathable. “It doesn’t matter. You’re always beautiful. Please let me take your picture?”

Despite my multiple layers of clothing, the intonation of Ben’s voice makes the question sound scandalous, as if he’s asking to take my photo while I’m naked in his bed. Which is not something I should think about if I’m trying to tame this heated desire that has sprung out of the thin, cold air.

Then again, do I want to tame this feeling?

These superathlete endorphins are affecting my thoughts, emboldening me. If I can climb a fucking waterfall, there’s no limit to what I can do today. Maybe I want to be a little reckless. This is a day of yeses after all…

With a self-assured nod that comes from someplace within me I didn’t know existed until this very instant, I tell Ben, “Yeah, go ahead.”

Ben grins devilishly, then lifts his camera and starts snapping. I don’t know what I should be doing, or how I should be posing, and despite my bravery endorphins, self-consciousness works its way to my outer facade.

“What do I do?” I ask as Ben circles around me.

“Pretend I’m not here.”

“Oh. Well, if you weren’t here, I’d probably be scaling the ravine wall with nothing but a rope and my bare hands. I don’t know if you’ve noticed but I’m quite the athlete. To be honest, you’re kind of holding me back.”

Ben lowers his camera, an amused smile playing over his lips. “That so?”

I tilt my head skyward, closing my eyes and basking in a flash of momentary sunlight that sweeps over my cheeks. My smile is irrepressible, and a series of shutter clicks punctures the air. Ben’s attention is a drug, one that I’ve missed for far too long. Or maybe it’s the satisfaction of accomplishing something I didn’t think I had in me, of finally doing the things I swore I would do all those years I was in Hudson Springs waiting for my opportunity to shine.

When I drop my chin and open my eyes, Ben’s camera is lowered and he’s watching me again, the heat in his eyes from moments ago replaced by something sad, something remorseful.

And I can’t fucking stand it.

The hollowed-out ache in my chest propels me forward, and I know this is a bad idea but I don’t think I can stop myself now. My gaze holds Ben’s as I move toward him, and he reads something in my eyes that makes him set his camera down on the backpack at his feet. As soon as I’m within reach, his arms come around me and he spins me so that my back is pressed against the hard, wet ravine wall.

The heat in his eyes is back. Mission accomplished.

“Are we doing this, Ems?” he asks, so close now that his full lower lip faintly brushes my top one.

“We probably shouldn’t,” I breathe. Though I don’t know why I say it, there’s only been one other time in my life I wanted a kiss as much as I want this one right now.

“That isn’t what I asked.”

Unable to resist this pull between us any longer, I nod vehemently and tighten my arms around his neck. “Yeah. We’re doing this.”

Ben’s mouth covers mine the next instant, at once hungry and urgent and feeling so much like home I want to cry. I think I do cry a little bit, at least a small whimper escapes my throat anyway. At my stifled noises, Ben’s tongue sweeps across my lower lip, and I lose myself in this kiss. I pull him closer, forcing his body flush against mine, relishing the delicious weight of him pinning me against the ravine wall. His hands slip underneath my layers and clutch the bare skin at my waist, and I think he might be losing himself, too.

Kissing Ben is somehow still familiar and completely different all at once. He’s the comfort of the first boy I ever kissed and the thrill of a man whose body is brand-new to me. His shoulders are wider, his muscles stronger, his demeanor more confident and commanding. But he still tastes like cinnamon.

Ben’s thumb strokes across the bare skin at my hip bone, and my back arches in an involuntary spasm. He breaks our kiss then, pulling back and resting his forehead against mine while we both catch our breath.

“Goddamn, Ems,” he exhales.

Both of us are panting, and neither of us lets go of the other. Scents of fresh earth and Ben’s soap hang in the air. The only sounds are our heavy breaths and the water pouring down the ravine wall a few feet away. My mind is spinning, but I don’t want to think, I want to feel. And kissing Ben is the most incredible feeling I’ve had in years. Fourteen, to be exact.

“Did that really just happen?” Ben asks. His voice is filled with wonderment. As if he truly can’t believe where we are and what we did. It’s the vocalization of my exact thought that makes me bite down on my lower lip, the surge of pain ensuring this isn’t a dream.

Ben Carter is back in my life, and I just kissed him next to a waterfall in Iceland.

“It happened,” I say, not sure if I’m trying to convince him or me. Maybe if we try it one more time…

But Ben pulls back a little more, and I reluctantly let my arms slide away from his neck.

“Have dinner with me tonight?” he asks. “I think it’s time we settle a few things.”

Chapter 13

Tip #8 when visiting Iceland: Thanks to an endless hot water supply due to geothermal sources, it can be quite easy to lose track of time in a steamy, indulgent shower.

Instead of dining out for dinner, we stop at a market and pick up a bottle of white wine and a box of pasta to cook at home.

Home.

When the word drifts through my mind, I take pause. This isn’t home. Not even close. Iceland is thousands of miles away from home. I’m staying in a suite I checked into exactly one day ago. Yet grocery shopping with Ben, and then watching him carry those groceries into my suite and unpack them on the small kitchen table—just as he and the twins would do each time my mom returned from her weekly shopping trips with enough food for a small army—feels distinctly safe, distinctly comforting, and yeah, distinctly like home.

I definitely don’t want to feel this way, but I don’t think I have the power to control the way Ben makes me feel. The way he’s always made me feel.

“I’m going to run to my room and shower,” he says, shaking me from my thoughts. “I’ll be back over in a little while to start dinner.”

I stand in my own shower for far too long, replaying the kiss we shared today on a loop. Last night when the power was out and I found myself wrapped in Ben’s arms again, I’d wondered if he could still kiss me the way he used to. After today I know he kisses me better. Age and experience combined with the expert knowledge of what I like is a potent mixture. Now I wonder what it would be like to do more than kiss Ben. What it would be like if he were here with me now, in this steam-filled room with the hot water streaming over my skin like a caress. I imagine Ben’s hands on me, his mouth on me, and as I do, I close my eyes and place my own hands on my body.

My fingers trace the smooth, rounded curve of my hips and head upward to cup my breast. A breathy sigh dusts over my lips as I lean against the tiled shower wall, my legs already in a weakened state. As my thumb trails over the peak of my breast, I imagine it was Ben’s hand instead, and a rush of heat surges down to my pelvis. While one hand caresses and teases, the other moves with the flow of water down my stomach and slides between my legs. My middle finger lightly circles that particular spot, and I breathe a deep inhale as I sink into the wall at my back, my legs inching apart.

A shrill ping sounds from my cell phone on the counter next to the sink, jolting me from my…moment.

Probably not important, I think, eyes closing again.

Then I’m transported back to my fantasy of Ben in this shower with me, his tongue sweeping into my mouth, and I roll my nipple between my fingers, biting back the moan that rises in my throat.

My phone pings twice more.

Goddamn it.

Moment effectively shut down, I step through the steamy glass door. The cool air that greets me pimples my flushed skin and only heightens my current state of arousal. I grab a plush towel from the warming rack and wrap it around me, then pick up my phone to find out what is so fucking important.

Ben Carter

At your door.

You okay?

I’ve been knocking for five minutes.

“Shit!” I glimpse the time on my phone and realize I’ve been in the shower for forty-five minutes! “Oh my god.”

I check my reflection in the mirror. My skin is bright pink from my chest upward, my hazel eyes frenzied and unfocused, my lower lip swollen from being bitten between my teeth. I might as well hang a sign around my neck that depicts exactly what I was doing in that shower. “Shit, shit, shit!”

While I’m trying to figure out what the hell to do, my phone pings again.

Ben Carter

Starting to worry…

Without debating it further, I rush from the bathroom to the suite door, holding my towel tightly in place with one hand. When I yank the door open, Ben’s shoulders slump with relief. Then his posture stiffens again as his eyes sweep down my scantily clad body.

“Um, hi.” His voice is strained, eyes darting up to my face and then down again, like he’s really trying to be a gentleman here but is struggling.

I was already turned on before, and the way Ben’s looking at me certainly isn’t taming that desire. A wave of silky heat sweeps over me like someone poured warm honey on my skin, and I make a deliberate effort to twist my towel in the palm of my hand instead of reaching for Ben and dragging him back to the bathroom to enact my very fantasy.

“I, uh, I was in the shower, obviously, and I lost track of time.” My voice comes out low and raspy, most likely a dead giveaway to the X-rated scenarios running through my mind. “Come in.”

I shuffle a few feet away from the door as he enters my room so he doesn’t get too close and tempt me further with his scent or his…Ben-ness. With the way my body is thrumming, I don’t trust myself to let him within arm’s reach.

“I’ll just finish getting ready while you start dinner. If that’s okay.”

Ben casts a look back over his shoulder with a devious smirk that dumps gasoline on the roaring flames in my belly. “Please. Finish whatever you need to.”

I practically sprint back to the bathroom and slam the door closed behind me, drop my towel and jump back into the running water, twisting the dial toward cool.

When I emerge from the bathroom a second time, now fully clothed, Ben is setting two plates of tortellini on the table by the glass wall overlooking Iceland’s southern coast.

“Sorry again,” I apologize as I pad barefoot to the kitchen area.

“No apology necessary.” He turns toward me, backlit by the evening sun streaming in through the floor-to-ceiling windows, and I take a moment to soak in how good he looks. He’s wearing a charcoal gray sweater that appears soft, cashmere maybe, with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows, dark jeans that fit his thighs just right, and brown leather oxfords. His face is freshly shaved, and his normally tousled hair has been combed into place. Ben put obvious effort into his appearance tonight, and I, well, I’m wearing an old college T-shirt with a hole in the side. It’s a small hole, but still.

An awkward silence falls over us, and I wonder if Ben can tell how ashamed I am for clearly misinterpreting his invitation to dinner as casual. After that kiss, I should’ve known better.

“How about some wine?” Ben asks, moving to the fridge and retrieving the bottle of pinot grigio we selected at the market.

“Yes, please.”

After he pours us each a full glass, we sit at the table opposite each other, the air thick and heavy while we both pretend to eat.

“We’re really not going to talk about it then?” Ben finally says, pushing his plate away.

I swallow a bite of pasta and take a long sip of wine. “Talk about what?”

“Hmm, I don’t know, Ems,” he answers dryly. “Take your pick. The way we had our hands all over each other last night, that kiss in the ravine today, or maybe”—the corner of his mouth flicks upward into the most aggravating, sexy smirk—“what you were doing in the shower when I arrived.”

My fork slips from my hand and clatters loudly against the ceramic plate, splattering pasta sauce all over my T-shirt. “Benjamin Harrison Carter!”

Laughing, he holds up both hands. “Okay, sorry. We won’t go there.”

I shoot him a reproachful look that screams, You’re damn right we’re not going there, while I futilely dab at my shirt with a paper towel.

“Let me take you somewhere,” he says then.

“What? Right now?”

“Right now.”

I don’t know if that’s a good idea. “Ben, I already showered. I don’t want to get dressed in all those layers again.”

He stands from the table, a look of determination tightening his jaw. “You don’t have to. Just throw on your coat and your sneakers. We won’t stay long. Please?”

With a resigned sigh, I nod, knowing there’s no way I can say no to Ben with the big, round puppy-dog eyes he’s giving me right now. I move from the table and slip on my sneakers and grab my heavy coat, and right before we head for the door, I down the remainder of my full glass of wine.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, Ben and I sit on a blanket he borrowed from the hotel suite on the black sand shore of Reynisfjara beach. At this hour, dusk fades closer to twilight, and there are only a few other visitors out, mostly gathered at the cliff comprised of basalt columns to climb the steep vertical stones and pose for photos. Ben and I weren’t supposed to explore this beach until tomorrow morning before we head farther east on our journey, but I don’t think this visit is about the job. He didn’t even bring his camera.

I gaze across the vast expanse of ocean and let out a long, peaceful exhale, pulling my legs into my chest and resting my chin on my knees, the sound of the crashing waves lulling me into a state of languor. The smooth rounded stones and gritty black sand make for an aesthetically luring coastline, but like most things that have no business being as beautiful as they are, there’s a danger lurking unseen. Sneaker waves have been known to take unsuspecting tourists by surprise on this beach, so one must always keep their guard up or risk getting swept to sea. Ben and I sit far enough away from the shoreline to stay out of harm’s way.

“Ems, I know I screwed things up back then,” Ben says softly and out of nowhere. My head jolts in his direction, but he keeps his gaze fixed on the horizon. “I know I hurt you. Badly. And I know I have no right after what I did to ask you to forgive me, but I think we have to talk about it. And about what’s happening between us now.”

Tears flood my eyes as my throat and chest simultaneously constrict, which is exactly why I don’t want to talk about this. Ben’s correct about one thing—he doesn’t have the right to ask for my forgiveness. So why keep bringing this up?

Anger simmers under my skin, mixing with years-old hurt, and when I speak, my words are clipped with resentment. “Fine, you want to talk about it so badly? Let’s talk about it then. You hurt me in a way that no one has ever hurt me before or since. You were the first person I loved, Ben, and you broke my heart so completely that still to this day, I can’t fully trust another man. Because how could I when the one person I thought I knew better than anyone else, the person that I cared about for my whole entire life, my goddamn best friend, ripped my world apart in a two-minute conversation and then literally disappeared as if he’d never existed. So, there you have it, that’s the end of the story. As far as what’s happening between us now, that’s called getting caught up in physical attraction.”

The second I say those last words, I know they don’t feel right from the way they settle heavy in my stomach like I swallowed a brick. But fourteen years’ worth of resentment isn’t easily overcome.

Ben turns to me, watching with pain in his eyes as I swipe my tears away with the sleeve of my coat. “If you’ll just let me explain. Please?”

Scoffing, I shake my head. “Oh, you want to explain now? Where was the explanation when I showed up on your doorstep that next day? Or for the entirety of our senior year when you ghosted not only me, but my entire family?”

“I never wanted—”

“I don’t want to hear it!” I snap, ashamed my pent-up anger is surfacing on a public beach, even if no one is close enough to decipher my words. “You were everything to me, Ben. Fucking everything. That summer was the best summer of my life. I know it’s dumb because we were just kids, but I thought you were my person.” My voice falters, and my next words are nothing more than a broken whisper. “I really thought we were going to get married someday. And I thought you felt the same way I did.” I pause, swallow past the painful lump in my throat. “I thought you cared about me.”

“It isn’t dumb, and of course I care about you,” Ben says, voice strained like he’s been sucker-punched. “But I—”

“But nothing, Ben.” I rise to my feet, needing an escape from this conversation while I still have any chance of surviving it. “When you care about someone, you don’t sleep with them on their seventeenth birthday and then never speak to them again!”

I storm off in the direction of the car, my feet unable to transport me over the gritty black sand fast enough.

Ben doesn’t try to catch up to me, so I suppose I’ve managed to officially squash this conversation once and for all. For whatever that’s worth. Which right now, with tears spilling down both cheeks and an inconceivable ache throbbing throughout my entire core, doesn’t feel like a whole hell of a lot.

* * *

Back in my hotel room, alone, I clean up the remnants of our barely touched dinner and start to pour myself another glass of wine. Then I think, What the hell, and lift the entire bottle to my lips like an anarchist. Pinot floods my mouth and spills down my old T-shirt, but it’s already covered in pasta sauce anyway, so I ignore the wet spot and flip open my laptop.

Sinking into a kitchen chair, I open my email and get an immediate sense of impending doom when I see a message from Calvin, sent a couple of hours ago. I sit up straight and set my wine bottle off to the side. As I click to open the email, I rationalize with myself that Calvin probably emails all the Internationals to check in during their trips. Of course, it only takes a couple clicks of the mouse for that rationalization to be proven wrong, because the email is only one line.

One measly, infuriating line.

How is the recruitment of Benjamin Carter coming along?

—Calvin Cramer III

Chapter 14

Tip #9 when visiting Iceland: These Icelanders don’t fuck around.

If there’s anything that should distract me from the events of the past twelve hours, it’s the landscape stretched out before me at nine a.m. the following morning. Ben and I drove up to the peninsula at Dyrhólaey to view the dramatic cliffside rock formation that creates a circular arch as it juts out into the ocean. There’s also a lighthouse to explore, as well as sweeping views of the black sand beaches far below.

I roam the hillside paths as Ben searches for the best location for his shots, the salty ocean wind stinging my cheeks, the scent of brine hanging thick in the air. Gulls soar through the sky overhead before circling back to the rocky cliffs where they’ve nested, and tall green grasses sway with the breeze, a vibrant contrast to the coal black shoreline below and the white-capped waves that crash and recede, leaving their outline on the sand only for the next roll of the tide to wipe it away.

I might as well be standing in an ASMR recording, but instead of feeling peaceful, I’m miffed.

I can’t get Calvin’s dismissive, indifferent, cavalier email out of my head. For one goddamn line of text, he sure managed to get to me. So instead of enjoying the early-morning views of this picturesque location most people would kill to see in their lifetimes, I’m silently fuming. One little sentence and he manages to wipe away any confidence I’d started to build. A sprinkle of words and he’s reinforced the fact that this trip, this article, has nothing to do with me and everything to do with Ben.

Which brings me to the other thing keeping my peace at bay. After debating it over and over while I did anything but sleep last night, I’ve accepted a hard truth: I am the problem.

I’ve acted unprofessionally this entire trip. I have allowed myself to not only give in to my attraction to Ben in the first place, but then I yelled at him in public for something that happened fourteen years ago. The humiliation of knowing he knows how much our past still haunts me made it very near impossible to face him this morning.

So far, the only acknowledgment I’ve gotten out of Ben today was when we met up at the car and I pasted on my affable smile and said, It sure is a lovely morning out, isn’t it? Ben’s response came in the form of an eye roll and a mumbled, Christ. Are we really back to this? We’ve coexisted in silence since.

I have to fix this. Calvin’s email served as a stark reminder that I’m here to do a job, and I can’t recruit Ben if he isn’t speaking to me. Therefore, I’ve made up my mind; I will take responsibility and apologize for my actions. I’m just waiting for the right moment (and some courage), and then I’ll recruit the hell out of Ben Carter.

My courage doesn’t come in the very long, very silent two-hour drive as we leave the southernmost part of Iceland behind and head northeast to Vatnajökull National Park. But the rain does. And so does the wind. Along with some thunder for added fun. And like most Americans who don’t know shit about the metric system, I gravely underestimate the “moderate” 1.5 km hike to Svartifoss waterfall.

The brutal winds and torrential rain aren’t helping matters. As if it’s not enough for my muscles to struggle against my own body weight on the uphill trail, I must also struggle against the sudden blasts of air that pitch me off-balance and the raindrops that mix with my sweat and drip into my eyes, inhibiting my view.

All I can think of as I pull my hood tighter at my chin, thunder cracking overhead, is that this is it, this is where I give up. Yesterday’s confidence and accomplishments feel completely out of reach today, washed away by the monsoon currently pelting us. And a one-line email.

We round a zigzag in the gravel trail, and another steep incline looms in front of me, confirming my self-doubts.

“I can’t do this,” I say in a winded burst, coming to an abrupt stop and doubling over at the waist.

Ben turns at my voice, rain dripping from his eyelashes. “We can take a break.”

He slides his backpack off his shoulders, sighing as he sets it to the side of the trail, and it’s not lost on me—again—that Ben is doing this wet, merciless hike while carrying around equipment that probably adds at least thirty pounds to his shoulders.

I’m carrying a water bottle.

“Sorry,” I say when I’ve recovered enough to stand upright again. “I’m slowing you down and forcing you to be out in this rain longer than necessary.”

“It’s fine,” he says without looking at me. “I’m used to working in the rain.”

While that’s probably true, I guarantee he’s not used to slowing his pace to that of a snail to accommodate a partner in over their head. “I don’t think my body has recovered since day one.”

“Day one was the Blue Lagoon.”

“True, but they could’ve had the courtesy to warn me then that there aren’t enough healing minerals and silica in the fucking universe to prepare my body for what was to come.” I swipe the rain and sweat off my forehead. “These Icelanders don’t fuck around.”

“There you go.” Ben finally meets my gaze as a hint of a smile looms at his lips for the first time today. “A lovely quote for your article already.”

I smile, too, and maybe this start of a conversation is the opening I need to repair the damage I caused last night. “I’ll finish, I swear. I just need a minute.”

“Take your time, this is hard shit.” Just as he says it, a shirtless guy with rippling muscles jogs by us and offers a friendly smile and wave, his long, wet hair flowing behind him like a horse’s mane. “Okay, maybe it’s not hard for him,” Ben says as the man leaves us in his wake, “but fuck that guy.”

“I bet he does CrossFit,” I add, annoyed by someone who has their life together.

“Absolutely,” Ben agrees. “Probably at four thirty in the morning before he goes into the office to get an early start on the day.”

“I almost feel sorry for him. What an empty personal life he must have.”

Despite the humor in my voice, Ben’s almost-smile fades. “Yeah, poor guy.”

I don’t know what nerve my words struck, but I’m not willing to fumble this opportunity now that I have him talking again. “Look,” I timidly start, “I need to apologize for the way I acted last night.”

“No, you never need to apologize.” He wipes the rain from his brow. “I’m the one who fucked things up between us. Not you.”

A clap of thunder shakes the ground beneath us.

“Maybe so,” I shout to be heard over the elements. “But I shouldn’t be letting our old history affect me now. I know this is an odd situation we’re in, but it’s no excuse for how unprofessional I’ve been.”

“If you’ve been unprofessional, so have I,” he retorts. “Like I told you before, I don’t know if we have the ability to be purely professional, Ems. There’s too much between us.”

I think of Calvin’s one-sentence email, and my cowardly response: Recruitment’s going great! No worries here, sir!

“I think we have to find a way to be,” I tell him. “Trying to do my job and sort out our past, it’s too much.”

Ben watches me through the heavy downpour. “So, we’re what? Colleagues?”

In the question, I hear all the unspoken contradictions.

But we held each other in the dark…

But we kissed in the ravine…

But I know you better than anyone else ever has…

“Friendly colleagues,” I amend with a head nod for extra assurance.

I’m just not sure whose doubts I’m trying to assuage, his or mine.

* * *

By the time we drive another hour to make it to our last stop of the day, Glacier Lagoon, the weather has done an abrupt one-eighty. For the first time since we arrived, the sun makes a full appearance overhead, and the calm, icy blue water softly lapping at the black sand shore reflects the pillowy white clouds above. Icebergs ranging in an assortment of sizes jut from the surface of the water and glitter in the unexpected sunshine, the mountainous rise of a glacier looming in the background. Ben and I walk the water’s edge, stepping around washed-up chunks of ice that decorate the shoreline like sparkling jewels.

An inner peace finds a way to settle my worn-out soul as the sun heats my face, fresh air filling my lungs. I shift my gaze just in time to spot three seals surface in the lagoon not far from where we stand, the water swishing over their slick, leathery bodies.

“Ben, look!” I grab his arm and point to the cute sea creatures with their scrunched-up faces and whiskers, but then I realize these three fellas aren’t alone. There are dozens of them: some gliding through the water effortlessly, some disappearing below the surface as soon as I spot them, some lying out on the icebergs, soaking up the rare sunbeams.

“Guess I better get some sea-life photography to complement all my sheep photos,” Ben says. And it’s true. He’s taken approximately five thousand photos of sheep so far because they are everywhere.

Ben kneels to the ground, dropping his camera low to get an angle of the lagoon with a jagged piece of washed-up ice on the black sand in the forefront, a seal napping on a chunky iceberg in the distance. I cannot wait to see how these photos turn out.

“Hey, can you hold this?” Ben twists a lens off his camera and holds it up to me.

“Oh my god, are you finally trusting me with your camera?”

Outwardly, I take the lens from his hand like it’s no big deal. Inwardly, I turn into one big bundle of nerves because a fancy lens like this can cost thousands upon thousands of dollars, and I don’t have that kind of money just hanging out in my bank account for funsies. Before he unzips his backpack to retrieve another (also expensive) lens, he tilts his head back, squinting against the sunlight.

“What are you talking about?”

“I offered to help before and you turned me down.” I shrug a shoulder, keeping the hand that’s holding the lens perfectly still. “I figured you didn’t trust me with your expensive equipment.”

He scrunches his forehead like I’m ridiculous. “I’m just used to working alone, I guess. But of course I trust you. Especially with my equipment.” A smile breaks wide across his face as my knee swiftly connects with his ribs, throwing him off-balance so he has to palm the sand to stay on his feet.

“Oh, I can take one of you two together.” A woman with short gray hair and a thick wool scarf gestures at Ben’s camera as she approaches us. “You two make such a lovely couple.”

From his crouched position, Ben looks up at me, awaiting my response.

“Oh, that’s okay,” I reply. “We’re not a couple. We’re just colleagues.”

“Friendly colleagues,” Ben sarcastically mutters under his breath.

“Oh, what a shame.” The woman shakes her head like this is the most disappointing thing she’s heard in some time. “But even colleagues need a photo in this beautiful place.”

“She’s not wrong,” Ben says from below, and I’m tempted to knock him over again.

“Sure,” I say, because I’m certainly not one to be rude to strangers. “Why not?”

After quickly swapping out the lens, Ben passes his camera to the woman—who is clearly not as concerned about handling his expensive equipment as I am—with a few quick instructions, then turns back to me with an amused glint in his eye. Reaching my side, he places an arm around my shoulder, and I press my open palm between his shoulder blades. There’s absolutely no reason this kind of platonic touch should fill my stomach with swarming butterflies.

And yet…

We smile for the camera, and the woman snaps several takes before passing Ben’s camera back with another declaration of how lovely we are together and then traipsing off down the shoreline. Perhaps to make some other non-couple feel awkward.

“I guess we should, uh, get some work done,” I say, but it comes out like a question.

“Right,” Ben agrees. “Work.”

We separate so Ben can take more photos while I find a grassy area on a hill overlooking the lagoon to sit and write in my notebook. Yet work is the last thing on my mind. Even though I shouldn’t have let it happen, our kiss in the ravine yesterday is all I can think about. Despite last night’s argument on the beach and today’s subsequent agreement to be colleagues only, it feels like that kiss set something in motion, something unstoppable, something potentially devastating.

Regardless of the fourteen-year-old knowledge I have of the danger that lies ahead when it comes to Ben Carter, when I think of his soft mouth on mine, his rough fingers sinking into my bare skin, the press of his weight against me, I can’t shake that same heady, intoxicating feeling I had all those years ago, after the kiss that started it all that summer.

It was Fourth of July weekend, and my parents had gone out of town, foolishly trusting my brothers not to do anything stupid. Naturally, they threw a party and invited everyone they knew. Hours of too-loud music and poorly mixed drinks later, someone suggested a game of truth or dare. Quiet and reserved even then, especially then, I didn’t want to play, but my friend Jenny from AP Chemistry dragged me into the circle before I could protest. All was well until someone selected me for a turn. I chose dare, thinking that was the best option as all of the dares to that point had involved taking a shot or some other alcohol-related task, which sure seemed better than risking an embarrassing question I didn’t want to answer in front of all my classmates.

Unfortunately, the person who chose to call on me was Theo from the football team, and his dare involved making out with him in my bedroom. Having never even kissed anyone before, I panicked, crimson welts breaking out over my chest and neck as I muttered something about not feeling well and fled the room, the whispers of She’s such a child and She’s nothing like her brothers and How are they even related? trailing behind me.

Afraid to go to my room, lest Theo seek me out, I made my way through the woods and down to the lake, knowing I had at least an hour reprieve before sunset and thankful my classmates were too busy getting drunk and hooking up to move the “lake party” to the actual lake. It’s where Ben found me crying sometime later, having just arrived from his shift at The Boathouse. He’d begged me to tell him what was wrong, but I refused. It was too embarrassing. Then he’d said, Come on, Ems, let’s trade secrets. You tell me why you’re out here crying, and I’ll tell you a secret, too.

So I finally gathered my courage and told him the whole mortifying story, admitting that I’d never kissed anyone and how I felt so behind everyone else in our grade. He listened quietly as I poured my heart out, and when I finished, he did what he was always so good at—he made me better.

Instead of telling me not to be upset or dismissing my feelings, he sat with me for a long time in silence, listening to the rustling leaves and watching the fireflies blink in the dusky light. Eventually, he asked if I wanted to swim, and we stripped down to our swimsuits and leaped off the dock, the cool lake water a relief against the muggy summer air. We floated and splashed and jumped from the dock more times than I could count, my tears transformed to laughter, Theo and the rest of my classmates long forgotten.

Dusk inevitably gave over to night, and Ben lit the row of citronella torches installed at the water’s edge so I wouldn’t be afraid. When he came back into the lake with me, his demeanor had changed. No longer playful, it seemed there was something on his mind he needed to say. I remember the way his fingertips pressed into my wrist when he pulled me closer in the chest-high water, then how they moved under the surface to my hips when I went to him with no hesitation. I remember the squelchy mud of the lakebed between my toes, my knee bumping against Ben’s as I drew closer, the way I held my breath because while I didn’t know what was happening exactly, I knew it felt different, and big. I remember the moonlight reflected in his green eyes and his summer-tanned skin bathed in the orangey glow of the torches and his shy, barely-there voice when he asked, Do you want someone to kiss you, Ems?

Right then, in that very instant, in the lake I’d spent my entire childhood swimming in, my life irrevocably changed, forever split in two by a before and an after. Though I’d never considered the possibility, I suddenly wanted Ben to kiss me more than I wanted my next breath. So I nodded, heart pulsing so fast it was a vibration throughout my chest.

“But not Theo,” I quickly added for clarification, just in case I was reading the situation completely wrong.

“Yeah, fuck that guy,” Ben said with a grin, stepping closer so that he loomed above me, his fingers loosely trailing over the strings of my bikini tied at my hips. “Let me rephrase. Can I kiss you?”

Never before had I felt a physical reaction like the one my body had to that question. The electric current ignited across my skin, the background blurred in my periphery, an automatic yes formed on my lips.

Then Ben did just that, leaning down and pressing his lips to mine in a soft, sweet kiss that sent me soaring through the summer sky.

It didn’t last nearly long enough before he pulled back, those beautiful green eyes searching my face to gauge my reaction. “More?”

I remember the flickering worry of I just kissed my brothers’ best friend, but Ben was my best friend, too. And kissing him felt right and safe and good. “More,” I answered breathlessly.

When he kissed me the second time, he crowded me in the still water, wrapping one arm around my waist and cupping my jaw with the opposite hand. He gently coaxed my mouth open with his own, and when his tongue brushed against mine, a brand-new type of heat swirled low in my belly. He tasted like cinnamon, and for someone who had only begun kissing boys, I was instantly addicted.

When he pulled back the second time, I audibly whimpered, which made him smile really big. “Still good?”

“Still really good.” My pulse throbbed all throughout my body, including places where that had never happened before. Private places. But as the shock of what we were doing tapered, self-consciousness was waiting in the wings to replace it. I certainly didn’t want Ben to kiss me out of pity or friendly obligation. Was that what was happening? “Am I, um, doing okay? Is it…good for you, too?”

“Yeah, Ems.” There was a strained quality to his voice I hadn’t heard before as his arm tightened around my lower back, reeling me in once more. “It’s good for me, too.”

Then it was happening again. Ben’s mouth on mine. Our bodies melding together as he guided me to wrap my arms around his neck, lifting me in the water until my legs floated up to encircle his waist, his hands then settling under my thighs for support.

We didn’t break apart again until the thunderous booms exploded overhead, the dark sky splintering with color as the town’s annual fireworks show kicked off. We watched the whole thing from right there in the water, our bodies tangled together as Ben whispered in my ear his secret to add to our list—that he’d wanted to kiss me since kindergarten.

From that moment on we went from trading whispered secrets as best friends to spending secret nights together as so much more, Ben tossing pebbles at my window and us sneaking down to the lake to eventually sneaking into my bedroom and between my sheets.

Now, a cold burst of wind sends my notebook pages flipping, pulling me from my memories of the warm summer lake and dropping me back into present-day Iceland. Like waking up from a really great dream you don’t want to end, I can’t control the sadness that overtakes me or the desperate desire to go back to a moment in time that no longer exists.

“You ready?” I hear from behind me, and I don’t need to turn to know it’s Ben. I would recognize that voice in every situation, every dream, every lifetime.

“Yeah,” I say. “All set.”

I shove my notebook into my backpack and start off in the direction of the car. Ben walks ahead of me, glancing back over his shoulder every so often with that same devastating grin of his, that same spark in his green eyes that still undoes me.

I’m not quite sure how, but if I want any chance of being able to focus on my job again, I need to get yesterday’s kiss out of my head. Wipe it from my memory like it never even happened.

What I don’t need: the apologetic smile of the clerk as we check into our guesthouse near the town of Höfn an hour and a half later when she informs us there’s a problem with our reservation.

“What kind of problem exactly?” I ask, knowing there’s no way I’ll survive an only-one-bed situation in my current state.

“Well,” the young woman drawls, “as I’m sure you already know, our most enticing amenity is each room’s private outdoor hot tub with incredible views of the glacier.”

I did not know this, but I can tell the woman is filled with pride over this feature.

“People love to relax in the tubs after a strenuous day of hiking,” she continues, and this I do understand. Completely. Even my ligaments ache.

“Unfortunately, the hot tub for one of the rooms you have booked is down for maintenance.” She grimaces like this is the most upsetting news she could possibly be delivering to us. “But if you’re traveling together, maybe you won’t mind sharing?”

Oh.

So not one bed, thank god.

Just one hot tub.

That can’t be nearly as tempting.

Right?

Chapter 15

Tip #10 when visiting Iceland: Turning down an outdoor hot tub in Iceland is 100% impossible.

“Would you like another?” The waitress at the hotel’s restaurant bats her eyelashes in the direction of my empty wineglass. From her platinum blonde hair to her rosy cheeks, she’s eerily similar in appearance to the hot tub enthusiast working the front desk, and I get the sense this is a family-run establishment with a bunch of twentysomething siblings manning the place.

“I probably shouldn’t,” I reply. “But thank you.”

She loads my empty plate onto her forearm. “How about dessert then? We have a dark chocolate cheesecake that’s worth writing home about. Or a strawberry shortcake if that’s more your style.”

Across the table Ben’s eyes flash, a knowing grin forming on his lips. “What do you say, Ems? Strawberry is your favorite.”

It’s irritatingly charming that he remembers all these details about me. But not irritating enough that I’m willing to turn down strawberry cake out of spite. “The shortcake sounds great, thank you.”

“Anything for you, sir?” she asks Ben.

Without looking away from me, Ben says, “No, thank you. But do me a favor and bring two spoons. If I’m lucky, I can convince her to share.”

The waitress smiles politely and leaves our table, but not before shooting me a look that any woman knows to interpret as, You lucky bitch.

“An awful bold assumption, Benjamin, to think you have any shot at my dessert.”

He shrugs, grin slowly spreading. “I know the odds aren’t in my favor, but what can I say, I’ve always been an underdog.”

“Really? I always thought you were pretty good at getting exactly what you wanted.” It doesn’t occur to me what a bitchy slight that sounds like until it’s out of my mouth and Ben’s grin disappears. “Sorry, I didn’t intend that how it sounded. I swear that wasn’t a veiled reference to our past, I just meant that it seems like you ended up in a good place. You’re successful. You get to travel the world. It all worked out for you.”

He nods, seemingly accepting my apology at face value. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful for where I ended up, but there are definitely things I’d change about my life if given the chance.”

“Yeah, like what?”

He leans back in his chair and considers my question, one hand resting on the tabletop, thumb tapping a fast-paced rhythm. “Well, you asked the other night about friends, and it is hard to maintain relationships when I travel all the time. I think that’s a given. I do miss the kind of close friendships I had with Marcus and Mason. With you.”

I ignore the way those last two words make my chest ache as I clear my throat. “What about your mentor? The Dan guy who taught you everything about photography?”

Before he can answer our waitress returns with my dessert.

“Enjoy,” she tells us, setting down a ceramic bowl and two spoons before slipping off to another table in the half-full dining room.

Layers of shortcake and gooey strawberry filling overflow from the bowl in front of me. But right now, I’m more interested in what Ben’s willing to tell me, so I make no move to dig in. Neither does he.

“Dan passed away a couple years ago,” he tells me, voice flat. “Not long after my mother, actually.”

My heart seizes, compassion unexpectedly consuming me. I reach across the table and lay my hand over his, stilling his restless thumb. “I’m so sorry. That’s terrible.”

He gives me a sad sliver of a smile. “It was a really rough six months or so.”

Once again, I get the sense there’s a lot more he isn’t saying, but also that he doesn’t want to delve into this topic any deeper.

He clears his throat and says, “Eat your dessert, Ems.”

I slip my hand away from his, but not before giving it a squeeze for comfort. Determined to erase the pain clouding his eyes, the tension clenching his jaw, I pick up a spoon and hold it out to him. “Well, after that sad news I suppose I have to share my cake now.”

My goal is accomplished when his smile breaks wide. “That was the plan all along.”

Laughter bubbles out of me, warmth filling all the places that ached moments ago. An idea occurs to me, and this time it doesn’t feel self-serving to pitch Ben on working for Around the Globe. Maybe it’s what he needs.

“I think you should consider Calvin’s job offer,” I say, and across from me Ben’s eyes roll as he scoops a bite of shortcake into his spoon. “Just hear me out. It’s steady work and the assignments aren’t long. You’d be partnered with a writer on every trip, so you’d get to meet lots of different people. It could be really good for you. Give you more time at home and let you develop some routine and stability and friendships. I mean, where are you even living right now?”

“I’ve been staying in Hudson Springs dealing with Mom’s house, but I have an apartment in the city.”

“Uh-huh. And when’s the last time you saw it?”

Ben scowls grumpily like he knows I’ve bested him on this particular point but doesn’t want to admit it. “It’s been a little while.”

The more the idea takes shape in my head, the more convinced I am that this could really benefit Ben, which means I don’t have to feel guilty for knowing it would also benefit my career.

“Look, just consider it, okay? Even if you only did it for a little while to test it out. It wouldn’t have to be forever.”

Calvin told me to recruit Ben, he never mentioned how long he had to stay at the company.

“Eat your dessert, Ems,” Ben repeats, changing the subject.

But he didn’t say no.

I pick up my spoon and dive in, and a moan vibrates in my throat when the tart strawberry and sweet cream flavors explode on my tongue. When I look up, Ben’s slowly withdrawing his spoon from his mouth, dark green eyes intently focused on my lips.

Heat ripples through my belly. All-consuming, inextinguishable heat.

If sharing fries was intimate, this is downright pornographic.

And such a bad, bad idea.

Underneath the table, Ben’s knee brushes against mine. It hardly even counts as touching with two layers of denim between our skin, but it’s enough to spark what comes out of my mouth next.

“Would you maybe be interested in taking a bottle of wine back to my hot tub? Since yours isn’t working, of course.”

Ben doesn’t miss a beat before signaling our waitress. “Check please.”

* * *

“So…I fucked up.”

“Fucked up? Or fucked Ben?”

“Jesus!” I pull the phone a few inches away as Jacklyn’s exuberant laugh bursts against my eardrum. “No! I did not sleep with him!”

“Yet,” she replies as if this fate is already written in the stars.

“Okay, this isn’t what I called to hear.”

“Fine, fine,” she mutters. “I’ll be serious. Go on. What predicament have you gotten yourself into?”

I stand in front of the bathroom mirror in her barely-there, emerald green swimsuit with a V cut down to my navel, my dark hair pulled up in a high ponytail. Switching the call to speaker, I lay the phone on the counter so I can apply some shimmery highlighter to my cheekbones before Ben arrives. “Okay, so I’m a bit all over the place and probably not making the wisest decisions…”

“Spill.”

I fill Jacklyn in on everything that’s happened since our last call: the night Ben held me in the dark, our kiss in the ravine, how I yelled at him on the black sand beach just last night. I tell her every last detail, including how I decided to tempt the gods of lust by inviting him over for a nightcap in my functioning hot tub. When I finish, there’s silence on the other end. I hold my breath. Jacklyn’s never at a loss for words.

“Okay, here’s what I think,” she finally says, and I let out a long exhale. “I think you have to sleep with him.”

“WHAT?” I choke on my own saliva, sending me into a coughing fit.

“Just listen to me here,” she continues once I recover. “You’re clearly unfocused. You clearly want him. And I don’t think you’re going to be able to do your job until you get this out of your system, one way or another.”

“This isn’t any random guy,” I argue. “This is someone I cared about for a very, very long time.”

“But it doesn’t have to be about that. Trust me, sex can be just sex. It could be a what-happens-in-Iceland situation between two consenting adults.”

“What happens in Iceland?” I repeat as if she’s speaking a language I’m not fluent in.

“Yeah, you know, when in Reykjavík, whatever. You get the point.”

I don’t think I do. “We’re not in Reykjavík right now.”

Jacklyn sighs. “That literally doesn’t matter. Listen, from what’s happened so far, it sure doesn’t sound like Ben’s going to turn you down. Do the deed, break the tension, and get back to work.”

“I don’t know…” Everything in me rejects this idea. But what I’m doing now—seesawing back and forth from hot to cold hour by hour—isn’t working, either. Jacklyn always has her life together, so who am I to judge her methods?

There’s a knock at my door, and my stomach drops.

“Fuck,” I curse, rolling my head from side to side and shaking out my arms like I’m an athlete loosening up for a sportsball event. “I’ve got to go.”

“Keep me posted.”

I end the call and take one last look at the flushed woman in the mirror, silently telling her that just because there’s a hot tub and wine, and despite Jacklyn’s advice, nothing lascivious will happen here tonight. Unfortunately, her hazel eyes stare back at me with a judgment that says, You’re a goddamn idiot.

Two deep breaths later, I pad barefoot across the room, stopping to pull a T-shirt on over my bathing suit before opening the door.

Ben stands on the other side in black swim trunks and a faded gray tee, and shit, this was a terrible idea.

“Come on in,” I say, trying to keep my voice even and unbothered.

The rooms at this guesthouse are cozy and well kept, all designed with a sliding glass door that opens to a wooden deck encircling a sunken hot tub in the center. The view of the glacier in the not-so-far distance fades in the dusky light, and fairy lights are strung overhead between wooden privacy barriers separating us from our neighbors, making this the ultimate cozy spot for a little Icelandic romance.

Again, a really terrible idea.

Ben pours a glass of wine from the bottle he purchased from the restaurant before we left, and his fingers brush mine when he passes it to me. I take a long sip.

His eyes stay on me as I swallow. “You’re nervous.”

“I am.”

“Nervous enough that you regret asking me to come here?”

“No.” Taking my glass with me, I exit through the sliding door.

The Icelandic winds lift steam from the bubbling water and send it whipping around me as I step out onto the deck. Ben joins me a moment later with two plush hotel robes that he places over a patio chair off to the side. He strips off his T-shirt, and I let my eyes freely roam the grooves of his abdomen, the defined muscles of his chest, the intricate black camera tattoo on his inner biceps. God, he’s gorgeous.

His golden brown hair falls over his forehead as he steps down into the swirling water and then casts a look back over his shoulder and asks, “You coming?” with a devilish twist of his lips.

Fuck, this is a very, very terrible idea.

“Right behind you.”

I set my wine—which I definitely don’t need and, ironically, also definitely do—on the deck within arm’s reach of the hot tub and then tug my shirt overhead.

Cold air hits the exposed portions of my torso and creates pebbles across my skin. Or maybe it has nothing to do with the cold at all. Maybe it’s because Ben’s green eyes darken as they drink me in from head to toe. If I felt self-conscious in this silky, thin material in the bathroom, it’s impossible to feel anything other than sexy and desired with the way he looks at me now.

When he realizes I’ve caught him staring, he shrugs a shoulder like it just couldn’t be helped. “Here, let me help you,” he says, extending a hand for me to grasp as I step down into the water and take a seat across from him, our fingers lingering a moment longer than necessary before letting go.

“Oh god,” I moan, sinking to my shoulders, my tense, achy muscles relaxing all at once. “This hot tub may be the best thing that’s ever happened to my body.”

“Really?” Ben questions, a spark flaring in his eyes. “The best thing?”

We both know what he’s referencing. The nights he used to slip between my sheets after everyone else was asleep. The way we’d kiss until we were both desperate for more, our touches pushing the boundaries further and further as we explored each other’s bodies in brand-new ways.

“Ems?”

Sucking in a sharp breath, I pull my mind back to the present before I start to unravel. Unfortunately for me, this current setup does nothing to tame my lascivious thoughts.

“Yeah?” My too-shrill voice betrays me.

“You okay over there?”

“Mmmhmm. No worries.”

Ben reaches for my wineglass and lifts it to his lips, and there’s something practically obscene about the way his mouth covers the pink imprint left behind from my lip gloss as he swallows half of my prosecco. I’m suddenly aching between my thighs.

Setting the glass back down, Ben winces as he extends his arm, then grasps his shoulder with the opposite hand.

“What’s wrong?” I ask, concern momentarily overtaking arousal. “Are you hurt?”

“Not hurt. Shoulder’s just sore.” He presses his fingertips into the rounded muscle, rotating his shoulder backward. “I told you that you weren’t the only one getting beaten up by this trip.”

I’m not sure if it’s the memories of those heated nights years ago, or if it’s the incredibly sexy, wet version of Ben staring back at me through the rising steam, or if it’s the wine, or this swimsuit, or the conversation with Jacklyn. But for none of those reasons or all of them, I say, “Come here.”

He swallows, Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. “Are you…” He swallows again. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

No. “Yeah. Let me help you for a change. I’ll rub your shoulder.”

He eyes me, skeptical, but then makes his way over to my side of the hot tub. I take hold of his arm and gently pull him down to me, spreading my thighs so he can sit between them on the acrylic seat, both of us facing the picturesque view as the sun forfeits its battle and falls below the horizon for the night. When I have Ben where I want him, it’s like a gift, my fingers desperate to slide over his slick skin, to relearn their way around the curves of his shoulders, the dips and planes of his back.

The moment my skin makes contact with his is an electric shock, and I think Ben feels it, too, because his spine stiffens right before my eyes. With my left hand on one shoulder, I press the palm of my right to the back of his neck, applying pressure in a smooth downward stroke over the opposite shoulder.

“Christ, Ems.” His head lulls to the side to provide me better access. “That feels amazing.”

It’s amazing for me, too, having Ben this close, getting to explore his body with my hands again, and unlike during the power outage, this time I get to watch as I do. He’s the same as before in so many ways: his teasing smiles, his kind, unfairly gorgeous eyes, his expressions I can read like a book. But his body is different, his muscles rounder and fuller, his shoulders broader, the weight of him more substantial. I wonder what that weight would feel like on top of me, pressing me into a mattress.

I repeat the movement several times on each side of his neck, then sink my fingers into both shoulders simultaneously, massaging away the knotted tension. As I forge deeper into this dangerous predicament I’ve created, the heat in my core winds tighter and tighter with each stroke of my hands, and I suddenly want him so badly it’s hard to breathe.

Maybe when I put Jacklyn’s swimsuit on tonight I inherited her personality. That’s the only reasoning I have for why I stop massaging Ben in any kind of therapeutic way, my fingertip trailing lower and tracing my name across his shoulder blades. Then both hands disappear under the surface of the water as I gently scrape my nails down his lower back.

At his sharp inhale, I whisper next to his ear, “Is this okay?”

Ben leans to the side to gaze over his shoulder at me. My eyes fall to his lips, so close to mine it would take only the smallest movement to press my mouth to his and be kissing him again like we did in that ravine. The kiss I can’t get out of my head no matter how hard I try. The thought alone sends my pulse skyrocketing.

“You tell me,” Ben challenges. “I’m not the one that said we’re just colleagues, and I’m not the one who won’t even talk about it.”

He’s right of course. I’m hurling so many mixed signals his way this might as well be a game of dodgeball. But level-headed, reasonable Mona Miller who makes safe decisions above all else feels a million miles away tonight. Right now, I want to be a little careless. I want to do what feels good without thinking of all the reasons that I shouldn’t. And dear god, does Ben feel good.

My arms slide around his waist, hands spreading over his toned stomach. His breaths turn deeper under my touch, then his hands grip onto my outer thighs.

“Maybe I still don’t want to talk about it,” I breathe. “Maybe I want to act on it.”

Seriously, who is this person who has overtaken my body? I’ve never been this forward in my life. If this newfound gumption is the work of Jacklyn’s swimsuit, I’m never taking it off. I’ll wear it to the office underneath my clothes every day. I’ll finally have the courage to yank Shirley’s cigarette out of her mouth and stub it out on her desk. I’ll call Calvin Cal right to his face as I tell him to find someone else to plan Shirley’s umpteenth goddamn office celebration. The possibilities are endless.

Ben’s gaze burns into mine, the air between us sparking.

“Your turn,” he says, surprising me as he loops an arm around my waist and dexterously pulls me in front of him so that his inner thighs frame my outer ones. Gripping my shoulders, he begins to caress my achy muscles, soothing out the knots under my skin. Silence falls over us while he does glorious things to me with those talented hands of his, and my back arches like a bow as he works his thumbs down each individual notch of my spine.

“This isn’t fair,” I practically pant. “You feel so fucking good, Ben.”

All movement stops, and I realize what I’ve just said aloud.

But there isn’t time to think about it.

Ben’s hand slides around my throat as he frames my jaw between thumb and index finger and tilts my head back. His chest presses against my shoulder blades. “Do you have any idea what this is doing to me right now?” he whispers, gritty.

The soft press of his lips on the back of my neck comes the next instant, and the growing want that’s been building and building crashes over me like a tsunami wave. I don’t stand a single goddamn chance. Goose bumps rise along my skin, nipples tightening against my thin, wet suit. And when his lips part and his tongue sweeps over me, followed by the gentle bite of his teeth, I whimper as my head falls to the side. Hand sliding from my throat, over my sternum, and lower, Ben grips my hips and pulls me back against him until I feel his erection press against the curve of my ass.

Any chance of talking myself out of this burns to ashes. The flame that was lit with that kiss in the ravine is now inextinguishable, so I guess the only remaining option is to soak it in lighter fluid and watch it incinerate us both.

I pull out of Ben’s clutches to turn and straddle his lap, linking my fingers at the base of his neck as he grasps my waist and settles me on his thighs. Finally in my sights, Ben looks a little wrecked—hair damp and tousled, cheeks flushed pink, eyes molten green. No one has ever looked so good to me.

His thumbs press into my hips like he’s on the verge of losing control, and getting him there is suddenly my highest priority. I lean in, slowly, and press my mouth to his throat, returning the delicious torture he inflicted upon me. My hands grip the back of his neck, hard, fingernails sinking into smooth skin as my mouth works upward. Ben’s breaths are ragged now, and when I sink my teeth into his sculpted jaw, a strangled, “Fuck, Ems,” emerges from deep in his throat.

It’s not enough though. I need more. I need Ben to want me as desperately as I want him. I want him to fantasize about me when he’s in the shower, and in his bed every night when he can’t sleep. I want him to be so consumed by me that he can’t focus on anything else. I want to do more than affect him, I want to afflict him. So I pull back and let our gazes collide, knowing there’s no way to brace for impact.

Neither of us speaks, we don’t need to.

Then we’re kissing, hard and fast and messy and urgent.

Ben’s tongue slides between my lips, and I moan his name into his mouth. He cups my face with one hand, the other sliding up my back and underneath one strap of my swimsuit, frantically clutching whatever skin he can find. I grip his shoulders and pull him closer, feeling as if I might combust from the pure heat of this desire but never breaking away from his kiss.

Ben tastes like my prosecco, but I think I’m inebriated off him alone. I’m doing things I don’t normally do with men: I’m sinking my fingernails into his neck like I’m clinging to a life raft, I’m whimpering tiny little noises of pleasure into his mouth, I’m rolling my hips against him until he cups my ass in the palms of his hands and slides me over his erection. And when I feel how hard he is against where I’m throbbing painfully for him, I think there’s a strong possibility I might actually cry.

“Ems, we need to slow down,” he rasps, but his mouth is still on mine and neither of us makes any move toward his suggestion.

Instead, I cover his hand with my own and slide it up to cup my breast.

That does it.

Ben breaks our kiss, and we both gasp for air like we’re oxygen-deprived. His hand stays covering my right breast, though, just above the water’s surface. Then his thumb slowly traces a circle around the hardened peak, evident through the flimsy suit. And god, it would be so easy to slide the straps off my shoulders and be topless in this hot tub in all of two seconds. To let the heat of his mouth replace the heat of his touch.

“I don’t want to rush this,” he says, but his eyes never leave my chest, teeth sinking into his lower lip.

Aroused to the point of pain, I suggestively whisper the first thing that springs to mind, which happens to be Jacklyn’s advice. “We’ve certainly had our share of secret nights before, Ben. What’s one more? It could be a what-happens-in-Iceland situation.”

Ben’s expression shifts in an instant, eyes widening as if he’s been drop-kicked back to reality. His hand falls away from my chest as he sits up straighter, and under the water’s surface I feel the subtle push of his other palm against my hip. “No,” he says, voice low but adamant. “Not like that.”

The heat of desire is instantly replaced with the heat of shame, which possibly burns even hotter. I slide off his lap and move to the opposite side of the hot tub as I readjust my twisted swimsuit strap.

I am humiliated.

“Ems,” he says softly, but I can’t look at him, so I stare at the bubbling water between us instead.

“I don’t get it,” I whisper, more to myself than to him. How am I finding brand-new ways to let this same man reject me? Confusion and hurt and embarrassment interweave like ivy over my heart, spreading up into my throat to try and suffocate me.

“It’s not that I don’t want to,” Ben pleads. “I want you so bad you have no idea.”

“Obviously not,” I retort. “I’m practically naked on your lap in a hot tub, throwing myself at you. If you wanted it, it was offered to you on a silver platter for your taking.”

“Because I don’t want it like that, Mona.” His voice rises to echo the same frustration laced through mine. “I can’t do a onetime physical hookup if that’s what you’re looking for. Not with you.”

“Really? That’s news to me because isn’t that exactly what you did before?”

Ben flinches, and I know I’ve gone too far, but that’s the thing about old wounds; sometimes you’ve spent so long patching them up or pretending they didn’t exist in the first place that you forget how deep they cut. I want to take the words back, not only because of the pained look on Ben’s face, but because of the pain the words simultaneously inflict on me, ripping the scab away and leaving the wound as fresh as it was fourteen years ago. Tears seep into my eyes, but I blink them back as I move to the steps of the hot tub, the soothing water now only serving to slow my escape.

“It wasn’t like that,” Ben protests, but I’m already emerging from the water. I don’t feel the cold air on my skin or the comfort of the plush robe as I pull it around me. I don’t feel anything beyond old hurt and new embarrassment.

Back inside my room I march straight to the bathroom and slam the door. I hover over the sink and stare at the woman in the mirror trying desperately to keep it together.

A few minutes later there’s a knock. “Ems?”

“No, Ben. Just leave me alone.”

Despite the door separating us, I hear Ben’s frustrated sigh on the other side. “Sooner or later, we’re going to have to deal with this.”

I don’t say anything back. And after a moment, the door of my hotel room clicks shut.

Chapter 16

Tip #11 when visiting Iceland: Seyðisfjörður is an adorable, must-see town (but watch out for heavy pours on those vodka sodas).

If there was ever a good day to spend approximately six hours in a vehicle with someone, can confirm it is not the day following your road trip partner’s stone-cold rejection of you. It just doesn’t make for a fun-filled excursion. Especially following a less-than-stellar checkout experience at the guesthouse where you were rejected, in which the bubbly young clerk kindly asked, Did you all get a chance to try out that hot tub?

Unfortunately, I’d huffed at the same time Ben sighed, It was certainly an experience.

After that, no words were spoken on the four-hour drive north to Stuðlagil Canyon, which might have had something to do with my earbuds staying in place (Ben didn’t need to know they weren’t playing anything) and my laptop remaining flipped open on my thighs (focusing on a screen in a moving vehicle makes me nauseous, but desperate times and all that) for the entire journey. Under normal circumstances, I’d courteously offer to split such a long drive, but I’m not feeling particularly courteous today.

Good news, with so much time on my hands, I started work on my article by transcribing the notes from my journal and coming up with a framework for the opening paragraphs. Bad news, none of it will matter if Calvin doesn’t get what he wants from me. And what he wants spent all day in the driver’s seat silently brooding while we both pretended I didn’t throw myself at him last night.

After we’d finished exploring Stuðlagil Canyon—because an 8 km hike in complete silence was just what I needed today—we made another two-hour drive east and checked into our residence for the night in the tiny coastal village of Seyðisfjörður.

By the time I shower and make my way into town to forage for food (alone), I’m exhausted and famished. I walk the streets lined with brightly colored buildings and pass by the Blue Church that I instantly recognize from my research on the town. Leading away from the church, a street painted in squares matching the rainbow—Seyðisfjörður’s own version of Rainbow Street—is flanked with shops and restaurants.

And Ben.

His camera is aimed down the colorful street at the pale blue church, its steeple haloed by the evening’s orange and pink sky. I slip past him without drawing his attention, dipping into a square-shaped building with a painted sign on the front advertising local beer. Inside, I make my way up to a polished wooden bar, and the person working the counter motions for me to choose a seat. The restaurant is half-full at nine o’clock, and I’m surprised it isn’t busier. Tourists probably outnumber the locals in this tiny village, and with limited options for dining and nightlife, I’d imagined most places would be fully packed. Then again, everyone is probably so goddamn tired from a full day of “moderate” Icelandic activities that they skipped dinner and went to bed hours ago. If my stomach wasn’t screaming at me for sustenance, I would have done the same.

I’m mostly finished with my dinner when a muscly man with hay-colored hair and icy blue eyes sinks into the open seat to my left and summons the bartender. He looks to be in his thirties like me, and when the bartender comes to take his order, his American accent catches my ear.

“You’re American?” I say, rudely interrupting his drink order.

He eyes me for the first time. “Yes,” he drawls in a distinctly Southern (and suspicious) accent.

“Sorry,” I say, realizing I’m being weird. But most accents I’ve heard here have been European. “I am, too. Please ignore me.”

The man smiles, revealing a set of perfectly straight, shockingly white teeth, and his expression changes as he looks me over. “Can I buy my fellow American a drink then?”

“Oh, that’s okay. I was just about to…”

I trail off when the door to the restaurant swings open and Ben appears in the doorframe, backlit by the fading sunlight. He’s dressed in an emerald green sweater, a gray wool coat, and dark jeans, and as he steps through the doorway, he pulls off his beanie and runs a hand through his messy, golden brown hair. The sight of him affects me, viscerally, and by the pit forming in my stomach, I know without a doubt I’m about to do something very, very stupid.

“Actually, a drink wouldn’t hurt,” I say to Blond Man who is not Ben. “I’ll take a vodka soda.”

Smile widening, the man turns to the bartender and orders our drinks, but I don’t hear the specifics because I’m too busy staring at Ben. He catches my gaze and makes a quick appraisal of the situation, jaw tightening as he takes in the stranger at my side. When he blinks back to me, I can read the disappointment in his eyes from across the room, and guilt fills the open chasm in my stomach.

Looking away, Ben takes an open seat at the opposite end of the bar, and I realize the man at my side is speaking again.

“I’m sorry. What was that?” I turn his way and offer a friendly, but not too friendly, smile.

“I asked your name,” Blond Man says.

“Oh.” Should I tell this guy my real name? This is so not me. Where is Jacklyn when I need her? “I’m Mona. Mona Miller. From New York. Brooklyn to be exact.” Shit, I might as well provide him my fucking address in case he wants to come murder me on his next vacay. How am I thirty-one years old and failing basic Stranger Danger 101?

The man’s smile is overtly smarmy as he looks me up and down. “Well, Mona from Brooklyn, I’m Tad from Charleston.”

“Todd?”

“No. Tad. As in Tad Peterson Jr.”

Dear god, what have I gotten myself into? Even this man’s name is off-putting. Still, I smile warmly as the bartender returns with our drinks.

An hour—and four vodka sodas—later, Tad has told me all about his work as some kind of finance bro (classic), his historic home in the city (probably bought with Tad Peterson Sr.’s money), and how if I ever visit Charleston, he’ll be happy to “show me around” (his bedroom, I’m certain). But I laugh and flirt (and mostly drink since he won’t shut the fuck up) because as childish as it is, I want to make Ben feel a sliver of the rejection I felt last night. That I felt fourteen years ago.

Also, I’m a little drunk.

Ben remains seated across the bar. He’s finished his dinner and now sits with his palm hovering over a crystal tumbler of whiskey, rotating it in his fingers but never sipping. I haven’t made eye contact with him since he first walked in, allowing myself only lightning-fast glances here and there, but I feel his stare scouring my skin.

While I’m laughing at some joke I didn’t listen to (and that might have been a bit misogynistic from the part I did catch), Tad leans in too close to my face and whispers, “Let’s get out of here.”

A shiver runs up my spine. Not the good kind. “I don’t think I’m in any condition for company tonight.” I shake my empty glass for emphasis, the melting ice cubes clinking together.

“You only had a few drinks, sweetheart.” The term of endearment makes bile rise in the back of my throat. Tad stands and tosses some bills on the bar to cover our drinks, suddenly impatient. “Come on, let’s go.”

His hand wraps around my upper arm, but I jerk away. This is quickly escalating to something I never intended. “Look, I appreciate the drinks, but I’m not leaving here with you.”

Tad, unfazed, simply smirks. “Come on, baby.” He leans into my space again, and this time his hand starts rubbing my lower back. “I promise I’ll show you a good time.”

Again, I twist away from his touch and say, “Please stop.”

The room is starting to spin now, the effects of that fourth drink setting in hard, and nothing feels real anymore. Before I process what’s happening, Ben is at my side, his voice hard and syllables clipped when he tells Tad, “You heard her. She’s not going anywhere with you.”

“Who the fuck are you?” Tad demands, puffing his chest out like some strange bird claiming its territory. “She can go anywhere she wants.”

Oh shit.

“Yes, she can,” Ben says. “And she already told you she doesn’t want to leave here with you.”

The scene in front of me feels like a bad dream. Hazy around the edges, the warmth in my belly turning sour.

“You ready to go, Ems?” Ben asks me, and when I finally look up at his gorgeous green eyes, filled with concern but not a single trace of judgment, shame fills me.

I nod pathetically.

“That’s not even her name, asshole.” Tad smirks, like this is some sort of win for him.

“Come on,” Ben says gently, ignoring Tad and taking my elbow. When I stand from the barstool, the floor is a Tilt-A-Whirl beneath my feet, but Ben’s solid grip steadies me.

Once I have my bearings, he pulls my coat off the chairback and holds it open for me to slide my arms into.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Tad, Todd, whoever, barks. “You let me buy you drinks all night and now you’re leaving with him?”

“Piece of advice.” Ben wraps his arm around my shoulder, and I lean into his side for balance. “Buying drinks for a woman doesn’t entitle you to her body. Maybe learn that before you inflict yourself on the public again.”

Tad’s face goes fire-engine red, and he grabs hold of Ben’s sweater, his other fist clenched at his side. “You arrogant son of a bitch.”

Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god.

I am worried.

Very, very worried!

Ben takes a deep, measured breath, the kind that suggests it’s taking everything in him to keep his cool. As he does, he slides his arm away from my shoulder, gripping my forearm instead and guiding me to stand behind him. Then he says to Tad, “Take your hand off me. Now.”

Others seated nearby watch and whisper about what’s going down. Across the room, the bartender and another restaurant employee, both wearing fraught expressions, head in our direction. There’s practically zero crime in Iceland but leave it to Americans to bring violence into the country.

Still seething, Tad glances around the bar and then releases Ben’s sweater from his clenched fist. “Whatever. I’m not ruining my trip over some dumb slut.”

There isn’t time to react to how fast Ben lunges at him, barstools falling to the side with a thundering clatter as he pins Tad against the nearest wall and presses his forearm into the guy’s windpipe.

“BEN, NO!” I shout, stumbling forward and pulling at the back of his coat. “What he said doesn’t matter. Let’s just go! Please, let’s just go!”

Without another word, Ben releases him and slings his arm over my shoulder. Then he leads me out of the restaurant, not slowing until we’ve made our way down the rainbow-painted pavement and stand in front of the Blue Church. Then he drops his arm from around me, folding at the waist with his hands on his knees. He pulls air into his lungs and forces it out in restrained measures, as if he’s trying to regain control of himself.

“I’m so sorry,” I plead with him. “I’m so, so, so sorry.”

“You don’t need to apologize.”

“Yes, I absolutely do. That was all my fault.” The cold night air does nothing to lessen the heat burning my cheeks. “I brought that on myself. That was so fucking stupid of me.”

Standing upright, Ben moves closer and takes my face between his hands. “That wasn’t your fault. That was his fault. You’re allowed to interact with someone without it leading to anything further.”

Despite his words, Ben’s eyes are filled with a potent combination of hurt and fury, and it might as well be a knife taken to the center of my chest. “But look what I did. Look what I did to you. You’re so angry.”

“I’m not angry at you, Ems.” He strokes my cheek, a gentle, heartbreaking juxtaposition to the tension holding the rest of his body captive. “That guy was just…and I just…I don’t like losing control of my emotions.” His hands fall away as his eyes scan me over. “But that doesn’t matter right now. Are you okay?”

I’m not, but I nod anyway.

We stand there silently watching each other in the cast-off glow of a streetlight, me having no earthly idea what to say or do. Before I can come up with anything, Ben pulls me into him, wrapping me up in his arms. I cling to the sides of his sweater and let the closeness of him soothe me as I struggle to keep my emotions from surfacing. I don’t even know what I’m feeling really. I just know it hurts. I guess that’s what four vodka sodas will do to a person.

After a long moment, Ben slides his arm back around my shoulder and guides me on the short walk back to our accommodations for the night—a historic schoolhouse renovated into two apartment-style rentals. Ben’s apartment is on the bottom level, mine on top, but he helps me unlock my door and make my way up the steep, creaky old staircase.

After leading me straight to the bedroom, Ben goes to retrieve a glass of water and some ibuprofen while I slip into the bathroom and get ready for bed. Splashing cold water on my face, I catch my piteous reflection in the mirror. Eyes red-rimmed. Cheeks and nose pink with an alcohol-induced flush. Dark brown hair a frizzy mess. I blink away, unable to face myself.

Back in the bedroom, Ben’s waiting with a full glass of water and some pills, and I take them with a muttered, “Thanks.”

I manage to get my coat off all on my own, then my shoes, before crawling into bed with the rest of my clothing still on. Laying my head on the soft pillow, I close my eyes, only to be hit with a wave of vertigo so nauseating that I force them open again.

“Since you’re settled now, I’ll take off.” Ben’s familiar cadence is my only comfort. The thought of him leaving me right now is unbearable.

“Please don’t go.” I’m desperate when I say it, when I reach out and grasp his arm, but I don’t have the capacity to care currently. “Please stay with me tonight, Ben. Please. I feel so awful right now, but I feel better with you. I always feel better with you.”

He looks me over, eyes soft, any trace of the anger that burned through him at the bar now dissipated. “Okay,” he agrees. “I’ll sleep on the couch.”

“No.” I emphatically shake my head, which does not help my vertigo. I press the palm that’s not gripping the sleeve of Ben’s coat to my forehead, trying to push away the pain behind my eyes. “Here. With me. Please?”

I hold my breath as Ben considers it, exhaling in relief when he nods down at me, just once. He moves out of my reach as he slips off his shoes and lays his coat across the chair in the corner, then undoes the clasp on his silver wristwatch and sets it on the nightstand alongside his phone. There’s something so intimate about the process, about his movements as he pulls his sweater off, leaving his white undershirt in place, and ensures there’s a triangle of light trickling in from the hallway before shutting off the lamp and slipping into bed beside me. Visions descend upon me of Ben doing this every night, of the two of us in bed together in my apartment back home, and the longing that fills me floods my eyes with tears and makes me grateful for the semidarkness.

Undoubtedly because my inhibitions left my body as I downed my second drink of the night, when Ben settles in the sheets beside me, I roll toward him and rest my cheek on his chest. Just above his heartbeat. Just like I used to. “Thanks for staying.”

“You’re welcome.”

We lie in silence for a long time, the tips of his fingers stroking up and down my upper arm in slow, soothing motions.

“I’m sorry again for the way I acted tonight,” I eventually say. “It was immature and childish, and I wasn’t ever interested in—”

“It’s okay,” he cuts me off. “I understand why you did what you did. I’m sorry I hurt you last night. It wasn’t my intention. It’s never my intention.”

His fresh cotton scent pulls me closer, and I snuggle against his neck and let my fingers trace his collar. But my mind struggles against the alcohol haze to piece together the reaction I saw in him tonight. It isn’t so much the anger that doesn’t sit right with me, the truth is the Tad/Todd asshole had it coming, but instead I’m haunted by the reaction Ben had to that anger afterward in the street. He was shaken. As if he was afraid of himself.

The night we had dinner in Reykjavík, he told me things had been bad at home all those years ago, and the more I ruminate on my past—our past—throughout this trip, the more I’m starting to remember things that didn’t necessarily stand out to me then that maybe should have.

As close as Ben and my brothers were, why weren’t they ever at his house? And when I think back on all those soccer games Ben actually hated, why is it that I recall only my parents cheering whenever he scored a goal, taking him out for pizza with us afterward and then always back to our house? Where were his parents? And why can’t I remember Ben’s father’s face at all?

As unease expands in my chest, bits of a new memory spring to mind. Me as a teenager watching some Cameron Diaz rom-com on TV. Whispered voices coming from the kitchen. Peeking around the corner and seeing Ben in his navy Boathouse T-shirt with his red plaid flannel tied at his waist. My mother speaking to him in hushed tones, her hands on his shoulders as if comforting him. Then she hugged him. And now guilt fills me as I recall my only thought at the time being, Mom even pays more attention to Ben than she does me.

I swallow hard, ashamed of my younger self.

Equally ashamed of my older self tonight.

“Ben?” I whisper into the quiet room. His hand is still at the small of my back. “Are you still awake?”

“Yeah, I’m awake.”

“You want to trade secrets? Like we used to.”

A long pause.

“Please?”

“What do you want to know?” he finally asks.

Probably because I’m still drunk is how I summon the courage to say, “Exactly how bad were things for you at home? You know, back then.”

Because my hand is on his chest, I feel his breaths pause. And because my forehead is tucked against his neck, I feel the movements of his throat as he swallows before replying, “It was…really bad.”

The sorrow that hits me in that moment is like nothing I’ve ever felt before. All I want is to make it better for him, then and now, even if that’s something I can’t possibly achieve. So I do what I can to offer comfort by sliding my arm around his waist and squeezing him tight. “Will you talk to me about it sometime? I mean, only if you want.”

He shifts against me, presses his lips to my forehead in a kiss that makes me ache as equally as it soothes. “Yeah, we’ll talk about it sometime. I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”

“You want to know one of my secrets?” I whisper, needing to give something of myself back to him.

“Always.”

“You’re the only person in the world that makes me feel this safe.” It’s a confession I’ll probably regret tomorrow. But tonight, in the near dark, it feels like unloading a burden. I close my eyes, exhaustion setting in, and the room is finally still. “But don’t tell anyone else that. Pinky-promise?”

A soft chuckle bounces his chest. “I promise.” He twists his pinky around mine, leaves our fingers entwined over his heart. Another moment passes, and then, “Hey, Ems?”

“Hmm?” My body is heavy now, sleep only a few breaths away.

“Why are you so afraid to let me be in your life again? If you say you trust me?”

“Because I trust you with my life, Ben. But I’m not sure I trust you with my heart.”

Chapter 17

Tip #12 when visiting Iceland: Sometimes “a hike” is code for rock-climbing.

A sunbeam lands on my cheek, rousing me from sleep. In my slumberous state, I don’t know where I am, only that I’ve never been this comfortable in thirty-one years of life. I snuggle my cheek deep into my pillow, wanting to stay in this bed for the remainder of my years. I see no purpose in moving again. My work here is done.

It’s not until I nearly tip back over the edge of consciousness once more that the pressing weight around my waist shifts. Which is silly because my weighted blanket cannot move on its own. Another silly thing: I don’t hear the traffic in the streets, or my neighbors’ rambunctious kids thundering down the hallway on their way to school, or Jacklyn walking last night’s hookup to the door. I hear…quiet.

The weight around my waist shifts once more, and I squint against the morning light.

Iceland.

Seyðisfjörður.

Historic schoolhouse.

Ben!

Glancing down, my eyes confirm what my brain is catching up to—Ben’s forearm around my waist, my back pressed to his front as we lie on our sides facing the window that overlooks the tiny, picturesque town.

No wonder I’m so goddamn cozy; we’re cuddling!

Eyes wide open now, a dull ache starts at my temples, spreading toward the center of my forehead as visions of last night reappear one by one. Todd Jr. (I think that’s his name). Four (!!!) vodka sodas. My pathetic attempt to make Ben jealous, and then subsequently begging him to stay with me after I fucked it all up. Jesus. I, Mona Miller, have unlocked a newly discovered portal into a brand-new world of mortification. Population: one.

Ben must awaken as I stiffen against him, because his hand slides between my rib cage and the mattress, holding me even closer as if he’s afraid I’m going to bolt. “Ems,” he whispers, “don’t freak out about this.”

“I’m not.” I am! “I wouldn’t.” I would!

“Nothing happened between us,” he continues, pleading his case. “We’re both fully clothed. You didn’t feel great and asked me to stay. I did. That’s all.”

He thinks I don’t remember last night. In the inebriated state I was in, that’s not surprising or entirely inaccurate. While I recall the overall (humiliating) picture, the details remain fuzzy. However, he’s wrong about nothing happening between us. Something very real did happen. At least it did for me. Because whether or not it’s going to cost me my career, or worse, my heart, I have very, very strong feelings for Ben Carter. Again.

“I hate that you think you need to explain. I know you wouldn’t take advantage of me.” I say it to the square window across from me because I don’t have the courage to look at him yet. Or maybe I don’t want to risk moving from this exact spot and losing the comfort of his embrace. “You know I trust you.”

“Yeah. I know you do.” His forearm flexes around my waist, and damn it, he feels so fucking good. I want to lie here for hours, days, years. “With some things anyway.”

My heart stutters.

I roll to my back, losing the cocoon of comfort he’s woven me into. Ben rests his head in his open palm and peers down at me. If waking up with my body tangled with his was confirmation of my feelings for him again, the visual of him in bed with me in the early-morning light, hair sticking out in every direction and eyes still hooded with sleep, well, that makes those feelings dangerously potent. I long to pull him down to me, to have his mouth cover mine, to strip off last night’s clothes and feel his warm skin bare against mine. But my mind sticks on his words, and I replay the broken clips from last night again, wondering what all I’m not recalling.

“What does ‘with some things anyway’ mean?”

“It doesn’t matter,” he says, but the weary look in his eyes tells a different story. “We should get going.”

Ben rolls out of bed and disappears through the bedroom door while I scramble to piece together everything Drunk Mona said last night.

* * *

A good thing about day seven is that our schedule is light—comparatively speaking. After journeying farther northwest, we’ll have only a couple hours of hiking today, which at this point my thighs are counting as a win. As we drive down a seemingly never-ending gravel road, tires kicking up a cloud of dust in our wake, the scenery around us is unsettling at best. Gone are the moss-covered mountains and fields of bleating sheep, replaced by long stretches of dry, cracked dirt.

Even the name of our destination, Dettifoss, has an ominous ring to it.

We eventually make our way to a parking lot—with a restroom, thank god, because I was getting the impression civilization might be a thing of the past, and the very last thing I want to ask of Ben is to be my lookout while I pee behind a rock. In the elements.

When Dettifoss comes into view, my stomach plummets. Because Dettifoss is a raging, thunderous monster. A gaping hole in the earth devouring anything and everything flowing near its beastly mouth. Powerful doesn’t do it justice. Neither does formidable or mighty or fierce. The only word that sticks in my mind is brutal. A violent, unrelenting brutality of nature that makes me uneasy simply viewing it from the safety of the sidelines.

It is unapologetic.

It is magnificent.

“What do you think?” Ben shouts over the raging downpour as we make our way closer to the rocky outpost near the top of the falls, the tourists gathered there resembling tiny gnats in comparison to the beast at their side.

“Literally. Unbelievable.”

While Ben takes his place among the other sightseers, I hang back a bit and lean against a boulder, one that vibrates from the sheer force of the falls, prepared to wait from a safe distance that doesn’t make my legs tremble.

Ben has to work slowly to keep the cast-off spray off the camera lens, but I don’t mind. It gives me time to put order to my thoughts, to envision the real words I’ll write in my article to describe this unreal location. But as I contemplate the marvel of Dettifoss, I can’t help but wonder if this trip is the only time I’ll ever get to feel this thrill of discovering a brand-new piece of the world. My reemerged feelings for Ben are inconvenient at best, and if I end up fucking this whole thing up, there will be no more trips like this in my future. No more chances to see all the places I’ve dreamed of seeing since I was that four-year-old kid at the library checking out picture books about safari in South Africa. If I mess this all up, those dreams will be gone in an instant, and I’ll have no one to blame but myself.

After Ben finishes up, we start out on the path to Selfoss, Dettifoss’s neighbor just a mere 1.4 km away—another moderate hike, according to Icelanders. But as I’ve already discovered, and am quick to learn once again, Icelandic and American versions of moderate are very different when it comes to physical exertion.

“Holy shit, Ben, this isn’t a hike,” I mumble only minutes later. “This is a goddamn rock climb.”

Ben glances at me over his shoulder, a view that’s become quite common on this trip as I consistently lag behind, and winks. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, there’s a clearly defined trail.”

The clearly defined trail consists of wooden spikes in the ground every now and then with the tips painted bright yellow. The problem is that those spikes are necessary because this “trail” zigzags up and down the side of a steep hill covered in rocks and boulders of all shapes and sizes. I’m not so much “walking” or “hiking” as I am clambering over uneven rocks that are sometimes steeper than my knees and trying not to twist an ankle or fall on my face.

“Hey, look.” Ben disrupts my internal listing of grievances, and I pause my climb to look to where he’s pointing. Below us, the hillside gives way to a small alcove with a black sand shore, the raging river now lapping peacefully at the shoreline in this little outpost. In the sky above, a rainbow escapes through a crack in the gray clouds, stretching down toward the earth but never connecting with the hillside. “Stay right there, I’ll be back.”

Ben takes off toward the shore, moving deftly over the rocks at a much quicker pace now that I’m not attempting to keep up with him. Which is fine by me because I need a breather anyway. I take a seat on the dull edge of one of the surrounding boulders (I have so many to choose from!) and catch my breath, only to lose it all over again when Ben nears a steep drop-off overlooking the river below. As if hoping to complete the heart attack this “hike” probably set in motion, he sits (sits!!!) on the ledge and dangles (dangles!!!) his feet over the edge. Then, like it’s no big deal, he lifts his camera and starts taking pictures.

Instead of my anxiety turning to tears like it did at Skógafoss, it transforms to anger. Anger that he would put me in this position to be afraid for him again after he saw my reaction last time.

By the time he returns to my side—obliviously going on about how those unexpected photos you can’t plan for are always the best—I’ve developed a throbbing ache in my jaw from clenching my teeth that pulses to the same rhythm as my hangover headache. My spine is stick-straight, my arms crossed tightly over my chest as I openly seethe to convey my annoyance. When Ben doesn’t notice (or blatantly ignores me) and continues messing with his camera, I tap my foot impatiently on the smaller rock in front of me and let out a heavy sigh.

“Something wrong?” Ben asks without looking up.

That’s all the opening I need.

“Yes, something’s wrong!” I demand, standing to my full height for better effect. “Do you know how dangerous that was? Do you know that you could have fallen over the stupid edge and been swept downstream to Dettifoss and that would be the last anyone ever saw of Benjamin Harrison Carter? Do you not remember how I reacted at Skógafoss? And today you decide to dangle half your body off a cliff? Do you even care what that does to me?”

Ben looks up at me, blinking. “Ems,” he starts, gentle but firm, “I know what I’m doing. What you can’t see from up here is the other ledge below the one I was on. If I would have fallen, I would have landed about six feet farther below. I told you before, I don’t have a death wish. I wouldn’t put myself in unnecessary danger.”

I nod, stiffly, but keep my arms folded across my chest so he knows I haven’t completely let it go.

“I have a question for you, though.” He slings his camera bag over his shoulder. “Why does it bother you?”

“The thought of you falling off a cliff to your death? Gee, I don’t know, Ben,” I deadpan. “I guess it would kind of put a damper on my dinner plans if I had to wait for the rescue squad to recover your body.” I roll my eyes. “What kind of question is that?”

“So, you worry about all your photographers to this extent then?”

I open my mouth but nothing comes out. What do I say to that? No, I don’t worry about my other photographers while they snap pictures of apple tarts or Santa’s parade down some small-town Main Street—although, admittedly, one reindeer did get a little feisty. But Mr. World-Renowned Photographer over here certainly wouldn’t understand that, and I’m certainly not going to explain it to him.

Besides, the real meaning behind his question has nothing to do with the other photographers I’ve worked with and everything to do with my feelings for him. Feelings that are raw from being buried and discarded, pushed out of mind but never truly forgotten, then forced to the surface again after all this time. Maybe that’s why I can’t contain them. Why I’m a fragile mess who breaks down in tears or lashes out in anger or throws myself at Ben only to flirt with another guy right in front of his face because I’m pissed he rejected me.

This situation is so fucked up.

As soon as I think it, I know Ben sees the exact thought written across my face as if I’ve spoken it aloud.

“It’s going to happen,” he says, eyes locked on mine. “We’re having this conversation. Before we leave Iceland, we’re getting this sorted.”

He’s right, we can’t continue this way. Not when I can’t fully focus on my work, or anything other than him. Not when my body responds to his touch like it’s been waiting fourteen years for him to come back. Not when I breathe faster every time he walks into the room, or when my heart flutters with anticipation, yet hovers on the verge of breaking whenever he’s close.

We finish our hike to Selfoss, where instead of one monstrous waterfall like its predecessor, a seemingly endless row of cascade after cascade stretches out before us as I peer at the horizon. We make our way over slippery round stones and through puddles that reflect the cloudy skies above as we get closer. But when I stop a safe distance back, Ben continues to the edge of the cliff. A sharp needle of discomfort pricks in my belly, but I choose to trust what he said, that he knows what he’s doing.

With no one else around, it feels like we’ve stumbled upon the edge of the world, and I take a deep breath and try to soak it in.

Ceaseless.

That’s the word I’ll use for Selfoss.

Maybe if I’m lucky, I can harness some of its energy for myself.

Chapter 18

Tip #13 when visiting Iceland: If you need a little comfort food from home, the pizza in Iceland can be life-changing.

When we arrive in Akureyri, twilight is descending upon the brightly lit town, its reflection cast upon the still, dark surface of a fjord as we cross a bridge leading us into the heart of the city. Known as the capital of the north, Akureyri is Iceland’s second-largest city, which is great and all, but I’m excited to spend two nights here for a different reason. This is the northernmost stop on our journey, which means the greatest chance of seeing aurora.

While Ben waits in line for a takeaway pizza from the first local place we googled (because we’re both exhausted and dirty and cannot fathom sitting down somewhere), I use the portable Wi-Fi to download an app that calculates the predicted visibility of the northern lights based upon location and the weather conditions. Right now, it’s showing the highest chance for the city of Akureyri tonight is six percent…at two forty-five a.m. Fuck.

I close the app when the door creaks open and Ben climbs back into the car and passes me the square cardboard box, the smell of tomato sauce wafting into my space and making my stomach growl.

Pulling down the gravel drive of our home for the next two nights, a duplex of condos across the fjord from the city, I can’t be anything other than impressed by Suki’s ability to get this place approved by Calvin. Walking into the first condo, my admiration triples. There’s a bedroom with an attached bathroom immediately to my right, followed by a short hallway that leads into an open-concept kitchen and living room area. My eyes skirt around the spacious room, unsure what to take in first, the large granite island with a welcome bottle of sangria chilling in an ice bucket, or the brown suede couch and plush oversize chairs that beg my exhausted body to come have a seat. But I don’t focus on those details for more than an instant, because the far wall of the condo is made up entirely of rectangular panes of glass that stretch high, clean and sparkling and reflecting the inside lights back at me. Along the left wall, there’s a staircase leading up to a loft.

Ignoring my bags—and Ben—I summon a renewed energy and spring up the stairs two at a time. In the loft there’s another bed, faced toward the windows through which Akureyri shines in the distance, twinkling like a string of fairy lights across the fjord. Icelanders really know how to frame a great view.

I don’t notice Ben has joined me until I hear him say, “Not so shabby, huh?”

I turn to the top of the staircase, where he’s placing my suitcase down along the far wall, already knowing this is the bed I’ll choose to sleep in tonight.

“Can you believe this place? And we get two nights here, Ben. Two!” It’s almost a shame he has his very own condo just next door. This loft would be the perfect spot for a cozy sleepover. For staying up late talking and laughing and trading secrets. But I shouldn’t be thinking like that.

Ben smiles, but there’s exhaustion in his eyes. “I’m glad you like it. You want to eat first or shower first?”

“Definitely eat first. I’m starving.”

“I was hoping you’d say that.” He disappears back down the steps, and I take another few minutes to wash my face and hands in the en suite bathroom before joining him.

Downstairs, I slide my hiking boots and rain jacket off near the door, then make my way to the kitchen island in my sock feet. Ben’s hunched in one of the barstools, sipping sangria from a crystal wineglass, another full one on the counter waiting for me. Instead of looking for plates, I grab some paper towels and flip open the cardboard box. A sharp twinge in my chest steals my breath. In the box is a thin-crust pizza that’s half cheese and mushroom (my favorite) and half cheese and pineapple (Ben’s favorite).

I’d sent Ben into the pizza shop with the instructions of Just get whatever you want, it doesn’t matter to me, because that’s who I am and that’s what I do and No Worries! and all that. And yet…

Wide-eyed, I look up at him across the counter. The gold flecks in his green eyes shimmer underneath the track lights above the island.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” he asks with a shy smile.

“Because you ordered my favorite kind of pizza.” I say it as if this is the grandest gesture one person has ever made for another. But to me, it matters. He didn’t just remember, he also cared about what I wanted even though I told him not to worry about it. And that really fucking matters to me. A lot.

I’m around the counter before I realize I’m moving, my body on autopilot set to the return destination of home. His green eyes stay pinned on mine as he sits up straight and pushes away from the counter, as his thighs spread to make room for me, as his hands come around my waist as soon as I’m within reach.

My mouth crashes over his and my fingers twirl their way into his hair. The kiss instantaneously borders on frantic. No gentle buildup. No pretense of downplaying the pure, unadulterated want.

Ben’s lips part as he curses against my mouth, and I use the opportunity to run my tongue over his lower lip before biting the plump flesh between my teeth. The groan that emerges from his chest may be the best sound I’ve heard in fourteen years. His hands knead my hips as he stands and backs me against the counter, and I rise onto my tiptoes to keep our connection.

“Ems, listen—”

“Please, Ben,” I beg, kissing his mouth again. “I need you.”

“I need you, too,” he tells me, swiping his thumb across my hip bone. “Look, if we’re doing this…I don’t need you to have all the answers about what’s going on between us. But I do need to know this won’t be meaningless to you.”

I look deep into the familiar eyes staring back at me, a source of comfort and safety for as long as I can remember. “Nothing that occurs between us could ever be meaningless to me, Ben.”

That seems to appease some part of him, because he kisses me again, his mouth soft at first, growing more demanding as I arch my back and lean into him. My legs wrap around his waist as he lifts me, my worn-out thighs quivering as they squeeze onto his hips. All of a sudden, I’m sixteen years old again, kissing Ben in the lake as he held me exactly like this. The only difference: I don’t think even a fireworks show could stop us this time.

Ben carries me up the steps to the loft as I run my lips down the columns of his throat, breathing in the cottony scent that clings to his skin. I run my tongue over the pulse point in his neck, and desire floods my lower belly. But when we reach the top of the stairs and the king-size bed comes into view, I wiggle my hips until Ben sets me on my feet again. “I’m all dirty and gross. I need to shower first.”

“I’ve dreamed of this for fourteen excruciating years,” Ben sighs, “a little mud doesn’t matter to me in the slightest.”

I kiss his mouth again, because, god, I can’t seem to stop doing that now that I’ve started. Then I step back, pull my shirt over my head and toss it to the floor, then slide my wool leggings and socks off so that I stand before him in only my sports bra and cotton underwear. His eyes roam down my body and back up, darkening with a need that sends goose bumps scattering over my skin. “I never said you couldn’t join me.”

Those green eyes snap back to mine, and I take his hand and pull him into the attached bathroom. Ben’s thumb strokes up and down mine as I lean into a tiled shower, which has a large window displaying the view of Akureyri, and turn on the water. As we wait for the water to warm, he pulls me into his arms and kisses me slow and deep, tasting like sangria and cinnamon and everything I’ve ever wanted.

We separate as I tug two layers of thick wool shirts over his head at once, needing to feel his skin against mine. Before I can run my hands over his bare chest, he spins me and presses me against the cabinets across from the shower, and I watch our reflections in the mirror above the sink as he sweeps my messy braid to the side and kisses the back of my neck. A thrill zips down my spine and tightens my nipples against my sports bra at the feel of his warm mouth on my skin.

In the mirror, his gaze sharpens as he gently bites the spot where my shoulder meets my neck, and I gasp as arousal pulses hot and wet between my thighs. “Ben, I need you,” I plead, breathless and impossibly turned on. “Now.”

He yanks my hips backward so I feel his erection press against my ass. “Trust me, Ems, I need you, too. But I’ve waited too goddamn long to rush this. I want to worship every single inch of you. I don’t care if it takes all night long.”

Steam swirls around us as it pours from the open shower door at our backs and fills the room, but Ben makes no move to leave our place at the counter, and with the way my knees are shaking, I don’t think I could move if I wanted to.

Ben traces his fingertips upward over my ribs, eyes never straying from our movements in the mirror. When he reaches the edge of my bra, I lift my arms so he can pull it over my head. He discards it to the floor as my hair falls back around my shoulders.

“You’re so fucking beautiful,” he tells me, his warm breath a caress on the back of my neck.

One hand settles on my lower stomach, pressing me close, but the other trails up my ribs again, lightly brushing over my skin with reverence. It could almost tickle, but he applies just enough pressure to make my skin tingle with anticipation instead. When he reaches the underside of my left breast, he pauses. “Can I touch you here?”

“You can touch me anywhere,” I say, voice raspy. “Please.”

In the mirror, one side of Ben’s mouth quirks up. “Just making sure we’re still on the same page.”

His fingers brush over the peak of my breast at the same time his mouth settles back on my neck, and it’s almost too much, too good. Losing control, I press my hips back against the bulge in his pants, seeking whatever friction I can find. Ben groans against my shoulder, cupping my breast in his hand and teasing my nipple with his thumb. The mirror steams up as the room heats, condensation clouding the edges. But there in the center, I watch us. Watch Ben’s strong arms encircle me, watch his other hand dip lower now, fingers disappearing beneath the edge of my black cotton panties. His middle finger slides through my slickness, and we both curse.

“I’m so wet,” I tell him, even though he’s currently discovering that for himself. “I don’t think I’ve ever been this turned on before.”

“That makes two of us,” he replies, teeth scraping the hinge of my jaw.

I watch as Ben continues to slowly devour me, mouth and hands competing to see which can drive me the maddest, and it’s the most erotic moment of my life.

“I like watching us,” I tell him, and I don’t know why these confessions fall out of my mouth like one domino knocking over the next in line, but I also can’t locate the slightest desire to put a stop to them. “In the mirror, I mean. I love your hands. I love seeing them touch me.”

Ben’s mouth leaves my throat as he lays his forehead against my shoulder and takes a deep, shuddered breath. “Jesus Christ. You might actually kill me before tonight’s over.”

“What a shame that’d be when I haven’t even gotten you inside of me yet.”

With another strained groan, Ben lifts his head, then, deliberate and slow, slides my underwear off my hips. “Wouldn’t want to block your view.”

It’s my turn to groan as Ben returns his fingers between my legs, stroking me with just enough pressure to make me crave more. I watch his finger slide inside me, and I bite my lower lip to keep myself from crying out. He removes his slick finger, circles my clit and then reinserts it, and my spine arches involuntarily.

I don’t recognize this woman in the mirror in front of me. Her cheeks are flushed, her lips swollen and red. Her dark hair is tossed to one side, her nipples tight and begging for attention. She’s reaching behind her to guide Ben’s mouth back to her neck with one arm, and her other hand slides up to roll one of her nipples between her fingers.

“We look so fucking good together,” I tell him as I tease and caress myself, and his eyes roam over us as he slides another finger inside me, casting me closer to the edge. “But I don’t want to come yet.”

He removes his fingers and takes a step back, both our reflections looking absolutely ravaged. “We should slow down then. I’m not nearly through with you yet.”

He’s probably right, but how exactly do you slow a force fourteen years in the making? “Let’s shower,” I say, stepping forward and unbuttoning his hiking pants. I push those along with his boxer briefs down his hips, and he steps out of them, pulling off his socks in the process. When he straightens in front of me, I take his length in my hand, and his eyes squeeze closed as his head drops back.

“If you don’t want either of us to come yet, you’re going to have to stop touching me,” he says after only a few gentle strokes of my fingers.

So I take his hand and pull him into the shower with me.

The hot spray rains down on us from above, sliding over my skin like silk as I undo my braid and run my fingers through my hair. Ben starts to close the glass door behind us, but I stop him. “Leave it open,” I say, jutting my chin toward the mirror across from us. “We can still watch with it open.”

“You’re so goddamn sexy,” he replies, voice deep and gritty.

I pick up the provided bottle of soap, and we spend the next few minutes not so much showering as running our soapy hands all over each other’s bodies. Worshipping and relearning at the same time.

“All clean,” I finally say, and Ben takes hold of the back of my neck and pulls me into a kiss beneath the spray. I lean into him, my breasts against his chest and his erection pressed between us, and as much as we might want to go slow and sweet, I don’t think either of us are capable of it.

“I love your mouth,” Ben tells me, cradling my face and sweeping his tongue across my lower lip. “I could kiss you forever.”

Undoubtedly, those words will replay over and over in my head later. But right now, I’m too consumed with want to overanalyze any possible meaning behind them.

Pulling back from our kiss, I drop to my knees. “Maybe I can make you love my mouth even more.”

“Ems, you don’t have to.” His hands come to rest on my shoulders, holding me back from him.

“I want to.” I bat his hands away. “If we’re doing this, I want everything from you tonight.”

He studies me, and I can see in his eyes we’re both thinking some version of the same thing. Years ago, the one and only time we were together, we were two shy teenagers without much idea what we were doing and who lacked any sense of confidence about our bodies. Now we’re all grown up and experienced, and with the way Ben makes me feel desired, I know exactly what I want from him, and I’m not afraid to vocalize it.

I take him in my mouth, twirling my tongue around his sensitive tip, a string of curses and broken breaths unleashed from above. Then his hands are twisting in my wet hair, and I’m taking him deep in my throat and squeezing my hand tighter around his base, wanting to give him every ounce of pleasure that I can.

But he stops me again and pulls me back to my feet, swearing he’ll never last if I keep it up.

“My turn,” he tells me right before he lifts me and settles me on the tiled window ledge, “and I want you to watch every second.”

Across from us, the bathroom mirror is completely fogged up by now, so he steps out of the shower and quickly wipes it down with a towel before returning and dropping to his knees in front of me. Spreading my legs, he starts planting kisses on the inside of my left knee, working his way upward over my inner thigh.

The first time his tongue slides lightly over my center in a barely-there tease, my hips arch and a strangled cry emerges from the back of my throat that sounds more animal than human. As his delicious mouth continues its mission, my gaze never strays from the image of us in the mirror, the back of Ben’s head working between my thighs, his broad, muscled shoulders spreading my knees as he clutches my ankles and holds my legs apart. My shoulder blades press into the window as my back curves, one of my hands buried deep in Ben’s hair, the other pressed to the steamed glass above my head. Rivulets of hot water stream down my chest, my pink nipples tight and wet.

I will not last.

No one in my situation possibly could.

“Ben, you’re going to make me come already,” I pant.

He pauses to look up at me through thick lashes. “Would that be so bad?” Another slow slide of his tongue over me while his green eyes stay glued to mine. “You taste so fucking good, Ems, and I promise I’ll do it again and again.” Then he sucks my clit between his lips, and the pressure in my lower belly nearly explodes.

“Ben.” I push at his shoulder with my knee until I have his attention again. (Or at least my face has his attention again.) “This might be a request with a lot of meaning behind it that neither of us are ready to examine yet…” His brows knit together as I hesitate. “…But it’s been fourteen years, and I want to come with you fully inside me. Please.”

Something softens in his eyes, and he rises from his knees to take my face in his hands. “Ems, you can have anything you want from me.”

He presses his lips to mine in a soft kiss before shutting off the water. Then he grabs the towel hanging next to the open shower door and wraps it around my shoulders. I clench it tight as he retrieves a second one and starts drying off. I don’t know what’s happening exactly, but I know things aren’t stopping here, so I move off the window ledge and squeeze the excess water from my hair.

Ben takes my hand, towel clenched at his waist, and leads me to the bedroom.

At the side of the bed, he undoes my towel and lets it drop to the floor, followed by his own. Then we’re kissing, and my heart is thundering in my chest like it’s the very first time all over again.

I pull him down with me as I fall onto the pillowy mattress. He props himself up on his forearms, and the view of him above me, after all these years, constricts my throat.

“I never thought we’d end up here again,” he says, echoing my thoughts. He kisses my mouth, then my cheek, then my jaw.

“I guess fate had other plans for us,” I answer, trying to keep the emotion from my voice.

Ben kisses tenderly down my throat and chest, his mouth eagerly exploring every part of me.

As a writer who deals in words as a profession, I don’t have any for what’s happening between me and Ben right now. I’ve never experienced this overwhelming desire mixed with this intensity of emotion. Everything in me wants more of him, like no matter how close we get, it will never be enough. I want to be imprinted on him, and him on me.

Tears sting my eyes at the same time he elicits pleasure from every part of me he touches. My nails dig into his shoulders as he moves his mouth from one breast to the other, my back arching to get even more of his touch.

When I’m to the point I might come from this alone, Ben slides back up and kisses my mouth open, whispering, “I have a condom in my wa—”

“I have an IUD.” The statement flies from my mouth so fast that Ben pulls back to look at me, uncertain. “I mean, I’m just putting that out there for informational purposes. We don’t really need the condom. Unless you want it. Which is absolutely fine if you do. I totally understand. Everything is good either way. No worries.”

“Ems.” He smiles down at me, kisses the center of my forehead. “Tell me what you really want.”

I take a deep breath, remind myself who I’m with, and say, “If you want to get the condom, I’m completely fine with that. But if you don’t, I’m more than okay with that, too.”

“As long as you’re okay with it”—he trails his lips over my cheek to the corner of my mouth—“I’d love to be inside you with nothing between us.”

“Yes, Ben, please.” I’m already reaching for his hips, guiding him against me.

Our mouths merge as I feel the press of him between my legs, then the escalating friction as he eases inside me. When he fills me up completely, I swear I see stars behind my eyes.

“It’s so fucking good,” Ben moans, finding a slow rhythm that sends me soaring. “Nothing could ever feel better than this. You’re it for me. I swear to god, you’ve always been it for me.”

His words are a balm to my old wounds, transforming them into faded scars.

“I’m already close,” I say, embarrassed at my lack of stamina.

He grins. “It’s okay, I’ve been close since I saw you in Cal’s office.”

Laughter bursts out of me, despite the fact that Ben’s currently thrusting into me. “Please do not bring up Calvin right now.”

Ben’s laughing now, too, and I wonder if this is what a relationship with him would be like as an adult. Laughter and sex and inside jokes. A history longer than a CVS receipt. A friendship greater than any I’ve ever known. Someone to always keep my secrets.

I want all of those things so much it becomes hard to breathe if I really think about it, and that’s a dangerous line of thinking anyway. Giving myself to someone in this way, knowing he could destroy my heart for good this time. And yet, it’s too late to hold any part of myself back from him. “More, Ben,” I say, hitching my thighs around his hips. “More.”

He pins my wrists over my head and drives into me harder. My mouth seeks out his, and I whisper against his lips, “Please come with me.”

Groaning, he slides a hand down between my legs and rubs circles against my clit, and that’s all it takes to throw me over the edge, spasms racking my body in one wave of pleasure after another. Ben follows behind, his movements erratic as he presses his hips into mine and we’re both left breathlessly spent.

We lie twisted in the bedsheets for a long while, me holding Ben in my arms, the stars sparkling in the sky beyond the window, those special three words floating through my chest, winding around my heart, almost spilling from my lips. But I hold them back. Because even after fourteen years, I don’t think I’d survive saying them and not hearing them back again.

And for now, for tonight, this will do.

Chapter 19

Tip #14 when visiting Iceland: Sometimes life gives you orca whales, but sometimes they’re pilot whales that look nothing like Free Willy at all.

I end up getting my late-night sleepover after all.

When I emerge from the bathroom in clean underwear, Ben is dressed in his gray sweatpants and rummaging through his suitcase, now placed next to mine in the loft. He looks up and spots me in the doorway and a nervous grin forms on his lips. “I, uh, don’t want to be presumptuous here, but is it okay if I stay with you tonight?”

My heart might explode from the hopeful look in his eyes, the chivalrous way he always asks and never assumes, although there’s something kind of heartbreaking about that, too. “Yeah, Ben. I want you to stay with me.”

I make my way over to our luggage, but instead of taking anything from mine, I grab one of his perfectly rolled T-shirts and pull it over my head. I sweep my hair from the back of the collar and peer up at him, and his eyes heat all over again.

“That looks really fucking hot on you,” he says, pulling me into his arms.

His mouth immediately goes to my neck, but as good as it all feels, I’m not sure I’ll survive round two without sustenance. “Ben.” I press against his chest. “I’m really fucking hungry.”

He pulls back with a soft smile. “Well, let’s get you fed then.”

We slip back downstairs and dine on cold pizza and warm sangria, and somehow it’s the best meal I’ve had in years. Ben finishes off a slice while standing over the deep sink on the opposite side of the island, and after he swallows the last bite of crust, his mouth quirks into a grin that makes me self-conscious.

“What?” I ask, preemptively swiping at my chin for missed crumbs. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Ben shakes his head. “I’m just really happy, that’s all.”

If my heart swells any bigger, I’m not sure I’ll be able to contain it. “I’m really happy, too.”

Abandoning the rest of my crust in the cardboard box, I make my way around the island and squeeze myself into the space between Ben and the countertop, my hands coming to rest on his hips. “I can’t believe the way this all worked out,” I say. “I mean, of all the photographers in New York, the fact you ended up on this assignment with me? That has to be fate, right?”

Ben takes a breath and his gaze falls away from me. “Yeah, uh, about the assignment. I need to say something and—”

I slide my palm over his mouth. “Nope. No, you don’t. No more talk about work. This night is about us, not Around the Globe.”

The truth is, it’s all become so muddied—my recruitment of Ben, what just happened between us upstairs—that I’m not sure I know how to sort it. And the very last thing I want to do right now is listen to Ben tell me yet again that he isn’t going to accept Calvin’s offer and have to face the reality that my promotion isn’t going to happen. Right now, I want to forget all the reasons why we’re here and just appreciate the fact that we are here, together, in Iceland.

Ben kisses my palm before I slide it away. “You know, I obviously had no idea how this trip would play out, but I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t hoped something might happen between us.”

“Yeah?” My hand settles in the center of his chest.

“I meant what I said upstairs. You’ve always been it for me, Ems.” He brushes my hair back from my face, tilting my chin up in the process and stealing another lingering kiss. “When you held my hand on the plane, I didn’t want to let go. And then when you fell asleep on my shoulder, it felt so good that for the first time in my life, I didn’t want the flight to end.”

“Are we trading secrets again?” I ask with a playful smirk.

“Guess so. But hold up.” Ben lifts me in a sudden, swift motion and places me on the countertop, the granite cool against my bare thighs. My ankles link loosely together against his lower back, trapping him in my space, but I don’t think he’s looking to escape. He leans in close, the scent of his skin surrounding me as he reaches behind my hips and pulls another slice from the box. He takes a huge bite and then says, “Okay, now go.”

“Well…” I brush a hand through his messy hair as I consider which secret to spill. “If you want to know the truth, I may have been so in my head about coming on this trip with you that I couldn’t even pack my own stuff.” Warmth infuses my cheeks. “My best friend packed for me. In fact, both swimsuits I’ve worn on this trip? Hers.”

Ben finishes the slice and dusts off his hands. “What’s her name?”

“Jacklyn.”

He grabs my hips and scoots me forward until we’re pressed together. “Tell Jacklyn thank you for that. And also, she’s not getting those swimsuits back.”

Ben kisses me then, cradling my face in his hands and making it a point to go slow, to savor every soft slide of our lips, every delicate brush of our tongues. When he pulls back, those beautiful green eyes are filled with something deep, something meaningful. And for a split second, I think he might say the three words that I held back upstairs, the ones he never said fourteen years ago.

Instead, his focus shifts over my shoulder, and it was probably wishful thinking on my part anyway. “Should we continue our game upstairs?” he asks.

“Yes, please.”

I squeeze my thighs around his hips, and for the second time tonight Ben carries me upstairs to the loft.

We stay up way too late, watching out the window for any sign of aurora and swapping stories from the fourteen years we’ve been apart. We catch up not only with our words, but also with our bodies. I trace Ben’s tattoo with my fingertip while he tells me that he got it as a tribute to his mentor, Dan. Ben kisses over a line of freckles on my stomach that he swears wasn’t there before, remarking how similar the pattern is to some constellation I’ve never heard of while I laugh the whole time because his stubble tickles my skin.

Then he kisses lower and settles between my thighs, and the laughter stops as pleasure stirs again, warm and pulsing in my center.

Unlike earlier in the shower, this time I don’t stop him. This time I let myself fully relax into the sensations his mouth creates in my most sensitive places, knowing how much I trust him, and having the confidence to tell him what I like, what feels good, and what will make me come. He proves to be a fantastic listener, and he easily gets me there. Twice.

I don’t know what time I eventually fall asleep, but when I do, I’m completely satisfied, completely at ease, and yeah, completely in love with Ben Carter.

* * *

The morning starts in a way I’ve dreamed of countless times over the years but never thought would pan out. Now that it’s happening, it’s better than any of those dreams. Scattered sunrays sweep in through the glass and light the room with a soft morning glow, and the weight of Ben’s arm winds around my waist, tucking me against him. Unlike yesterday morning, his presence in my bed isn’t jarring in the slightest. In fact, I’m blanketed with a calmness I haven’t felt in…possibly ever.

My phone buzzes from the bedside table, and as much as I want to ignore all things awaiting me and snuggle deeper into Ben’s arms, I’m not the kind of person who lets a call roll to voice mail. What if it’s an emergency?

I pick up my phone, and a New York number flashes across the screen. Next to me, Ben shuffles in the sheets, his arm flexing around my waist to pull me back to him. I lean over his sleeping form and kiss the slim, faded scar below his hairline. “I have to take this,” I whisper, removing his arm from around me and crawling from bed.

I answer as I pad downstairs to the kitchen, coming to an abrupt halt when a stern voice greets me with, “Mona, it’s Calvin Cramer.”

“Calvin! Good morning, sir!” I hope my voice sounds more pleasantly surprised than dreadfully shocked as my heart rate increases like I just slammed three espressos. “How are you? How’s New York? How’s the weather there?” As I’m spouting my list of practiced niceties (apparently all of them at once), it occurs to me that New York is four hours behind Iceland time. If Calvin’s calling me…My eyes connect with the clock on the kitchen oven. 9:07.

Shit! We overslept!

“Listen, I’m glad I caught you,” he says, ignoring my attempts at small talk. Must be nice not to worry about coming off as pleasant and cheery all the damn time. “I know you’re busy, so I won’t keep you long.”

Busy recovering from the best sex of my life.

I expect guilt to follow the thought, but it doesn’t.

When it comes to Ben, I don’t think it’s possible to have regrets. Whether I’m ready to say it out loud or not, he is my person, he’s always been my person, and I can’t regret anything that happens between us, no matter what it might cost me.

As if summoned by our invisible connection, Ben appears at the top of the staircase with his sweatpants low on his hips, bare-chested, tattooed biceps flexing as he ruffles his messy bed hair. And yeah, I can’t regret that.

In my ear, Calvin’s saying something about an update on the trip, so I ignore the automatic flutters in my belly that stir whenever Ben is nearby and attempt to focus.

“It’s, uh, good. Great, actually! No worries here!”

Fuck, this is not going well.

Ben watches me from above with a quizzical look, so I point at my wrist where a watch would be if I ever wore one and mouth, “We overslept!”

He pulls his phone from his pocket and his eyes go wide, then he disappears back into the loft, and I hear the upstairs shower turn on seconds later. We’re supposed to be on a whale-watching excursion at ten thirty in the city of Húsavík, located at least an hour north of here.

“Everything okay?” Calvin asks. “You sound distracted. Are you distracted, Ms. Miller?”

“Yes! I mean, no! Sorry.” Dear god. I take a breath. “Yes, everything’s okay. No, I’m not distracted. It’s just…spotty reception.”

“Listen, Ms. Miller.” His tone hardens, and I know he’s losing his patience with me. “You know this assignment is important to me. I made that very clear, did I not?”

“Yes. Very clear, sir.” I close my eyes to better focus. “Iceland has been amazing. I’ve been thinking of ways to creatively incorporate each of the locations into the article, but there’re so many incredible sites to feature that it’s going to be difficult to narrow down the content and—”

“That’s all well and good,” Calvin interrupts. “But I’m inquiring about Benjamin Carter. Any luck on the recruitment front? Your response to my email was lacking on details, to say the least.”

I bite back my frustration because that’s what I do. “Uh, about that…”

I’m not sure what to say here. I can’t very well tell Calvin Cramer III that I spent half the night with his star recruit’s head between my thighs. And despite pitching the idea of working at Around the Globe to Ben again the other night—and putting aside the fact that I truly do believe it might be good for him to have some stability in his life—continuing to press the issue, especially after last night, feels disingenuous at best, downright slimy, if I’m honest.

“Sir, the impression I get from Benjamin”—the formal name feels foreign on my tongue—“is that he enjoys his freelance lifestyle. Maybe the most we can hope for is that he agrees to do more assignments for Around the Globe in the future without being a full-time employee contractually obligated to only us. I actually think there’s a strong possibility of that happening if—”

“No.”

No? Uh…“Excuse me?”

“Unacceptable,” Calvin reiterates. “Ms. Miller, I’m giving you a real opportunity here. I thought you wanted your shot at the big leagues.”

“I did. I do,” I say, thrown.

“Then I’m going to be one hundred percent honest with you right now.” From his sharp tone, I don’t think I want one hundred percent honesty. Perhaps I can only handle sixty percent honesty at best. Maybe fifty-five. “People don’t subscribe to Around the Globe for the articles. They subscribe for the photos. Photos that take them to a place far away from the monotony of daily life. Our subscribership has plummeted the past fiscal year, and we need a name like Benjamin Carter to turn things around. I thought you of all people could handle this.”

Well, it’s officially confirmed. This was never about my writing. Not even a little bit. Calvin chose me only because I’m the affable, party planning, No Worries!, go-to office girl who always has a smile on her face and never pushes back. I’m willing to bet, regardless of Suki’s broken ankle—if that’s even real—that I’m the only one Calvin would ask to do this. He wouldn’t push this “recruitment” off on one of the other Internationals because he respects them, a sentiment he clearly lacks when it comes to me.

“I have to go,” I hear myself saying. “I’m about to miss my whale-watching excursion.”

“Try not to take what I said personally,” Calvin says, calmer now, and I disguise the audible scoff that rises from my throat with a cough. “I firmly believe Benjamin wouldn’t have taken this assignment after all this time if he wasn’t somewhat interested. Find out what that interest is and exploit it. See you stateside.”

Calvin ends the call before I say anything else, which is fine because I’m speechless.

“Hey, you.” Ben startles me as he wraps his arms around me from behind. Freshly showered and wearing only a towel, his skin is warm and damp against the back of my borrowed T-shirt. “You feel tense. What was that about?”

I should tell him the truth. All of it. But if I tell him now, he’ll question why I didn’t tell him sooner. Last night was the best night of my life, and I want to hold on to that feeling for as long as I can. Besides, I’m an adult who is perfectly capable of handling Calvin on my own. I think.

“Nothing important,” I lie. “We have to hurry or we’ll miss our boat.” I spin out of Ben’s arms and sprint for the stairs.

* * *

Interesting fact about Iceland: The country has the best way to control speeding I’ve ever seen. There aren’t police cars waiting on the side of the road to pull over naughty offenders, at least not that I’ve observed. Instead, they utilize roadside radars, similar to the ones in the States, but instead of flashing the speed back at the driver, these light up with either a smiley face (for those law-abiders who drive the correct speed) or a sad little frowny face (for those who like to live life on the edge).

When the sad face flashes at us, I feel as if I’ve disappointed every person I’ve ever known—and I’m not even the one driving. It’s a mind game for sure, and the guilt is real.

“That’s our third frowny face in a row,” I chastise Ben. “Please slow down a little.”

He shoots me a sidelong glance from the driver’s seat. “I’m barely going ten over and there’s no one else on this road. We’re okay. I wouldn’t risk anything happening to you.”

“But those faces are so sad.”

“You know they aren’t real, right?”

“Yes, I know that.” Obviously. “But I still feel like we’re hurting their feelings.”

“You’re adorable.”

“Do you remember Ms. Bradford’s first-grade class and how she graded our letter-practice pages with either a happy face or a frowny face stamp? That’s what those speeding radars remind me of.”

“I do remember those.” Even from the side I can tell Ben’s eyes light up at the memory.

And it’s this—the history between us that can’t be replicated, a tie that binds us together no matter the years and distance we’ve spent apart—that proves to me, without a doubt, I’ll never love anyone the way I love Ben. But like I learned before, loving Ben Carter doesn’t mean I get to keep him.

“I struggled with my lowercase q’s for the longest time,” he says with a little laugh. “I collected a slew of those frowny faces.”

“To be fair, the lowercase q is challenging.” We hit a bump in the road, and I bounce in my seat. I shoot Ben another disapproving scowl, and he eases off the gas pedal. “I got one once. It was traumatizing.”

“One?” he asks, incredulous. “You only got one the entire year?”

“Yep. Not because of my letter work but because Ms. Bradford said I rushed through it. She told me there was no need to always be the first one finished. That showing off wasn’t a good look.”

“That seems unfair.”

I shrug. “From that point on I made sure to wait until at least one other person turned in their work before I did so I didn’t stand out. Funny thing though, she never said that to Logan Fletcher, who always turned his stuff in first once I stopped.”

Another radar looms ahead, and this time, we get a happy face of approval as we approach. I smile out the window at it like it’s a real person.

“Hey, Ems,” Ben says softly. “Fuck Logan Fletcher.”

My smile widens. I turn back to Ben and add, “And fuck Ms. Bradford, too.”

* * *

Húsavík is a darling Icelandic town situated on Skjálfandi bay and known for its whale-watching excursions. We hurry through the harbor and down a set of stairs to the bustling dock, fishermen and tour guides already hard at work by midmorning. In a shocking turn of events, the sky above is clear and blue—at least for now, in fourteen more seconds, who knows—and I turn back to Ben to comment on our good fortune.

Until I notice Ben’s expression is far from enthusiastic.

I come to an abrupt halt in the middle of the dock. “Hey, you okay?”

Up close his complexion is pallid, sweat dampening his hairline. “Uh, you know how I don’t like planes?”

“Yeah…”

“So, I don’t really care for boats, either.”

His gaze is cast somewhere over my shoulder, the reflection of the harbor glistening in his wary eyes.

“Are you afraid of all methods of transportation?”

His eyes flick back to mine, narrowed and unamused. “Only ones that don’t take place on the actual fucking ground.”

“Well.” I look over my shoulder at the bay, the surface of the water rippling in the sunlight. “Technically, there will be ground beneath us, it’s just below all that water.”

I glance back to see Ben grip his stomach and squeeze his eyes closed. “That’s not helping, Ems.”

“Shit! Sorry!” A grimace twists my lips at my unfortunate use of words. “I suppose I can see why that’s not helpful.” As gently as possible, I add, “Uh, should you maybe have mentioned this before we arrived?”

“Probably yes. But I packed some motion sickness meds and figured I’d power through.”

“Oh, okay, well, that’ll help, right?”

Ben shrugs, opening his eyes and blowing out a long breath. “Maybe if I’d remembered to take them.”

“You forgot?”

“I was a little distracted with everything that happened last night and then rushing to get out the door this morning.”

People shuffle around us as we stand in the middle of the dock, very much being those people who block the pathway. “Okay, it’s fine. We don’t have to do this. We’ll just pull another ‘Fuck the itinerary’ and skip it.”

Peering past me again, Ben seems to take my suggestion under consideration, but before he can respond, a cheerful American accent says, “Good morning, friends! Are you two perhaps Benjamin Carter and Mona Miller of Around the Globe?”

I turn my attention to a thirtysomething woman with strawberry blonde hair and a dusting of freckles scattered over both cheeks, clad in a heavy jumpsuit similar to the ones we wore snowmobiling. “I’m Cassandra with Húsavík Sailing Adventures,” she continues. “I’ll be your tour guide today. We’ve got the entire boat reserved just for you two!” She pauses. “Assuming you are Benjamin Carter and Mona Miller.”

“Yes! Sorry,” I say. “That’s us. Did you say the entire boat is reserved?”

“Sure did. We wanted to make sure Around the Globe gets A-plus treatment.”

This isn’t what I prefer; as a writer I want to view any experience as I would through the lens of a typical tourist. However, sometimes this preferential treatment is unavoidable. (Although the most it ever got me as a Local was a front-row VIP ticket to Jersey City’s pumpkin-carving contest.) In this specific case though, I’m more concerned about Ben. And I know from his stiff nod when I glance over my shoulder that he isn’t going to sit this one out when they’ve reserved the entire boat for the two of us.

“Thank you, Cassandra,” I say with a broad, No Worries! smile to hide my very real worries. “Lead the way.”

As we make our way down a row of wooden vessels, Cassandra tells us that the boat we’ll be using for our excursion today was primarily a fishing boat until about thirty years ago when it was converted for the specific purpose of taking tourists out into the bay to experience close encounters with sea life. Ben keeps swallowing hard in my peripheral vision, and I can only hope he doesn’t end up hanging over the back of the ship spewing last night’s cold pizza into the bay.

On board the ship, we’re lulled back and forth with the gentle waves while Cassandra sizes us each up before handing over two more jumpsuits from a rack stuffed full of them. “These should work. The wind can be fierce out on the water.”

Ben and I slip our jumpsuits on over our clothing and follow Cassandra to a built-in bench along the front of the vessel. Around us, a few other crew members tug on ropes and fidget with levers, doing all the important boatly things, I imagine.

Right as I ponder why one crew member in particular looks somewhat familiar, he comes closer and…oh shit.

“Fridrik?” I question with a nervous glance back at Ben. Our overly truthful snowmobile guide isn’t what he needs right now. “What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be snowmobiling?”

“Ah. Yes. Snowmobiling volcano glaciers is my one true passion,” Fridrik proclaims with a far-off look and wistful shake of his head. “But alas, my father owns this vessel and was injured in the line of duty two days ago, so I’m here to help out this week. Today, I’m your captain.”

Fucking hell.

“That’s great!” I say at the same time Ben asks, “Injured how?”

“He fell overboard.”

“Oh my god!” I exclaim. “Is he okay?”

Fridrik’s expression remains blank, as if we’re talking about the weather forecast. “Of course. He’s a man of the sea. Very strong swimmer.”

“That’s good. He’s fine,” Ben mutters, more to himself than to me or our blunt Icelandic friend. “He’s okay. Strong swimmer.”

“Not completely fine,” Fridrik corrects. “Nasty bite wound to the leg.”

Jesus.

“Bite wound?” Ben sinks onto the wooden bench, complexion slipping one shade closer to the green spectrum of the color wheel. “From what?”

Fridrik shifts the weight of the ropes he carries and shrugs. Beside him, Cassandra’s wide-eyed stare indicates she might be witnessing a slow-motion train wreck. “Large fish. Small whale. Maybe a seal. In these waters, who’s to say?”

Ben drops his head between his knees.

“They have to monitor him for bacterial infections. Whatever sea creature it was ripped the flesh right off his—”

“Fridrik!” Cassandra cuts in. “We should get this tour started. I’ll take over with our guests from here.”

Fridrik shrugs again, but before he shuffles off to find someone else to overtly terrify, he points at me and says, “See, now this is a tour where we don’t expect you to drive.”

“Got it,” I say, nodding. “Thanks.” Once he’s gone, I take the seat next to Ben and rub soothing circles between his shoulder blades.

“Sorry about him,” Cassandra says. “His father never learned the art of subtlety, either. That’s why I do all the talking on our tours.”

“That’s a fantastic business decision,” Ben says from his slumped-over position.

A few minutes later the boat pulls away from the harbor, and Cassandra delves into her spiel on the types of whales we may see on today’s tour: humpbacks, orcas, pilots, and, although rare, the blue whale has been spotted from time to time in the bay. Which I must admit scares me a little, too. I’ve seen the YouTube clips on how massive blue whales are, even compared to an entire boat full of people. I’m not sure I want a close encounter. An orca would be nice though. When I was young, I went through an embarrassingly long period where I was obsessed with Free Willy and convinced myself I wanted to be a traveling marine biologist. Who knows if that’s even a thing.

The first half of the tour is uneventful, and Cassandra and I chat about her move from America to Iceland five years ago. She tells me how she burnt out working a job in health care, threw caution to the wind, and moved to Iceland on a whim because it’s somewhere she’d always wanted to visit. As someone who understands a strong sense of wanderlust but can’t imagine being that fearless, I am endlessly fascinated by her story.

While she talks, Ben manages to sit up and listen, and while he certainly doesn’t look great, he looks like he might survive, which is a vast improvement.

Off in the distance, movement catches my eye. “Hey, look!”

Ben and Cassandra turn to follow the direction of my finger, pointed out over the water where multiple sleek black fins curve over the surface and then roll back under.

“Pilot whales,” Cassandra announces, rising from her seated position to get a better view. “They look very similar to dolphins—only larger—and travel in groups. You two are lucky, we don’t always get to see these!”

A soft groan sounds from Ben’s throat, low enough only I can hear, communicating that he’s not feeling particularly lucky about this new development. But as a professional, he now has a job to do, and he pulls his camera from his bag, props his elbows on the side of the boat for stability, and starts snapping pictures of the group of whales off in the distance.

“Your partner okay there?” Cassandra asks me quietly as we both watch him work.

“Yeah, he’ll be fine. Don’t worry,” I assure her. “Seasick or not, his photos will be incredible. Ben’s amazing at what he does. I don’t know if you’ve seen any of his work, but if you have, then you probably already know how stunning his photos are. I’m in awe of his talent sometimes, and—”

I stop talking when I look over and see a knowing grin stretching Cassandra’s lips.

“I’ll shut up now,” I say, blushing.

Her loud, bubbly laugh fills the open air around us. “It’s okay. I get it.” She shoots a pointed look to the enclosed wheelhouse where Fridrik steers the ship with a solemn expression that suggests this boat could go down at any moment.

“Really?” I question. “You two seem like complete opposites.”

“Oh, we are. And he doesn’t know how I feel. He’s not the best at picking up on social cues.”

“You don’t say,” I tease.

We continue chatting while Ben swaps out his lens, then focuses his camera on the mountain peaks across the bay. Eventually, Fridrik turns us back in the direction of the harbor. We don’t see any more whales on our excursion, which, for Ben’s sake, is probably best. But I am slightly disappointed I didn’t see Willy.

We pull up to the dock a little later, and I stay on board to thank Cassandra for her time and expertise while Ben makes a beeline for solid ground. From the wheelhouse, Fridrik shouts down at us to watch our step so we don’t slip and concuss ourselves on the solid oak ship.

The absolute absurdity of the moment makes me laugh, and for a brief second, I even forget about Calvin’s call this morning.

Chapter 20

Tip #15 when visiting Iceland: If a cloud appears to be shape-shifting, hold up a camera and you might get the surprise of a lifetime.

With Ben nowhere close to a hundred percent, we walk the town and explore a few historical sites before grabbing lunch at a restaurant overlooking the harbor. We talk about the town and about work and definitely about Fridrik, but not about last night, and it leaves me wondering if maybe Ben’s regretting what happened between us.

I know that no matter what happens going forward, this trip will live forever embedded deep in my bones. There will be no possible way for me not to associate Ben with travel, and travel with Ben, and as my two favorite things in life, how will I ever recover if this all goes up in flames and I lose them both?

I don’t know what changed since this morning when we woke up entangled in each other’s arms, but the peace and certainty I felt then is slipping away. Perhaps it’s my fault. Perhaps I’m letting Calvin’s phone call get to me, or maybe Ben can sense that on some level I’m not being completely honest with him. Perhaps it’s that, despite being in love with him again, I still don’t know if I can truly forgive Ben for what he did to me all those years ago, and that’s something I’m going to have to figure out for myself once and for all before things become even more involved.

My worries must wait, however, because once we leave Húsavík in the early afternoon, our itinerary is still packed full with trips to Víti crater and Grjótagjá cave and Goðafoss waterfall.

By the time we make the drive back to Akureyri, the sun has set for the day, but we manage to find an open market five minutes before closing time and quickly pick out sandwiches from the deli to take back to the condos. After last night, being completely alone with Ben should be easy, a welcome relief even, but as soon as we walk into the quiet condo, tension permeates the air. Things feel not exactly awkward—because it’s Ben. But also, they’re not not awkward either—again, because it’s Ben.

Needing to clear my head, I announce I’m going to shower before we eat, further unsettled when all Ben does is nod like he’s not even listening. I slip upstairs and gather my clothing, then head into the bathroom and turn on the water. Once I’m under the hot spray, tension melts from my body, but anxiety still churns within.

There’s a chance this could all be in my head. Ben didn’t feel well earlier, maybe he still doesn’t. Or maybe he’s in his head as much as I am. What happened between us last night was certainly monumental—can I blame him for being shaken up today? Twenty-four hours is just long enough to doubt your entire belief system.

I know from experience.

It’s not fair to him for me to draw the parallels between then and now, but it’s almost impossible not to. Just like the instant I flipped open that pizza box last night, I knew the second Ben slipped into my bedroom the night of my seventeenth birthday that everything was about to change. I just had no way of knowing how drastically.

Ben sat on the side of my bed that late-August night and held out a velvet box that fit in the palm of his hand. Opening it, I pulled out a thin gold chain with a delicate M charm that I knew must have cost way too much of the money he earned working at The Boathouse all summer. I remember how timid he was when he asked if I liked it, how my heart overflowed when I swore to him I loved it.

What I really meant was that I loved him. Too scared to say it outright, I pulled him between my sheets, kissing him as if I could say it with my body instead. When we reached the point where we usually drew the line, I instead persisted, Ben whispering Are you sure? in my ear at least three times. But I had never been more certain of anything in my life. Whether or not it had been vocalized, I loved Ben. And I knew he loved me, too.

Everything about my first time was greater than I could have imagined. The complete trust I had in Ben. The way he told me how beautiful I was over and over again. The magical new collision of pleasure and pain. Afterward, he held me for as long as possible, until the sun started to shine through my window and he had to leave or risk being caught when someone woke up.

I finally fell asleep that morning with my fingers pressed against the M at my collarbone, dreaming of marrying Ben Carter one day.

Only to wake up later that afternoon to a series of text messages that flipped my world upside down.

Ben Carter

I’m so sorry, Ems.

I don’t think I can see you anymore.

It’s nothing you did. It’s me.

I’m so sorry.

Instantly nauseated, I threw off the covers, hurriedly dressed, and ran downstairs, hoping he was still at my house. He wasn’t. He also wasn’t answering my calls or responding to the texts I fired off asking him what the hell he was talking about. I called The Boathouse. He wasn’t working, either. So I did the only other thing I knew to do. I ran down the street to his house.

His red pickup was in the driveway. And for a moment, one stupid, fleeting moment, I thought everything was going to be okay. This was a misunderstanding, that’s all. There was no way Ben really meant he didn’t want to see me again, not after last night. I pounded on the door of a house I’d never been to, and minutes later when he stepped outside and pulled the door closed behind him, I knew as soon as he looked at me, his green eyes eerily vacant, that he meant what he’d said.

Still, I stayed on that porch for god only knows how long, pleading with him, telling him I was sorry if I did something wrong, that whatever had happened was fixable. But his expression remained empty, as if he weren’t even there, as if he couldn’t even hear me. At least until I said what I’d been holding back all summer. That I loved him. When I said those words, he paled as if I’d slapped him instead.

I remember the tears streaming down my cheeks when reality set in that he wasn’t changing his mind. The way I yanked off the necklace he’d just given me and forced it into his palm. The way the only words he seemed to have for me were I’m so sorry.

When I left his house that day with my heart utterly shattered, I didn’t know that would be the last time I’d see Ben Carter until he walked into Calvin’s office fourteen years later. There was no way then to foresee that he’d disappear altogether. His cell phone number would be disconnected. He wouldn’t come to the house anymore. He’d quit his job at The Boathouse. He even stopped coming to school. Rumors swirled that he’d dropped out, became addicted to drugs, maybe even was a missing person.

Ben Carter became a ghost, and he haunted me every single goddamn day.

I couldn’t function for months. Couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, cut all ties with my friends and let my grades drop. Everyone knew something was wrong with me, but since we’d kept our relationship a secret, no one knew what that thing was. I didn’t have anyone to talk to, and what’s worse was listening to my father and brothers unknowingly and relentlessly talk about Ben in front of me. Inquiring where he was and what could have happened and why he didn’t come around anymore. And I had to sit there—knowing my brothers were confused and hurting, too, even if they were too proud to admit it—riddled with guilt that it was somehow all my fault.

A knock on the bathroom door startles me.

“Ems, you okay?” Ben’s voice calls through the door. “You’ve been in there for a really long time.”

“Yeah, I’m okay,” I call back, shaking off the painful memories I can still feel viscerally. “Just relaxing, that’s all.”

But when I reach for the shampoo bottle, my hand trembles.

By the time I make it downstairs, Ben is plating our deli sandwiches and chips at the kitchen island. He’s dressed in a black shirt and dark jeans, the golden ends of his wet hair gleaming in the overhead lighting.

“Hey,” he says at my appearance. “I went ahead and showered down here.”

“Oh. Okay.” I twist my hands in my oversize tee and take a seat at the counter. Despite the things Ben said, it’s entirely possible that last night didn’t mean to him what it did to me. Maybe while I’ve been realizing I’m in love with Ben again, he’s been realizing what happened between us last night was a mistake. Just like fourteen years ago.

It doesn’t help my inner turmoil that we eat mostly in silence, with Ben making occasional comments about the photos he thinks will work for the article so far. After we finish, he clears our plates, and I meander over to the glass door and stare out at the city lights across the water, still trying to shake the memories from upstairs and regain that elusive, mystical feeling of being an ocean away from home and at total peace.

As I stare out at the midnight sky, I notice an oddly shaped cloud. Feathery and stretched thin, like pulled-apart cotton running perpendicular to the horizon. Even more odd, it appears to shift and stretch longer as I watch, growing thicker in places and fading from view in others.

On a hunch, I run back to the counter and retrieve my phone, swiping open the aurora app with my thumb.

“What’s up?” Ben asks as I frantically tap at my screen.

“There’s a weird cloud in the sky.” Ten percent chance of visibility according to the app, but not for another hour. Still…

Going off pure instinct, I take my phone back to the glass door and slide it open. Frigid air sweeps in with the breeze, but I don’t pay attention to the cold because adrenaline begins to pulse through my veins. I switch from the aurora app to the camera and hold my phone skyward, gasping when the cottony cloud appears as a long stretch of neon green down the center of my screen.

Oh my god! This might be it!

“Ben!” I shout. “You need to come here! Now!”

He’s behind me in seconds, and I watch over my shoulder as he peers at my phone screen and his eyes go wide. “Holy shit.”

Then he’s gone again, rummaging through his camera bag at the counter and frantically pulling out equipment. I follow him back inside and throw on my coat and slip my feet into my sneakers, my hands shaking as I attempt to tie them before I give up and run back to the deck with my laces flapping against the floor, afraid I’ll miss the show.

Outside, Ben’s hands hurriedly work to get his tripod set up.

“You good?” he asks, without looking up. I know he’s asking because it’s completely dark out here, and with his tripod set up in record speed, he moves to shut off the interior lights so they don’t interfere with his photos.

“I’m good,” I promise.

He leans back through the doorway and flips off the lights in the condo, plunging us into darkness.

When I look up at the sky, the thin cloud from before is gone, but now there’s a new one running horizontally over the horizon, splitting the sky in two above the city of Akureyri.

“Come here.” Ben motions me over with a hand while keeping his eyes on the display screen in front of him.

He steps aside so I can glimpse the screen, and when I see his photo of aurora—neon green stretched above the golden lights of the city, the scene reflected upon the inky waters of the fjord like a mirror—something deep-seated shakes loose in my core.

I’m here. In Iceland. Living a life I’ve always dreamed of. And I’m living this dream with Ben, who I love.

In this moment, I know. I can forgive him.

Whatever happened back then was between two teenagers, but we’re fully grown adults now. I still may not have a clear way out of this scenario where I get to keep the job of my dreams and Ben, but maybe that’s okay. Maybe this moment is the best life can possibly get, and maybe I need to quit goddamn thinking and enjoy it while it lasts.

“Ben.” I press a hand over my heart. “It’s incredible. I have no other words. You’re fucking amazing.”

He smiles, something unspoken passing between us in the still night.

Over the next half hour, aurora dazzles us with a show. The lights grow stronger and become visible to the eye without a camera, and Ben and I are like excited children again, turning circles and searching the heavens above. At one point, the lights are so vivid they consume the whole sky, greens and pinks dancing a waltz above our heads, a wavy mirage of moving color. It’s so fantastically thrilling it’s almost scary. The basic facts of human life, the grass is green, the sky is blue, flipped upside down in an instant. The sky doesn’t look real anymore. Nothing feels real anymore.

“Ems, let’s take a picture.”

I join Ben in front of his tripod, where he pulls me into his arms. Instead of posing for the camera, he leans in and presses his lips to mine in a soft, slow kiss. I hear the click of the shutter, and I don’t need to see the photo to know it will be the most meaningful one ever taken of me.

When Ben pulls back, he rests his forehead against mine. “I’m sorry. I know I’ve been quiet today.”

My heart lurches. Surely he isn’t about to ruin the best moment of my life by turning it into the worst. Then again, he’s done that very thing before. “Are you regretting last night?” I bring myself to ask. “Did we go too fast?”

His head jerks back, eyes urgently sweeping my face. “God no! Is that what you’re thinking? Christ, Ems. I would never regret what happened between us. Ever.” He plants a hard kiss to my forehead. “But I need to tell you something. I’m just nervous.”

I don’t know whether to be relieved by his actions or fearful of whatever he has to say, so I choose the path of least resistance and lean into my anxiety. “Tell me what you’re thinking. Please? You’re scaring me.”

“You’re the one who’s good with words, not me. Maybe I can show you better than I can tell you.”

Ben picks up his tripod and camera with one hand and pulls me toward the door with his other. Back inside, he flips on the lights and leaves me standing in the living room while he sets his tripod down and goes off to rummage through a side pocket on his camera bag.

He quickly returns, displaying his open hand in front of me without saying a word. A delicate gold necklace rests in his palm.

“This isn’t?” I lift the chain and a dainty letter M charm dangles in front of me. “This can’t be the same one. Ben?”

“It’s the same.”

I shift my focus past the necklace. Ben worries his lower lip as he studies me. “Where did you…How did you…”

“I kept it.”

“All this time?”

He nods, once, scratches at the back of his neck. “I got the broken clasp replaced after you gave it back to me that day on my porch. I think even then I was hoping there was some small chance you might wear it again someday.”

I squeeze the necklace tight in my hand, the same way my heart is being squeezed inside my chest.

“Then when I started traveling, I took it with me on my trips. I told myself after all those times we’d talked about all the places you wanted to see, it was like I was taking a piece of you with me around the world. But truthfully, I did it for me. That necklace became a comfort object or a good luck charm or something. I don’t know. This probably seems weird. Maybe I shouldn’t have shown you this—”

He reaches to take it from me, but I pull my hand away. “Ben, tell me. Tell me the real reason why you kept this and why you’re showing it to me now.”

He drops his head and stares at the floor. “Ems, we have to talk about what happened that day.”

My stomach clenches, my body automatically rejecting the idea of reliving that heartbreak yet again. “No, we don’t. It doesn’t matter. We were young, and what happened is done. We’re different people now.”

Ben moves away from me with a heavy sigh, crossing the room and sinking onto the overstuffed sofa. He leans forward and buries his hands in his hair, twisting at the root. I follow, sitting across from him on the ottoman but close enough that our knees weave together. I take one of his hands in mine and kiss his palm.

“I forgive you,” I tell him. “We don’t have to do this.”

“It’s important to me that you know what really happened.” He squeezes my hand. “Everything this time. All of it. The ugly truth. You and I both know we’ll never be able to really move forward until we talk about it.”

While there’s a chance he may be right, I’m terrified that what he has to say, the ugly truth, will destroy everything that’s developed between us on this trip. A wrecking ball taken to a weakened heart that showed its first cracks fourteen years ago. It’s one thing to convince myself I can forgive Ben if we ignore it and never bring it up again, write it off as two immature teenagers who made stupid mistakes. It’s another thing altogether if he’s about to confirm my deepest fear out loud, that he was never who I thought he was back then. He wasn’t my first boyfriend. He wasn’t my childhood best friend. He wasn’t the keeper of my secrets. He was a teenage boy who got what he wanted from me and then discarded me.

But when I look into his eyes, all I see is determination, and I know there’s no more avoiding this conversation. “Okay. Tell me.”

He takes a deep breath, chest shuddering with its rise and fall.

“The night of your birthday, when we were together that first time…” Around us the condo is completely silent, as if it, too, waits with bated breath for Ben’s words. “Ems, up until last night that was easily the best night of my life. I need you to know that you were everything to me.”

The statement is so direct that it wrings the air from my lungs, my heart swelling in my chest.

“Marcus and Mason were like brothers to me, and your parents basically took me in. But it was you. For me, it was always all about you.”

My eyes burn with the tears I’m suddenly holding back, my voice shaking as I ask, “Why did you do it then? Why’d you disappear on me like that?”

He hesitates a moment, then says, “Because that night quickly turned from the best of my life to the worst.”

Dread clamps my throat like a vise, and I get the eerie foresight that this conversation is going to hurt even more than I could’ve imagined but for entirely different reasons.

“After I left your bedroom that morning, I was on cloud fucking nine. It was early, but I decided to head back to my house because I knew that if your brothers saw me that happy when they woke up, they’d finally figure out something was going on between us.” He pauses, and I think my heart stops to wait with him. “I could hear my father yelling before I even got to the door, and when I went inside, the house looked like it had been ransacked. Broken glass on the living room floor. Photos knocked off the mantel. My mom sobbing in the kitchen.”

My chest aches so intensely that I want to cover my ears like a child so I can’t hear the rest. But I need to know what Ben went through. I need to understand the cause of it all, and why everything went up in flames within the blink of an eye, within a beat of a broken heart.

Ben’s voice is flat, but he squeezes tight to my hand, keeping our connection. “My parents…they weren’t like your parents, Ems. They were toxic. Volatile. Destructive. They’d have these fights where they’d scream and throw things at each other. My father would pack his shit and leave, and my mom would get so depressed she wouldn’t get out of bed or go to work. Then he’d come back hours or days later, they’d make up and pretend everything was fine for a few days, act like they were newly in love all over again, then the smallest thing would happen, and the cycle would repeat. It would always repeat.”

“Ben,” I whisper gently, but I don’t know what else to say. How could I have been so close with him and never known what his life was like at home?

“Anyway,” he continues, “with all the energy they invested in each other—negative or otherwise—there wasn’t a whole lot left over for me. By the time I was five, I figured out how to make my own macaroni and cheese on the stovetop because someone making a meal for me was the exception, not the rule. And when my hair would get too long and hang down in my eyes, I’d take scissors to it myself.”

He huffs a sad little laugh at this, but I can’t find the slightest humor in it at all.

“I learned to make myself small, invisible, even, so I didn’t upset the precarious climate in the house. They ruined so much of my childhood—if you can even call it that. As I got older, I got better at fending for myself, better at hiding their neglect, but I became more resentful. Maybe it was seeing your parents together, being around a family that actually loves each other, I don’t know. But that night, them ruining the best night of my life, something inside me just…snapped.”

“What did you do, Ben?” My voice breaks on his name.

His tired eyes focus somewhere over my shoulder, like he can’t bear to hold my gaze, like maybe he’s afraid of my judgment. “The next thing I knew, I had my father pinned against the kitchen wall. And I screamed at him to leave. Told him if he was so goddamn miserable here to leave and to never fucking come back this time. Ever. I said if he ever so much as thought about walking through that door again, I’d tell everyone about the years and years of neglect I’d suffered at their hands.”

My stomach roils. I might be sick.

“I’ll never forget how he looked at me. He gave me this sick grin like he was somehow proud of me for losing control. Like he finally recognized a version of himself in me after all.”

“Ben…” I cannot breathe.

“The worst part was that as soon as the words were out of my mouth, my mom wrapped herself around my father’s leg like a child, begging him not to go, not to leave her. But he packed a suitcase and walked out the door with my mom still clinging to him, and he even winked at me and told me to take care of my mother as he got in his car and thankfully drove the fuck out of our lives for good. Then I picked my mom up off the wet lawn, carried her inside, and sat with her while she cried. Cried and blamed me for making him leave, that is.”

Each beat of my heart is a sharp, stabbing pain.

Ben’s beautiful green eyes, glassy with tears, focus on mine again. “Did you know she knew about us, Ems?”

“Your mom?”

He nods. “She didn’t know much, but she saw the receipt for the necklace I bought you and figured it out.”

I squeeze that very necklace in my palm.

“She told me that night that if I really cared about you, I’d leave you alone. That if I’d proven anything, it’s that I was destined to be just like my father, and I’d end up breaking you the way he’d broken her.” Ben drops his head again, and when he shrugs, it’s the saddest movement I’ve ever seen. “At the time, I believed that. So that’s what I did.”

The pieces all snap into place in my head, a puzzle I’d rather not solve. The vacant look in Ben’s eyes when I showed up to his place that day. How he’d slid outside and pulled the front door closed behind him, because he didn’t want me to see what had happened inside. The way his voice sounded hollow when he told me he was sorry. How he paled when I’d finally admitted those three words to him I’d been holding back.

Three words that I know in hindsight he felt, too.

I want to move, but I’m frozen with the weight of so many emotions bearing down on me at once. Anger that any child would have such a shitty home life in the first place. Grief because Ben deserved so much better than what life gave him. Guilt for never putting the pieces together back then.

But mostly, there’s love.

Love for seventeen-year-old Ben, who I thought used me and forgot about me after that night together, but who was actually trying to protect me. Love for the thirty-one-year-old Ben sitting across from me now with tears in his eyes. If I’m honest, I’ve loved Ben Carter since he walked up to me in that kindergarten class, and I know in this moment that no matter what happens between us in the future, I’ll love him until the day I die.

“You aren’t him, Ben. You aren’t your father,” I say, words as broken as my heart.

“I know that now,” he says, resolute. “But I didn’t then.”

“If you didn’t want to tell me about it back then, you could have told someone. My brothers or my parents. We all loved you. Any of us would have helped.”

“Your mom did help,” he says. “You just didn’t know it.”

“She did?” My world has been tipped off its axis. Everything I thought I knew back then was a rose-colored version of reality, and I was a naïve child who didn’t see what was right in front of her. “Why didn’t she tell me?”

“Because I asked her not to. But she started piecing things together that last year or two, and it was her, along with a school guidance counselor, who convinced the administration to let me do a home study my senior year and still graduate. She brought dinner and groceries to our house more times than I can count. And when I took the bartending gig in the city once I turned eighteen, your mom would come and sit with my mom on the nights when she wouldn’t eat or get out of bed. When I started traveling with Dan, your mom would check in on mine. Mary Ellen was the only reason I was able to keep us above water.”

“So you were still around?” I ask. “That whole year in Hudson Springs, I thought you’d become a ghost. My brothers thought you’d become a ghost. They went to your house, Ben. They called you. They looked for you. I don’t understand.”

Ben tilts his head and delivers the saddest words I’ve ever heard. “I wasn’t a ghost. I just didn’t want to be found. And I had seventeen years’ worth of experience at hiding.”

“How did I never know any of this?” I demand, angry at myself for being so stupidly oblivious.

“Because I loved you, and I didn’t want you to know.” Ben scoots closer and cradles my face with the hand that isn’t clinging to mine, his thumb wiping away one of my tears. “It was my burden to bear, not yours. I’m so, so fucking sorry for breaking your heart. I was a messed-up kid in an impossible situation with no goddamn idea what I was doing. But I knew before you even showed up on my doorstep that day exactly what I’d be losing, and that broke my heart, too.”

For fourteen years I thought he’d simply changed his mind and rejected me. Learning that he did love me but was dealing with circumstances no teenager should ever have to, any years-old resentment I had dissolves instantly.

All I want is him.

I don’t realize how sharply the edges of the charm press into my palm until I relax my grip and hold the necklace up in the air again. “Put it on me?”

A smile curves his mouth, easing a little of the hurt inside me. “Of course.”

Twisting around, I lift my hair so he can fasten the clasp at my nape. When the M hangs at my collarbone, I turn back and say once more, “Tell me why you’re giving this to me again. Why now?”

“Come on, Ems.” He reaches up and runs his fingers over the charm. “You know why.”

“I need you to tell me, Ben,” I persist. “I need to hear it.”

“Because I love you.” The words rush from him in true Ben style—not loud but honest. “I love you now, I loved you then, and I’ve loved you the entire time between. I don’t know if you ever got over us, but I never did. And I know it’s been years. And I know how much I hurt you before. So if this is too much, or it’s too late, or if you just don’t want to go down this path again, I understand.

“But I need you to know that I’ve done the work. I may not have had a good example of what a healthy love looks like growing up, but I started going to therapy after Mom died, when I knew I couldn’t keep running from my past anymore. Getting help was something she always refused to do, and I didn’t want to live like that. So I’ve worked really, really fucking hard to be in a place where I think I can be the kind of partner you deserve. And I know it’s presumptuous of me to assume that’s even something you’d want, but if there’s even a chance that you—”

I’m kissing him so fast that I take us both by surprise, Ben’s cutoff words vibrating against my thundering heart as I climb onto his lap and press myself against him. I’ve waited fourteen years to hear those words from him, and now that I have, it’s as if every single part of me I was trying to hold back, trying to protect, is unleashed all at once. I break our kiss, only so I can finally tell him what I’ve known consciously since yesterday, but probably unconsciously much longer than that. Probably since he first walked into Calvin’s office.

“I love you, too,” I say. “I’ve always loved you, Ben.”

He brings my mouth back to his, kissing me deep as I part my lips and brush my tongue against his. And like every single time I kiss this man, heat whooshes into my belly like an automatic reflex. We stumble upstairs where a tangle of torrid kisses and reverent touches and frantic undressing ensues, until we end up between the crisp white sheets once again. Ben braces himself over me, filling me up again and again while he whispers in my ear all the things I need to hear from him.

Afterward, I hold him close, his face buried against my neck as I run my fingers up and down the planes of his back. Beyond the glass, aurora’s last remnants paint the sky in streaks of faded green and dusty pink, drawing to a close for the night. I exhale the deepest sigh of contentment, something I’ve questioned for fourteen years now as clear as the windowpane I stare through.

Ben Carter loves me.

Chapter 21

Tip #16 when visiting Iceland: Icelandic sand dunes can sure come in handy.

Our last two days in Iceland pass by in a dreamy haze. During the day, I hold Ben’s hand as we explore the sights, laughing at his stupid jokes until my ribs hurt. At night, we explore each other in our hotel room with the window propped open and the cool breeze skating over our flushed skin. We stay at Hótel Búðir on the Snæfellsnes Peninsula, situated on the western coast with sweeping views of the photo-famous Búðir Black Church and some of the most dramatic seascapes Iceland has to offer. The hotel is quaint and upscale, and as soon as we checked in, I knew these two days would be my favorite of the trip. Sure, a lot of that has to do with Ben, but a lot of it has to do with the quiet beauty of the region—something that will certainly be noted as a cannot miss in my article.

We explore the land bridge at Arnarstapi, Skálasnagaviti lighthouse, and Ytri Tunga beach. We spend quite a bit of time at Kirkjufell mountain—which Ben tells me was featured in Game of Thrones, and I nod like that means anything to me. Then I tell Ben it looks more like a grass-covered Hershey’s Kiss than a mountain to me, which he seems to find baffling.

Kirkjufell is a two-for-one deal because across the street from the mountain is a waterfall (shocking, I know), so if you photograph it right, according to Ben, you get both in the same shot. A third bonus is the herd of horses grazing on the mountainside, so accustomed to people by now that they let us walk right up to them and pose for a picture. I have Ben snap my photo with a dark brown stud with a sand-colored mane who has a look in his eye that’s equal part friendly and equal part I-may-trample-you-with-my-hooves-at-any-moment.

As great as all these experiences are, as much as I’ll cherish each one of them till my dying day, the absolute best part of these last days in Iceland is my time alone with Ben at Hótel Búðir. The countryside is something out of a dream, sheep grazing in the fields in such large numbers that we sometimes have to stop the car on the road to and from the hotel and wait for a herd of them to cross. There’s one sheep in particular that hangs out around the gravel parking lot, and Ben and I name him Joseph. At night, he bleats outside our open window and Ben yells, “Quiet, Joseph!” into the dark, and I laugh every single time.

It’s all so…good. Too good. And as much as I’m loving every minute and trying to relish this time, I can’t quell the sadness slowly sneaking in over our trip coming to a close. It’s the worst case of the Sunday scaries ever, and I think Ben feels it, too. The real world awaits us with deadlines and Calvin Cramer III and a million other outside influences waiting to pop this bubble we’ve found here in Iceland.

I think it’s why Ben is strangely formal when he asks me to dinner at the hotel’s restaurant on the last night of our trip, insisting we get ready in our separate rooms so he can “pick me up” at seven o’clock for our first real date. He says it’s important to him to do things right, and to get to know the person I am now, not just rely on the history we shared years ago.

His solemnity about the whole thing has my butterflies swarming, my thoughts scattered as I pull on the black lacy dress Jacklyn packed for me. The long-sleeved number has a deep V neckline that runs down my sternum (naturally the one Jacklyn selected out of my entire wardrobe of mostly modest clothing). I finish with my dress and zip my black ankle boots. I’ve already curled my hair and spent an eternity on my makeup, so I spritz on perfume and am adding the last detail to my outfit—the necklace from Ben—when he knocks at my door.

I hurry and pull it open, and Ben stands before me in navy pants and a white dress shirt, sans tie and the top button of his shirt unfastened. His unruly golden brown hair has been mostly tamed into place with some type of product, but the front pieces are still tousled, as if he just couldn’t resist the urge to run his fingers through them right before he knocked on my door.

“Hi,” I say breathlessly. It’s the only word I remember with him standing there looking that good.

“Hi, yourself.” Ben’s bright green eyes skirt up my bare legs, briefly catching on the hemline at my thighs, then continue upward until they come to an abrupt halt when they reach the M charm dangling at my breastbone. The corner of his mouth pulls upward.

He leans forward to kiss me, but I lean back.

“This red lipstick will get all over you,” I warn.

“And I couldn’t give a single fuck.”

He walks me backward as his mouth covers mine, pressing my back against the open door. The kiss is agonizingly slow and sensual at first, quickly escalating into something heated and passionate. Something that makes me think we’ll be missing that dinner reservation after all. But Ben eventually pulls away, releasing my hips like they’ve burned him.

“I’ve wanted to take you on a real date for as long as I can remember,” he tells me. “I’m doing this the right way.”

His determined expression fills my heart, and I rub away what I can of my lipstick from his mouth, knowing that despite my efforts, everyone in the restaurant is going to know what we were doing as soon as we walk in.

Dinner at Hótel Búðir is easily the best meal I have in Iceland. We dine on rib eyes with mushroom sauce and truffle fries, a bottle of white wine, and raspberry crème brûlée for dessert. By the time we finish, I’m warm and full and tipsy, and Ben insists on paying for dinner instead of charging it to the Around the Globe credit card since it’s our first date.

The things this man does to me, it’s as if he wants me to jump him here in the middle of the restaurant.

After we finish with dinner, Ben runs upstairs to grab his gray wool coat and my teal one, then we take a long drive without any particular destination in mind, pulling over into an empty gravel lot when we spot some trails leading down to the rugged coastline. Ben doesn’t bring his camera along, and I squeeze his hand a little tighter in mine, knowing that for both of us, tonight is about living in the moment with each other.

We walk slow since I’m in a dress and heels, but that doesn’t matter, I want to soak in every second of this time. We come to a stop when the matted grass beneath our feet turns into golden sand, my heeled boots unable to go any farther.

“What do you think your family will say when they find out about us?” Ben wraps his arms around my shoulders as we stare out at the edge of the horizon, the sun dipping low over the choppy gray ocean.

I consider his question for a moment. The truth is, I have no idea how they’ll react to the news of Ben and me together. “Well, I’ve never brought a guy home before, so I’m not entirely sure.”

“Never?”

I shake my head. “Nope. But I think that has more to do with my family than with the men I’ve dated.”

“What do you mean?”

I lean back against the warmth of Ben’s chest as I think of the best way to phrase what I’m thinking. “You know how my family is. How my brothers are. Chaotic. Wild. Loud. I’m more of a background character, you know? They are the stars, not me. Between Marcus and Mason and my dad, there’s not a lot of room left to shine. And that’s okay.” I pause for another beat. “But I don’t really need that put on display for someone I’m interested in. If that makes sense.”

Turning me to face him, Ben slides his arms into the front of my coat, forearms snaking around my waist. “I never knew you felt that way.”

The thing I love most about Ben in this moment is that he doesn’t try to offer a different perspective or talk me out of my feelings. He was best friends with my brothers for our entire childhood, but he doesn’t mention a single word in regard to them. Instead, he presses his forehead to mine, and simply says, “I’m sorry.”

Suddenly, I don’t want to waste another second talking about my family or work or anything really. These are my last hours in Iceland with him, and I don’t want to talk, I want to feel.

I rise up on my tiptoes and kiss him urgently, twining my fingers in the soft hair above his nape and pulling him backward with me as I part my lips.

“Let me take you back to the hotel,” he whispers against my mouth as we stumble over uneven ground.

“No. Too far away.”

Footing regained, Ben pulls back and searches my eyes, but I’m too aroused for debate. I step forward and kiss up the column of his throat, bite his earlobe between my teeth, slide my hand over his erection. He drops his forehead onto my shoulder. “Someone could see us out here.”

“I don’t care,” I answer like the depraved woman he turns me into.

He lifts his head, searching for a solution while I suck on his neck and work my palm over him. “Here…” He walks me backward, hands gripping my waist. “At least…”

When I briefly pull my mouth off him, I see we’re shielded from view of the trails by a grassy sand dune. Not absolute protection, but with it quickly getting darker out, it should suffice. Grasping my hips, Ben maneuvers me up against the sandy hill. Then he drops to his knees and pushes my dress up my thighs.

“You’ll get your pants dirty,” I say in ragged breaths, but he peers up at me with brows knitted together as if asking, Really?

His fingers inch underneath my hemline, and the cool air hits all my places as he slides my underwear down my legs. I step out of them, and Ben tucks the silky garment into his coat pocket. He kisses up my inner thigh, and when the warmth of his mouth settles over me, all my weight sinks against the damp, salty earth at my back. The piercing breeze and the heat of Ben’s tongue working between my legs makes for an arousing, delicious contrast, and I can’t get enough.

It’s a goddamn shame having a gorgeous man go down on me up against a sand dune on the Icelandic coast won’t make the article. That’d be the real can’t miss for our readership.

Another crisp breeze blows across my cheek, and I shiver. “So good,” I say, twisting his hair between my fingers. Ben responds by groaning his want, the vibrations between my legs casting me closer to the precipice. He wraps a hand around my calf and settles my leg over his shoulder.

And fuck…

That angle…

This view…

I fall apart in seconds, biting my lips together to muffle any sounds that threaten to escape. Ben eases into featherlight strokes of his tongue as he brings me through the aftershocks of my orgasm, fading to open-mouth kisses before he rises to his feet.

“That was…” Breathless and mind-numbingly satisfied, I don’t finish my own sentence.

Ben slides my dress back down my hips before taking my hand. “I’m taking you back to the hotel. Now.”

This time I don’t protest.

“In a way,” I muse aloud on our walk back down the trail, “that was kind of the perfect way to say goodbye to Iceland.” Although intended as a cheeky sentiment, the words create a cloudy heaviness in my chest. I don’t want to leave Iceland. I don’t want this trip to end. But what I can’t fully work out is whether the heaviness I’m feeling is over my dream trip ending, or the fear of what awaits me at home.

“Not so fast, Ems,” Ben says, breaking my thoughts. “I have a surprise planned for you tomorrow morning.”

Chapter 22

Bonus tip when visiting Iceland: If you see Joseph, tell him I said hi.

Ben’s surprise requires a wake-up call of three a.m., so I’m not particularly thrilled when I’m startled awake by the buzzing alarm on his phone. Our flight back to New York isn’t until later this afternoon, and I’d hoped to sleep in, eat a nice brunch, maybe get indecent against a sand dune again, who knows? The possibilities were endless.

Instead, Ben’s telling me to dress in warm hiking layers and to make sure I fill my water jug before we leave the hotel. Sadly, none of that sounds like there will be brunch or dune sex in my future.

Once the trusty Suzuki is loaded with our luggage, I snap one more photo of Joseph with my phone (to have framed when we get back home) as he lies in the tall grass at the edge of the softly lit parking lot with a judgmental expression akin to, Do you even know what time it is?

Sadness blankets me. Our trip is over, minus this one last excursion Ben has up his sleeve. As much as my body is physically spent, and of course I’m excited to see what life has in store with Ben back at home—no matter what it all might mean for my career—this trip changed me on a fundamental level. Iceland pushed me to my limits and never let up. But I still did the hard things, even if I did them while crying or complaining or swearing I’d never do them again (i.e., anything involving the word whiteout). And for that, even if I’m somehow lucky enough to travel to a hundred different countries in the future, it’s Iceland that will always have the biggest piece of my heart.

Ben holds my hand as we follow the one-lane road leading back to the highway. “We’ll come back, Ems,” he says, like he knows how sad I am to say goodbye. “We’ll have to come visit Joseph.”

I bite the inside of my cheek so my chin doesn’t tremble. “People always say that when vacation’s over, but everyone has to go back to real life.”

I know my bad mood is normal. I’m on the trip of a lifetime, and I’m not sure if or when I’ll get to do it again. Calvin isn’t going to promote me when Ben doesn’t join the company. I can’t afford trips like this on my own. And even if I could, it’s deeper than that. It’s the knowledge that there simply isn’t enough time in a lifetime to see every nook and cranny and small village and big city this gigantic, marvelous world has to offer.

What if I never find my favorite spot on earth because I never make it there?

“Well, I happen to be very excited to get back home and finally start a life with you in it again.” Ben kisses the back of my hand, and I smile over at him.

“Yeah. There is that.” The sorrow encompassing my chest dissipates the slightest bit. “Maybe I’m just tired. You know, since you dragged me out of bed in the middle of the night and all.”

We take a right turn onto the highway, and the bumpy ground beneath us smooths out. “Why don’t you recline your seat and get some rest?” Ben says. “I’ve got this.”

* * *

I wake again when Ben cuts the engine. Pulling my seat upright, I see we’re parked in a muddy field with a few other vehicles and a camper van nearby. Hills rise in the distance, but it’s still too dark out to get any real sense of what I’m looking at. This view isn’t exactly impressive.

“Where are we?” I ask, rubbing my eyes with the heels of my palms.

“Fagradalsfjall volcano.”

Confusion clouds my sleep-addled brain. “I don’t understand.”

I recall a brief mentioning of this area when doing the little research I’d had time for. In March of 2021, a volcano on the Reykjanes Peninsula of southern Iceland erupted, spewing lava sporadically for several months. YouTube and Instagram were flooded with videos and livestreams of hikers roasting marshmallows and hot dogs over the steaming orange slush. Which, on my personal list of things in nature to take seriously, molten lava sits right up there at the top along with quicksand and the recently added glacial crevasses, but who am I to judge?

“What’s so special about an inactive volcano?” I ask.

“It erupted again after we arrived.” Ben opens his door and steps out, then dips his head back into view and winks. “Let’s go climb an active volcano, Ems.”

Turns out, hiking a volcano is hard AF (as Jacklyn would say). To be precise, we don’t hike up the volcano itself, rather the mountain nearest the volcano that will provide the best view. Ben had warned me as he loaded gear into his camera bag back at the Suzuki that from what he’d read on tourist blogs, this would be the most difficult hike we’ve done so far. Which is fantastic news after ten days of hiking more than I’ve ever hiked in my life combined and having sex (same parameters sadly still apply) in multiple positions that haven’t been easy on the thighs. I can’t even sit down to pee without my legs trembling and threatening to give out.

And we start this hike in the dark.

With flashlights.

So cool, cool, cool.

Ben wasn’t lying, either. It takes an eternity just to walk around the field to get to the base of the mountain where the real journey begins. Thankfully, by the time we do, daylight breaks over the horizon and we put both our flashlights away in Ben’s backpack. (I already have the keys!)

Now I’m able to clearly see why we walked all the way around the field instead of through it; most of the area is covered in lumpy, hardened lava that at some point spewed from the top of the volcano like a shaken bottle of fiery orange soda. The curved, irregular edges of the solidified rock fascinate me, as if when the lava flowed down the mountain, it suddenly stopped and declared, Okay I think we’re done here. I walk over to one of the now-cooled edges and sweep my hand along the rough, texturized surface, knowing that not all that long ago, this belonged miles underground.

Continuing on our way, I pull my jacket off and tie it at my waist, sweat already forming a sticky layer between my skin and my wool undershirt. The dirt trail we follow becomes steeper as the mountain portion really kicks in, and despite the tread on my hiking boots, small rocks and debris give way under my feet and slide back down the hill, making it difficult to find footing.

“I don’t know about this.” I glance over my shoulder to where Ben follows behind me this time—probably prepared to catch me if I start to tumble down the hill like ill-fated Jill in the children’s nursery rhyme.

“Just go slow. We’re in no rush.”

I blow out a breath and let my gaze sweep over the valley below. More hikers file into the field of lava now that the sun is up, some even climbing atop it to pose for photos, blatantly ignoring the posted signs explaining exactly why they shouldn’t do that. Although the top layer has cooled and hardened, there’s a chance someone could fall through into what is still very much hot, burning lava underneath. And since Iceland doesn’t play, it’s made quite clear on the posted signage that if someone is foolish enough to try this, no rescue squad is risking their own lives to try and save whoever doesn’t have luck on their side that day. Essentially, in less polite terms, You’re on your own, dumbass.

“Okay,” I say aloud. “I can do this.” I put one foot in front of the other again, concentrating on a single step at a time. The trail narrows at certain points, and the last thing I want is for any of the hikers below to catch up to us and me to become that person who is holding everyone up.

Several minutes—hours? decades? lifetimes?—later, we reach a part of the trail so steep there’s a rope strung between wooden posts to help hikers pull themselves up. I shoot another snarky look back at Ben.

“Really?” I huff with all the breath I have left.

To his credit, Ben at least attempts to suppress his amused smile. “Where’s Ms. World Traveler now?”

“For your information, there’s a big difference in traveling the world and using a goddamn rope to pull my body weight up the side of a mountain.”

His chuckle does little to ease my current irritation. “If it helps, hundreds of people do this each day.”

“No, that doesn’t help, Ben.” But in a way, it kind of does. Because if hundreds of people can do this, then surely I can do it, too. I clench the thick, corded rope in my hand and start to heave myself upward.

By the time the rope ends and the ground levels out—and I am playing fast and loose with the term level here—my panting could put any dog to shame. I bend at the waist, desperate to pull any available oxygen into my lungs, and I don’t know, maybe there’s more of it a couple feet closer to the ground.

“I think…” Gasp. “The air…” Another gasp. “Is thinner up…” This time it’s a wheeze. “Here.”

“I’m certain it is.” Ben’s response isn’t meant as sarcasm, but the only sign of a struggle on him is the sheen of sweat glistening across his forehead like he’s a goddamn Cullen.

Meanwhile other hikers are closing in on us, so I need to get my ass in gear. We start moving again, and now I have a new problem: wind plus heights does not equal my friend. I already knew Iceland’s winds were no joke, but at this altitude, they’re downright brutal. Combined with the fact that the trail is only about fifteen feet wide in this particular area with a steep drop-off to my left, a very real fear spikes my already too-rapid heart rate.

The wind is going to blow my shaky body right off this mountain!

“Ben, I can’t do this.” I turn back to him, eyes burning with tears. Fucking everything burns. My lungs. My calves. My ass burns worst of all. “The wind is going to blow me away!” My voice is panicky, and a tear treks down my wind-burned cheek.

“Breathe, Ems. Just breathe.” Ben wipes away my tear with his knuckle.

“That’s the problem! I can’t just breathe!”

As I’d feared, some of the other hikers have caught up to us now, and they exchange awkward glances as they pass us by. Excellent. I’m now that person having a meltdown on the side of a volcano…or mountain…or whatever the fuck this qualifies as.

Ben stays quiet until they pass us, then says calmly, “I wouldn’t have brought you here if I didn’t know you could do it. Look at how far you’ve already made it.”

He motions over the valley with his arm, and a wave of nausea rolls through my stomach at the view far below.

“That’s part of the problem,” I say through sniffles.

“Look.” This time he points back in the direction we’re hiking. “Over that next incline is the lookout point. We’re almost there.”

“That’s where the trail ends?”

“Well…no.” Ben scratches his jaw, hesitant. “The trail continues for another two miles.” At the high-pitched noise that escapes me, he rushes, “But we aren’t going that far. The trail leads to multiple lookout points. We’re just going to the first. We’ll get a great view from there.” He cups my face in his hands, expression determined. “You’ve got this, Ems.”

I nod my head, and something about Ben’s belief in me makes me believe in me.

So fuck it. This is my last morning in Iceland, my last excursion. If it takes every drop of blood, sweat, and tears I have, I’m going to do this.

I put one foot in front of the other again, moving up the mountain at a snail’s pace. But at least I’m moving.

Eventually, we reach the viewing area, and while I’m not sure my lower half will ever recover from this journey, the view across from us is nothing short of spectacular. A circular lip forms the opening of the volcano, but the rest of the scene doesn’t look like the cone-shaped image I’d imagined. The volcano looks like any of the other hills surrounding us in the mountainous region. In fact, if it wasn’t for the sludge oozing from the top—ashy black and a hot, glowing orange—I probably wouldn’t know what I was looking at.

“Hey, Ems,” Ben whispers behind me. “That’s a fucking volcano. Like, right there. Erupting right in front of us.” The wonder in his voice roots me to the moment, and suddenly the journey to get to this point feels like a small price to pay for the gift of being here, with him.

“I did it,” I declare, covering my mouth with my hands as giddy laughter oozes out of me like the flowing lava in the distance. What an emotional roller coaster. Tears continue to track down my cheeks, but now they’re formed from a place of pride. “I made it! And that’s a volcano!”

Ben wraps his arms around me from behind, and I lean back against the solid comfort of his chest. Other hikers stand in scattered groups around us, but no one pays any attention to anything other than the miraculous feat of nature across the way.

“You see, Mona Mildred Miller,” Ben whispers against the shell of my ear, “you can do any fucking thing you want to do. You think you don’t shine like your brothers? You think they’re the stars of your family? Ems, if they’re stars, then you’re the fucking sun. You’re the most incredible person I know, and I’m so lucky I’m the one who gets to love you.”

Openly sobbing now, I twist my head and press a kiss to his mouth. We stand there for a long while, watching lava seep down the side of the volcano, and Ben doesn’t make a move for his camera. At least not yet. For now, we’re just still, enjoying the connection with each other, enjoying the view, enjoying life.

Eventually, when the sun is high in the sky above, I let reality slowly creep back in. “Hey, you have a plan, right? I can’t go to the airport this gross.”

Ben laughs softly and kisses my temple. “I booked a hotel room near the airport so we can shower before we leave.”

“I knew I loved you for a reason.”

That shower turns out to be a necessary foresight, because on the way back down the steep mountainside (somehow even trickier to navigate than going up), I manage to fall on my ass not once, but twice.

Despite the rope.

Chapter 23

The flight back home is turbulent and bumpy, and Ben clutches my hand the entire six hours. I can’t help but consider how much has changed over the course of the past ten days, from tentatively holding his hand during takeoff as a favor, to now holding his hand because he’s the man I love and I would do anything in the world to ease his discomfort.

Back in New York, I unlock my apartment door with the urgency of someone who avoids tiny airplane bathrooms at all costs and hasn’t peed in roughly eight hours. Abandoning my luggage at the door, I make a run for it, and only after my bladder is relieved do I throw myself across the sofa with a sigh, exhausted but not willing to crawl into my bed until I’ve showered. It’s only nine p.m. in Brooklyn, but I’m still four hours ahead on Iceland time.

I heave a forearm over my eyes, content to sleep here for the next five days if needed, but I hear the slow creak of Jacklyn’s bedroom door, followed by her footsteps padding across the living room.

“You’re home!” she declares, shoving my legs off the sofa to make room for herself.

I groan in agony as the sore, stiff muscles in my legs contract painfully.

“Jesus. Are you dying?”

“It’s entirely possible.”

Her throaty laugh makes me smile, and I slide my arm away to look up at her. Of course, she’s dressed to go out. Tight black skirt and equally tight racerback tank. Dangly silver earrings and perfectly wavy curls throughout her auburn hair.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m supposed to grab a drink with a guy I met at yoga last week.”

“Is this even a real yoga class or just a place to hook up?”

She shrugs a shoulder. “Two birds and all that. I wouldn’t have made plans, but I didn’t know if you’d be coming home. Anyway, I can be late. I need to hear all the things about Iceland. And again, by Iceland, I mean Ben.”

“Why wouldn’t I come home?”

“Well, you know.” She arches a brow. “I thought you might be going home with photographer Benjamin Carter.”

“Oh. Right.”

I’d called Jacklyn from the hotel before we left and given her a brief update on the status of me and Ben, mostly so I could finally deliver my strongly worded monologue regarding so-called swimsuits and her terrible what-happens-in-Iceland advice that I’d been practicing all week. All to which she’d unapologetically replied, Well, it worked, didn’t it?

The truth of the matter is I very much wish Ben were here. It’s been an hour since we parted ways at baggage claim, and I already miss him like I left a piece of myself behind. We’d made the decision to separate for a few days in the name of our careers, knowing we both have an exorbitant amount of work to get done before our meeting with Calvin on Monday. I’m not sure how we’d fare up against a deadline if we stayed together.

“We decided to focus solely on work until our meeting at the office on Monday.”

“So he’s turned you into a sex fanatic, I see.”

I roll my eyes. “It’s more than good sex. Great sex, actually. Fantastic even. But that’s beside the point.” Jacklyn watches me, waiting for me to verbalize what I haven’t told her yet but I think she already knows. “So…yeah, okay, I’m in love with him.”

“Oh, sweetie.” Leaning forward she scoops her phone off the coffee table, thumbs rapidly firing out a text.

“What are you doing?”

“Canceling my plans.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Absolutely I do. My best friend is in love for the first time since I’ve known her. This is a major life event, and I need to hear everything.”

* * *

By Monday morning, I miss Ben desperately. We’ve texted nonstop. FaceTimed every night before bed. Still, it’s not enough, and I can only hope I don’t throw myself at him right there on the conference table in front of Calvin.

The distance has been beneficial, though I hate to admit it, in allowing me to catch up on much-needed sleep and lay out a detailed outline for the article. Once Calvin approves my outline, I’ll spend the rest of the month writing the article, editing it numerous times, and working with Ben to decide which photos will provide the best aesthetic. Despite my confidence in the work I’ve done so far, I pace from gray wall to gray wall in my cubicle, checking my phone every few minutes as the time ticks closer to ten a.m.

As soon as the digits flip to 9:55, I weave through the thirty-sixth-floor maze—pausing for a brief, double thumbs-up and enthusiastic “You’ve got this!” from Jacklyn—then continue to the elevator bay and press the up arrow.

It was only a couple weeks ago I took this same journey, and it’s astounding to think of all the ways my life has changed in that little amount of time. Or maybe it didn’t change exactly, at least not when it comes to Ben. Maybe it was more of a course correction, fate finally putting us back on the path that led to each other.

The elevator dings, silver doors sliding open. And there’s Ben, leaning against the back wall in a white henley and his signature gray utility jacket, the only hint he’s attending a formal business meeting is the laptop bag slung over one shoulder, his fingers idly fidgeting with the strap.

In that precise moment I fully grasp why Ben Carter will never work for Around the Globe. He spent his entire childhood never having any say or control over the things happening in his own home, never knowing from one minute to the next what the atmosphere would be, or when it might shift. He grew up without the privilege of stability or the freedom to be a carefree, innocent child. Instead, he was an involuntarily independent kid who had to fend for himself when others failed him. Now as an adult he chooses to live life on his own terms. He’s created the ability to work when and where he wants, and I’ll be damned if I’m the person who ever tries to convince him to do otherwise.

“Ms. Miller,” he greets. “It’s good to see you again.”

I step into the elevator. “Benjamin, I hope you’ve been well.”

The second the doors slide closed I’m in his arms and his mouth is on mine and my back is pressed against the cool metal wall. My bag slides from my shoulder to the floor as I return his kiss, relishing the taste of cinnamon on his breath and his clean, fresh scent hanging in the air.

“God, Ems, I’ve missed you so fucking much,” he breathes against my mouth.

“I know,” I tell him, biting his lip. “Me, too.”

When the doors slide open again, Ben and I stand on opposite sides of the elevator like two professional coworkers and nothing more. Except if anyone looked close enough, they might notice my emerald silk blouse wrinkled at the hips, the hemline of my black skirt slightly askew. Thank god I was smart enough not to wear lipstick today.

Instead of proceeding toward Calvin’s office, I lead Ben through the glass hub of the thirty-seventh floor as we hook a right and head in the direction of the conference room. I spot Shirley seated at the long mahogany table before we reach the shiny transparent door. There’s a legal pad and three different pens in front of her to take notes for Calvin.

“Good morning, Shirley,” I say upon entering the conference room. I select a chair across from her and place my bag on the polished tabletop. “Lovely day out, isn’t it? Can you believe how quickly September is flying by?”

Ben eyes me with a curious look, then takes the seat beside me and pulls his laptop and a few prints from his messenger bag, arranging them in a neat stack.

“Mmm,” Shirley noncommittally replies to my questions she didn’t listen to. She jots down something on the legal pad, sending my already-jumpy nerves into overdrive. What could she possibly be writing already? Surely I won’t be judged on my awkward attempts at small talk.

We sit in silence for an eternity before Calvin bursts through the door in a rush, carrying an air of importance (entitlement) with him. Ben and I both stand, but Calvin moves past me without a glance to shake Ben’s hand.

“Benjamin,” he drawls, “it’s about time I saw you in this conference room. I hope you enjoyed your trip.”

“Very much,” Ben replies, but he looks over Calvin’s shoulder at me as he does.

Walking past me a second time, Calvin takes his seat at the head of the conference table. “Please, sit, sit. I cannot wait to see what you have in store for me. Let’s begin.”

“Yes, sir,” I say, taking my seat again. “If you will take a look at my outline, I believe—”

Calvin holds up a hand, silencing me as soon as I’ve started my pitch. “Ms. Miller, I would prefer to start with Benjamin’s photographs before we discuss the article.” He rubs his hands together, eyeing the stack of photos in front of Ben like it’s an award-winning filet mignon at a Michelin-starred restaurant. “I’ve been waiting years for this. No offense.”

“Of course! Totally understandable!” My tone is entirely too enthusiastic. “No worries here, sir!”

Ben shoots me another inquisitive glance as he leans forward to slide the stack across the table to Calvin. My cheeks flame. I don’t know what’s more embarrassing, the way Ben looks at me like he doesn’t know the person acting this way, or Calvin’s blatant dismissal.

Calvin flips through Ben’s photos slowly, reverently even, taking his time to study each one in depth while the rest of us practically choke on the silence. Or maybe that’s just me. Finally, Calvin wrangles the photos back into a neat stack, looks up at Ben, and says, “Truly exquisite work, Benjamin.”

Shirley writes that down.

Ben nods his head once. “Thank you, sir.”

An actual smile forms on Calvin’s stony face. “Now, I’ve told you to call me Cal,” he says—playfully?—and I’m not sure which of us has the bigger crush on Ben. Of course, Calvin’s crush is more about the money Ben stands to earn him, but still. “All right, Ms. Miller.” He straightens his tie as he addresses me. “Let’s hear it.”

My stomach somersaults. This is it. My chance to earn my promotion. To prove I’m cut out for this. To live my childhood dream. No pressure.

I clear my throat and begin. “There are two things that stood out to me about Iceland, sir. One was the overabundance of natural beauty everywhere I looked—as you can clearly see from Ben’s photos.” I catch myself saying Ben instead of Benjamin, but Calvin’s too busy beaming at him to notice. “The second thing is the personal journey—the physical, mental, and emotional one—an average person like me had to take in the pursuit of seeing these stunning places.”

I slide my outline in Calvin’s direction and, always prepared as I am, slide an extra copy to Shirley. “I’m not a hiker or an outdoor enthusiast by any stretch of the imagination, and I think that’s probably true for the majority of our subscribers. While I could simply list out a superfluous description of each place we visited, I believe this article in particular needs to incorporate more personal aspects than normally featured in Around the Globe. I want to write about how each of these sites made me feel, and how getting there challenged me.” I pause before adding, “Iceland changed me, sir. It pushed me to my limit in about every way it possibly could, but it also rewarded me far beyond anything I could have imagined, and I think that should be the focus of this piece.”

Calvin peruses his copy of my outline, the only sound in the conference room the frantic scratching of Shirley’s pen. At the prolonged silence, my cartwheeling stomach performs gymnastic feats that would make Simone Biles proud.

When Calvin’s steely gray eyes finally look up again, any trace of his good mood from moments ago has packed up and left the building. Glancing up from her note-taking, Shirley glimpses the ominous expression transforming Calvin’s face and takes a quick hit off a vape pen, waving away the puff of smoke that momentarily obscures her face. No one says anything for the longest ten seconds of my life.

“Ms. Miller.” The chilly cadence of Calvin’s voice sends a shiver from my scalp to my toes. “Around the Globe is a respected leader in the travel journalism industry.”

“Yes, sir. I’m aware.”

“Oh. So you are aware then that I didn’t ask for a personal essay about your feelings or a quiz on which sites in Iceland you should visit based on your zodiac sign, for Christ’s sake.”

My stomach falters and crashes to the floor. “I, uh, that’s not—”

“Our readers don’t care about your personal growth, Ms. Miller.”

“Actually, I think—” Ben starts to interject, but I snap my head around and nail him with a look that makes it abundantly clear I don’t want him to rescue me. He falls quiet.

I lower my voice, defeat setting in. “I just thought our readership might appreciate someone being real about the toll a trip like this can take on someone who is not athletically inclined and has zero experience with the outdoors. I wanted to show how rewarding it was to challenge myself in ways I never expected. How I gained so much more than just a trip to Iceland, and how I discovered pieces of myself I didn’t know existed.”

“No.” Calvin is persistent. Unwavering. “That’s the final answer. Get a new outline to me by the end of the week.”

The battle is over, and I went down in flames. So much for a promotion. So much for my dream of seeing the world. At this rate, I’ll be lucky to keep my old job as a Local. “Yes, sir. My apologies.”

Calvin stands and buttons his suit jacket, signaling the end of this meeting. Following his lead, Shirley gathers her pens and legal pad and vape. I clench my jaw to keep my chin from quivering. This was a goddamn disaster, and I’m humiliated and angry and too much of a coward to do anything about it.

“Oh, and Benjamin,” Calvin turns back, already halfway out the glass door. He chuckles smarmily, just the two of them in this boys’ club I’m not privy to. “Going forward, you might want to rethink your insistence Ms. Miller be the one to cover any articles you photograph for us. I hate to tell you I was right when I said she wasn’t up for an assignment of this magnitude. I apologize profusely for not being more insistent.”

My heart stutters.

Blood roars through my ears with such ferocity that my eardrums vibrate.

“Wait. What?” I swivel my chair in Ben’s direction because this must be a misunderstanding. His pleading, wide-eyed expression all but confirms that it’s not. “You chose me? You set this all up?”

“Ems, listen to me.” He places a hand on my arm. “I was going to tell you. I wanted to tell you. But things were so good between us after all these years, and I didn’t want to screw that up. Again.”

Nausea crashes over me like an Icelandic sneaker wave. If I thought I couldn’t be more humiliated, I was so wrong. “You lied to me. I thought fate brought us back together, but it wasn’t fate at all, it was you. You arranged this.”

“Excuse me,” Calvin’s voice booms through the glass rectangle. “You two are involved in a personal relationship?”

I press a hand to my churning stomach. In the corner of the room, Shirley reaches inside her blouse and pulls a cigarette and lighter from her bra, the vape pen no longer cutting it.

“I can explain,” Ben says when I don’t say anything at all, but Calvin holds his hand up again, gray eyes locked solely on mine.

“With all due respect, you don’t work for me, Benjamin. Not yet anyway. Ms. Miller does. She’s the one who needs to explain her actions here.” He releases the door and moves in my direction, his gaze a laser beam pinning me to my chair. “For Christ’s sake, when I said to recruit him, I didn’t mean by sleeping with him!”

This cannot be happening.

“You were recruiting me? Was that what happened between us?” Ben’s words are far away and muffled, as if I’m underwater.

“I should fire you on the spot!” Calvin explodes.

I push out of my chair, uncertain my legs will hold a body that no longer feels like my own. I’m just an outside observer to the scene in a movie where everything goes horribly wrong. But if it isn’t real, then why are tears hovering at the edges of my vision, threatening to fall right here in front of everyone? I have to get out of this room. Away from Calvin. Away from Shirley. Away from Ben. Now.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Calvin questions, but I’m already speeding toward the door. “Do not walk away from me!”

I stop in my tracks, only to hear myself utter words I never imagined saying.

“I quit.”

* * *

I take the stairwell instead of the elevator, aware Ben doesn’t know his way around this building, and on the thirty-sixth floor, I weave back to my cubicle on autopilot. Jacklyn must sense my distress as I pass her by because the next thing I know, I’m at my desk and she’s sitting in the cheap plastic chair across from me asking what happened.

“The meeting went badly?” she gently says.

“You could say that. I quit.”

“You what?” Her blue eyes are huge pools of color, reminding me of the water at Kerið Crater. Which reminds me of Ben. Which makes me fold in two in my desk chair at the pang that strikes beneath my ribs.

I open my mouth to tell her what happened with Calvin, but all that comes out is, “He lied to me. Ben lied to me.”

Jacklyn passes me several tissues, but I don’t bother wiping my tears away.

“Calvin didn’t choose me because of my writing abilities or even because he thought I’d be the friendliest option for his little recruitment plan. Ben requested I be the writer in order for him to sign on. I feel like such an idiot.”

“Oh, sweetie.”

Jacklyn comes around the desk and pulls me into an embrace, and I’m sobbing against her collarbone when I hear Ben’s somber voice. “Ems, can we talk this out? Please?”

I don’t know how he found me, and I don’t really care.

Releasing me, Jacklyn turns to Ben, who stands stiffly in the entranceway of my cubicle. “I think you need to leave,” she tells him.

“Please,” he continues to plead. “I know we can talk through this.”

“It’s okay, Jacklyn,” I say. “Really.”

She gives me an uncertain look, but says, “You know where to find me,” and leaves my cubicle.

Ben kneels before me in the space Jacklyn vacated, but when he reaches to take my hands, I pull them away. “Look. I should have told you that I asked for you on this assignment. The truth is, I finally felt like I was at a place where I was ready to see if there was anything still between us. And I knew if I just showed up at your door after all this time, you’d rightly slam it in my face. So when this opportunity came up, yes, I asked for you. I thought if we had time together then I could at least explain what really happened back then. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the full truth. I wanted to. I even tried to that night in Akureyri, but you didn’t want to talk about work.”

I scoff. “You mean right after we’d had sex, Ben?”

“I know I fucked up here,” he pleads. “But you didn’t tell me you were recruiting me, either. We both kept things from each other. But it doesn’t mean that what happened between us in Iceland wasn’t real.”

“You’re right,” I agree. “I didn’t tell you I was supposed to recruit you. But like everything else I do, turns out I wasn’t very good at that, either. And after things changed between us, I stopped even trying. Also, my secret doesn’t humiliate you, so there’s a distinct difference.”

“There’s no reason to feel humiliated. If anything, I was doing Cal a favor—” At the way my eyes roll at the casual name, Ben corrects his misstep. “I was doing Calvin a favor by requesting you. You’re incredibly talented, whether he sees that or not.”

I close my eyes and take a deep breath. “Do not placate me.”

“I’m not placating you. I swear.” He glances down at the floor before blinking back up to me. “Look, I’ve followed your career with Around the Globe ever since I found out you worked here a couple years ago. I’ve read every article you’ve written. Ems, those pieces are really good. Too good to not be appreciated here.”

If I’d thought I’d hit rock bottom, I was wrong. Because this…knowing Ben read all my fluff pieces while he was traveling the world as a well-respected photojournalist…I’m not sure I’ll ever recover. I want to crawl into a literal hole somewhere in the forest and cover myself with wilderness kindling. But I can’t even focus on escaping this goddamn gray box because Ben is still kneeling in front of my chair, pleading with me.

“What if we travel the world together? You could come with me on my freelance assignments. You can go freelance, too. You’d have the freedom to write whatever you wanted. Or we could start our own travel blog. There are a lot of possibilities here, but the point is that we’d get to be together and do what we both love.”

My tears have run dry as I’ve slowly gone numb. So when I say, “I’m not going to ride your coattails, Ben,” my voice is hollow and emotionless.

“It wouldn’t be like that!” He buries both hands in his hair, pulling at the ends. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Please leave.”

“Ems, I love you.”

Despite everything that has transpired in the past half hour, I will not allow him to feel the way I felt when he withheld those words from me fourteen years ago.

“And I love you, too. But I’m not sure that’s enough. I trusted you. I opened up to you. I told you how I felt like an impostor, like I was never good enough. And this entire time, you knew we were only on this assignment together because of you, and you never told me. Do you know how mortifying that is for me? It’s one thing to feel overlooked in my career and like the work I do is insignificant. It’s another thing entirely to have the person I love exploit that.”

“I swear, I never thought your work was insignificant,” Ben says, voice breaking, “and that’s not what I intended to do.”

“Intentional or not, can’t you see that’s exactly what happened? You’d read all of my fluff pieces and you knew I wasn’t where I wanted to be in my career, so you requested me on this assignment, and it worked for you because I desperately needed this assignment. And then I had to find out the truth from Calvin, of all people.”

“I didn’t see it that way. I swear, Ems.” There’s a watery sheen in Ben’s green eyes now, and if I weren’t numb, that alone might break me. “I never intended to hurt you.”

“Yet somehow, you always do.”

“Please don’t do this.”

“You need to go,” I say again. “I have an office to pack up.”

Ben stands, glancing over me one last time before respecting my request and disappearing from my cubicle.

When I’m alone, the numbness evaporates, and I give in to sobs that rack my body. I don’t know how much time passes before Jacklyn is back in front of me, pulling me out of my cheap, faux-leather chair as she tells me, “Come on, let’s get you home.”

Chapter 24

The next two weeks are a blur of alternating pain and numbness. When I’m numb I wish to feel anything at all, yet ironically, when the pain sets in and buries me beneath the debilitating weight of heartache, I long to feel numb again. The living room becomes my new habitat—night and day, day and night, on repeat. Unemployed now, it’s not like I have anywhere better to be than this sofa. Jacklyn comes directly home from work each evening and takes up residence with me. We watch Friends reruns and eat strawberry ice cream straight from the carton (because fuck bowls, nothing matters anymore). She’d offered to quit Around the Globe in solidarity, but I’d refused. We can’t both be unemployed if we want to keep our apartment.

Thanks to my father drilling the importance of a savings account into my head from a very young age, I have enough saved to cover my share of the bills for a few months, but I don’t know how long it’s going to take to find another job. Travel journalism is a niche market, so I’m faced with the reality that I’m likely going to have to give up my dream of traveling and focus on finding any writing job that pays the bills. Yet for the past two weeks, I can’t summon the energy to shower on a regular basis, much less job search.

I’ve become a shell of myself.

Just like fourteen years ago.

If it were just one loss, I think I’d be strong enough to handle it this time around. It’d hurt of course, but I’d get through it. But I don’t know how to cope with the loss of my rekindled relationship with Ben and the loss of my dream career and the loss of my financial security all at once. So I don’t. I exist on this sofa, sustained by ice cream, ramen, and an occasional PB and J if it’s a good day.

I’ve made it through all ten seasons of Friends—at least one thing I’ve accomplished—and am on the series finale when Jacklyn arrives home from work one evening with a little too much exuberance in her step for my liking. I’m on the part where Ross realizes Rachel got off the plane, admittedly not my wisest decision, when Jacklyn picks up the remote and switches the TV off.

“Hey! I was watching that!”

“Noooo,” she drawls, perching on the arm of the sofa. “You were being a dirty little masochist.” She pulls the carton of mostly melted ice cream from where it’s cradled in my arm like a newborn baby and sets it on the coffee table. “Besides I have news. Important news.”

“Ugh, fine. What is it?”

“Calvin’s out.”

“Out where?”

“No. Out, out. Of Around the Globe.” She slides her hand across her neck in a slashing motion. “Finished. Done. Fired. Ousted by the board.”

I rise up on an elbow, suddenly feeling something other than the searing ache in my chest for the first time in weeks, although I can’t quite put a name to what it is. Happiness? Hell no. Vindication? Maybe. Intrigue? Abso-fucking-lutely.

“What do you mean he got fired?” I question. “He’s been there forever.”

“Apparently that’s part of the problem.” Jacklyn slides off the arm of the sofa, down to the cushion next to my feet. “With subscribership down, Cal needed a home run in order to keep his job. That’s why he was so adamant about bringing on a big name like…”

Ben.

The instant his image forms in my mind, my stomach seizes.

“Anyway,” Jacklyn continues, blowing past her faux pas, “turns out Cal’s job had been on the line for some time. Now with you quitting, he has no cover story for the December issue, no backup plan, and no…”

“You can say his name, J.”

She shakes her head. “Nope. Not necessary.”

“So, wait.” I piece together what she’s telling me. “Since I quit, Calvin doesn’t have a cover story. Or Ben’s photos. And because of that, he got fired?”

“Well, I think there were a lot of other contributing factors, but that was the final straw. Can you believe it?”

“That doesn’t make sense though,” I process aloud. “Why wouldn’t he put out my article whether he believed in it or not? Wouldn’t that have been better than this?”

She shrugs. “Maybe he’s just another mediocre white man who assumed he was untouchable. It sounds like the CEO had been putting pressure on him to modernize the print division for some time. But good ole Cal adamantly refused.”

I shouldn’t be this interested. I don’t work there anymore. And yet…“What does this mean for the magazine?”

Jacklyn smiles in the way that tells me I’ve asked a question she can’t wait to answer. “It means there’s going to be a lot of change. More of a social media presence, which we should have had years ago but Calvin thought that would ruin the prestige of Around the Globe’s name. Also, there’s a new president taking Calvin’s place, and I think she’ll be fantastic.”

“She?” Around the Globe has always felt like a boys’ club.

“Suki!” Jacklyn’s practically beaming now. “Suki’s taking over as president. It was announced in an emergency staff meeting this afternoon.”

I get why Jacklyn’s enthused; Suki would be amazing to work for. She’s confident, professional, doesn’t put up with bullshit from anyone, and she’s done the actual job and knows what it takes. Also, she’s never once asked me to pick up a get-well-soon card or plan someone’s baby shower. “That’s really great for you, J. I’m glad things are turning around there.”

Her brows pinch together in bewilderment as if I’m missing some vital piece of the puzzle. “You know what this means, though, right?”

“That you’ll get to work for a kickass boss?”

“Yes, that. But also…” She pauses for dramatic effect. “You could come back.”

“Ha!” I bark. “I couldn’t go back after the way I left.” Could I?

Jacklyn doesn’t miss a beat. “Of course you could! They still need a story for the December cover, and Suki always liked you. More important, she recognizes good writing. I think you should call her on Monday.”

My fingertips begin to tingle, my heart rate kicking up a notch. This is the first time in weeks I’ve felt anything other than hurt, so it takes a moment to recognize the feeling as hope.

I know what I need to do.

“I have to get to work,” I say, more to myself than Jacklyn. “If I’m going to ask Suki for my job back, I need to have this article ready for her. And it’s got to be the best goddamn thing I’ve ever written.”

“There she is.” Jacklyn smiles proudly. “Welcome back.”

* * *

I spend the weekend at my laptop, alternating between staring at the blank white screen and typing furiously, only to delete everything moments later. I’d be lying if I denied that Calvin’s harsh rebuke of my outline—like it’d be better suited for my old middle school’s quarterly newsletter as opposed to his prestigious publication—didn’t take a chunk out of my confidence. He may be an ass, but he didn’t get to where he is (or was, I suppose) without having some idea of what he was doing. So I debate my approach to the article over and over again, getting nothing accomplished in the process.

Well, that’s a lie. I accomplish one thing: staying distracted from Ben’s text messages that have poured in over the past weeks. The gist: he’s sorry he didn’t tell me the truth, and he loves me. I don’t doubt either of those things, and if it were as simple as him keeping some random information from me, I could probably get over it.

What I can’t get over is the humiliation his actions caused me. Ben used to be my safety and my comfort and the person who knew me best in the world. I don’t know how to reconcile the fact he knew from reading my articles that my career was nowhere close to where I pretended it was, that I hadn’t traveled the world like I always dreamed of. He knew those things, and he used them to his advantage to step in and arrange this trip, dangling everything I’ve ever wanted in front of my eyes, but knowing the whole time that it was all because of him. Because he is the one with the award-winning career. He is the one living my dream, just in a slightly different way. He’s the one who went out there and created the successful life for himself that I haven’t been able to.

Yet the question that haunts me most during the dark, sleepless nights: Am I really that angry with him, or am I jealous?

No one forced me to stay at Around the Globe for as long as I did. No one made me be the people-pleasing, No Worries! party-planner I allowed myself to become. In my life, I’m surrounded by go-getters who demand attention and go after what they want. What they deserve. My father, Marcus and Mason, Jacklyn, and now…Ben.

Maybe it’s time I stop apologizing and follow their lead.

And that starts with this article.

So how could it not be personal?

A new email notification pops up on my screen. From Ben. It’s well past midnight Sunday night and, having gotten zero responses from me over the past weeks, I’m surprised he’s reaching out this late.

When I open the email, the first thing I see is an image. One that knocks the wind out of me completely. Ben kisses me in the foreground of the photo, the sky behind us filled with swirls of green and ripples of pink, like something out of a Van Gogh painting. It isn’t the phenomenon of the northern lights that draws my focus though, it’s my own profile. Though my face is partially shielded by Ben’s hand cradling my jaw, it’s clear by the lift of my cheek that I’m smiling, even as Ben’s mouth covers mine. I look so happy, and so obviously in love.

I look like I’m exactly where I belong.

Beneath the photo is a message.

I’ve been offered an assignment in South Africa for three months. Give me a reason not to take it, Ems.

Then I notice there’s a file attached, and I click to open it before I can think better of it. My screen fills with dozens of images from Iceland, all of them of me, or of me and Ben together. There’s the photo of the two of us on the bench at Kerið Crater, several from our snowmobiling escapades taken by Fridrik as I cling to Ben for dear life, and my influencer photo from Kvernufoss is there, too. Tears fill my eyes when I come to one from Nauthúsagil, me standing in the mossy cavern with my face tilted skyward and my eyes closed, sunlight streaming down on my cheeks. It was the photo Ben took right before we kissed. Right before everything changed.

I quickly click through the rest, needing to see them but not strong enough in my current state to linger. There’s one of me on the whale-watching excursion, my head thrown back in laughter as I chat with Cassandra. And another of me, dirty and sweaty but smiling all the same, as I pose on the mountain with the volcano erupting in the background. The last photos are from our time at Hótel Búðir: one of me walking through a grassy field toward the Black Church, my bright teal coat popping against the surrounding earth tones. Then there’s one of me in the gravel parking lot, smiling at the camera as I stand close to Joseph while he munches on a patch of grass.

I close all of the photos and completely exit out of my email.

Ben’s message is an unexpected blow I’m not prepared for, threatening to knock me off my newly charted course. The truth is, I’m not ready to admit to Ben that I miss him. That he haunts my mind every second of every day. That I feel his absence all the way down to my bones. That while I’ve lived without him before, I don’t want to do it again.

Right now, I’m certain of this: The best thing I can do for myself, and for Ben, is concentrate on earning the life I want, on demanding the recognition I deserve. I am a good writer, damn it! Maybe I have to believe that before anyone else will.

I start typing, and this time the words flow from my fingertips as I envision the photos Ben sent me. If what I wrote before was too personal for Calvin, this might as well be a diary entry. But how could it not be? Iceland taught me I could do the hard things, and that is precisely the approach I take as I allow the words to pour from somewhere deep inside me. A place I usually keep hidden from everyone…except Ben.

I write about having a panic attack while snowmobiling on a glacier, but how I wouldn’t trade that experience for any amount of money, despite my fear. I write about pushing my body to its physical limit on hikes that far surpassed any difficulty level I was prepared for, but how the views of an active volcano or a waterfall tucked deep inside a cavern made the reward far greater than any temporary pain. I describe the enchanting romanticism of the Blue Lagoon and Hótel Búðir, and I mention all the friends we met along the way: Natalia, Cassandra, Fridrik, and—certainly not to be left out—Joseph.

Further pushing myself to be vulnerable, I write about falling in love in Iceland and how the person I fell for encouraged me and believed in me, and by extension, I began to believe in myself, accomplishing feats I would never have thought myself capable of. Then I tell the readers that if they’re lucky enough to have the means and privilege to travel, they should put Iceland at the top of their list. And if they are especially lucky and get to travel with a partner they care about, they might just find themselves falling in love all over again.

Just like I did.

It’s nearly seven a.m. Monday morning when I email the article to Suki with a photo attached—the one Ben sent me of us kissing in front of the northern lights. The article is a very rough first draft, but I’m proud of my work, whether or not it earns me my job back. After I hit send, I crawl into my bed and pull the covers up to my chin. Then I do something I haven’t been able to accomplish in two weeks.

I sleep.

Chapter 25

“Wake up!”

Jacklyn’s words buzz around my ear like an annoying mosquito, and I nuzzle deeper into my pillow and ignore them completely. Then all at once my covers are ripped off my body, exposing me to the unwelcome cool air.

“Hey!” I groan. “This is the first time I’ve slept in weeks!”

“Mona, Suki is on the phone for you. Wake up!”

I jolt straight up in bed like I’ve been zapped with an electrical wire.

Jacklyn stands at the foot of my bed with her palm covering the receiver of her cell. “You good now?”

Dizzy from sitting up so fast, I clear my throat and wipe the sleep from my eyes, then I motion for her to hand me the phone.

“Suki, hi!” I say cheerfully.

“Mona, I’m glad Jacklyn was able to find you,” she says on the other end. “I’ve been calling all day.”

I shoot a glance toward the clock on my nightstand. It’s four in the afternoon. “Sorry. I was up all night working on the article I sent you.”

“Not to worry, that article is why I’m calling.”

My palm is suddenly damp as I clutch the phone a bit tighter. “Oh? Please know that article is a first draft. I would definitely polish it more.” Then I surprise myself by adding, “However, if you think it’s too personal for Around the Globe, I understand, but I’m not willing to change it.”

Across from me, Jacklyn’s eyes widen, and I don’t know if it’s an expression of Good for you! or What the fuck are you doing? until a slow grin curves her lips.

“Well, it is certainly personal.” Suki’s unwavering tone masks if this is a positive or negative in my favor. “And raw and honest and vulnerable.” I hold my breath through her pause. “I think it’s exactly what Around the Globe needs as we head in a new direction.”

“Really? Because Calvin would’ve hated it.” I have no clue why I’m arguing against myself, other than I guess I still have a way to go with this self-confidence thing.

Luckily, there’s a crack of laughter on the other end. “Calvin was a jackass, and everyone knows it. Listen, Mona, travel is incredibly personal. There’s a reason people have bucket lists and places they return to time and time again, why they save up their vacation time and spend their hard-earned money to see the world. Experiences matter. And showing our readers we understand that passion is the exact direction I want to take the magazine in. I think your article will be the perfect way to kickstart that change.”

“You are aware I quit, right?”

“I am. I’m asking you to come back.”

Sparks flare in my chest, everything within screaming at me to say yes. But I hesitate as I picture Ben and me standing at the site of an active volcano, his arms wrapped around me while he whispered in my ear that I can do anything I want in this life.

“I have some conditions,” I say.

“Name them.”

Having put seven years’ worth of consideration into what would make Around the Globe the dream job I thought it would be when I started as an intern, I don’t hesitate. “First of all, I want the promotion to the international division. No more weekend festivals.”

“Done,” Suki replies with no hesitation.

Jacklyn beams at me from the end of my bed, looking like a proud mama bird whose baby just flew from the nest for the first time.

“Secondly, I’m never planning another office party again. Not to get all T. Swift on you, but I mean never. Like ever.”

Jacklyn laughs, but it’s Suki’s response I need to hear.

“You drive a hard bargain, but I think we can make it happen. What else?”

This one might be pushing it. “I want upgraded airline seats and lounge access for the Locals, even if I’m not one any longer.”

At this, Jacklyn gives me a double thumbs-up and mouths, “Yes, girl.”

Suki is silent for a beat, so I press. “Just because the Locals don’t travel internationally doesn’t mean they are less than or don’t work as hard. If the company can afford to do this for some, they should do it for all, and I really—”

“Mona, I agree with you,” Suki interjects. “And I want you to know, there are a lot of things that will be changing now that Calvin’s gone. The culture he created here is not one I want to continue.”

“Oh.” I didn’t expect it to be that easy. “That’s good. Okay then.”

“So, is that it? Are we all good here?”

I sigh, because there is one more thing, but this one is out of Suki’s control. “I, uh, need to talk to Benjamin Carter, my photographer. I’ll need to get his permission to use the photo I sent you, as well as some of the others. That wasn’t ever intended to be for the article.”

Across from me, Jacklyn’s amusement abruptly fades, and she crosses her arms over her chest with a pinched expression.

“Ah yes, there is that little hiccup,” Suki says, and there’s an unspoken awkwardness between us since we both know she’s read my article and has seen the photo of me and Ben kissing. I also assume from my hesitancy on this topic, she can infer what happened between us in Iceland is no longer happening here at home. “Where does that stand?”

“Um, I’m not really sure.”

“Okay. Well, I’ll certainly be happy to reach out to him if that’s not something you’re comfortable with.”

“No. It needs to be me.”

“I understand,” she says. “We have some time here. Why don’t you take a few days? Reach out to Benjamin when you can. No rush. Get some rest and work on your article in the meantime, and I’ll see you at the office sometime next week. How does that sound?”

“Yeah, I’ll be there. Thank you, Suki.”

“You’re welcome. And Mona, let me make one thing clear, whether you get his permission or not, you’ll still have a job awaiting you. If we can’t run your exact article as is, we’ll figure something else out.”

Relief washes over me. Working for Suki is already one thousand times better than working for Calvin. “Thank you again. I really, really appreciate it.”

As soon as I end the call, Jacklyn tackles me in a hug. “I’m so fucking proud of you!”

“You know what?” I say through laughter as she squeezes the air out of my lungs. “I’m pretty proud of me, too.”

Collapsing back on my pillows, she sweeps my knotted hair off my face. “Seriously, though. You’re different from before. There’s a confidence there now. I see it.”

“Yeah. I feel different.”

I don’t say the rest of what I’m thinking, that while I have changed, I think loving Ben again was the catalyst.

All at once, Jacklyn hops up and smooths her skirt. “All right, you need to shower if you want to make dinner on time.” Then, at my absent expression, “You do know what today is, right?”

These past weeks I’ve been a zombie, living in a land where time doesn’t exist. I rack my brain, and it finally dawns on me. “Shit! The twins’ birthday.”

“Which means you have a train to catch to Hudson Springs.”

“Shit. Shit. Shit.” I jump from bed and start haphazardly grabbing items from my dresser. Then I stop and spin in Jacklyn’s direction, one hand gripping a bra and the other a fuzzy tube sock (I don’t know why). “Ben’s in Hudson Springs.”

She grimaces. “I’m aware.”

“You have to come with me! My family doesn’t even know Ben went to Iceland with me. I can’t handle being that close to him and deal with my family and—”

“Shhh,” Jacklyn soothes. “Of course I’ll come with you.”

* * *

Heavy drops of rain pound the windows of the cab we take from the Hudson Springs train station to my childhood home a few streets away. We pass Ben’s house on the corner, and my eyes perform a diligent search in those precious few seconds. There’s no car in the driveway. But does he even own a car since he’s always traveling? There’s no activity or lights on that I can see, either.

What I do see, at least in my mind, is an entirely different version of the home he grew up in. I no longer see the white brick rancher with black shutters and a neat, well-kept yard as the place where a boy once left me brokenhearted. Instead, I see a place full of secrets and painful memories that I never knew about. A place Ben managed to survive, but couldn’t possibly thrive in. I look at the house now and I envision Ben picking his mother up off the wet lawn, trying to hold it together while his world fell apart. My heart twists painfully, and I’m so fucking angry on his behalf. Angry because he had to act like the parent when he was just a kid. Angry because the shitty situation forced him to be the one to sacrifice the people and things he cared about. Angry because he didn’t deserve to suffer one goddamn second of fear or shame or hurt.

I’m tempted to tell the cabdriver to pull over. To hop out of the car and sprint down the sidewalk toward his house in the pouring rain like we’re in the movies. But it doesn’t look like he’s home, and I have no idea what I would say or where to start, and this isn’t a movie.

“Hey.” Jacklyn’s voice interrupts my thoughts as though she’s reading them. “Let’s just get through dinner, okay?”

The cab pulls up at my house, and I take the opened bottle of bourbon Jacklyn clutches and throw back a swig. She’d been thoughtful enough to purchase two bottles for my brothers since I was in no such state for things like remembering birthdays or planning gifts. Problem is, because of said state, I already opened one bottle to calm my nerves on the way here. I hate bourbon, but it does the job of making me warm and fuzzy and convincing me that maybe I can get through this night after all.

Jacklyn steps out of the car first, opening an umbrella for us to huddle underneath while we rush up the drive. We make our way through the front door, slipping out of our raincoats and hanging them with our bags in a nearby closet. I pause for a moment, closing my eyes and basking in the warmth of the house on this cool, rainy evening, the smell of freshly baked cake wafting through the air.

Then I’m pelted in the shoulder, and I open my eyes to see a Nerf football at my feet.

“Sorry,” Eli, my nephew, says seconds later as he scoops up the football and runs back to the dining room, footsteps reverberating throughout the entranceway. At the same time, chaotic, poorly played notes from the old piano in the living room ring through the house in what sounds like “Mary Had a Little Lamb” in extreme slow motion.

I cast a glance over at Jacklyn, who wears an expression of displeasure and mutters under her breath, “This reminds me that I need to get my IUD replaced next month.”

A short laugh bursts out of me, and I relax my shoulders, more at ease with her beside me. We make our way into the kitchen and find Marcus and Mason standing over a ceramic bowl of tortilla chips, Marcus in his park ranger khakis and Mason in his light blue scrubs.

“Well, look who it is,” Mason says at our approach. “Our baby sister back from the great outdoors.”

I hold up both bottles of bourbon. “Happy birthday, idiots.”

“Hey now.” Marcus takes a bottle and examines it in the light. “Mine’s already open. That’s not fair.”

“Here, I can fix that.” Jacklyn takes Mason’s unopened bottle from his hand, twists off the top, and throws her head back as she takes a long pull. Then she passes the bottle back to Mason, her deep red lipstick coating the rim. “Now you’re even.”

Mason smiles at her in that way that makes me feel like I shouldn’t be witnessing this interaction. “So glad you made it tonight, Jacklyn.”

She steps forward and pats his cheek. “Happy Birthday, healer.” Then she saunters off in the direction of the dismal piano notes. “Someone needs to teach that child about tempo, and I guess it’s going to be me.”

Later, when my father has pulled himself away from work and we’re all seated around the dining room table with full plates, my mom’s voice rises above the rest to say, “Mona, tell us about Iceland.”

I knew the topic would arise, and now I have two options here: tell them everything or tell them nothing. My typically reserved self would err on the side of nothing but the basics, not because I want to keep things from my family but because I’m uncomfortable talking about myself in general. Especially when my most enthralling activities usually pale in comparison to one of my brothers’ random Tuesdays. I covered a weekend biscuit festival? Marcus encountered a copperhead on the trail. Jacklyn dragged me to her (so-called) yoga class? Mason and Dad worked together to bring a man back to life whose heart had stopped.

But perhaps I’m part of the problem. Perhaps if I want to be seen in this family I need to speak up and assert myself. Can I blame the others for overlooking me if I purposely seek out the shadows?

“It was fantastic,” I say. “The country is beautiful in a way that’s truly unimaginable until you see it in person. Actually, even when you see it in person it’s still unfathomable. I hiked some of the most gorgeous landscapes. Waterfalls, beaches, volcanoes. All of it more impressive than the last.”

“That sounds lovely,” my father says from the head of the table. “Speaking of hiking, I had a patient today that had hiked—”

“Actually, Dad, I wasn’t finished.” My voice is stern, unapologetic. Something inside of me has snapped. Or maybe it’s the bourbon. Either way, all nine sets of eyes at the table focus on me in earnest. Beside me, Jacklyn chokes on her water before clearing her throat.

My father waves his hand in a sweeping motion, as if to say, The floor is yours.

“See, I’ve dreamed of traveling the world since I was a kid. Maybe none of you knew that about me, but I did, and I finally got to live that dream. And you know what? It changed me.” My voice cracks. And yeah, this is definitely the bourbon speaking. “I hiked to an active volcano. Active! As in lava and fire. I snowmobiled on a goddamn glacier!” I shoot a look to the three wide-eyed kids across from me. “Sorry, Carrie,” I apologize to my sister-in-law before jumping back into my diatribe.

“I saw the northern lights. And pilot whales—although they kind of look like dolphins and weren’t that exciting. I made friends with a sheep. Joseph—that’s his name.” My voice breaks again, and I am truly having an emotional reckoning here in front of my entire family and my best friend, in a room that’s now so quiet you could hear a pin drop. “I did those things. Me, Mona Mildred Miller!” I swing my upper body in the direction of my parents at the far end of the table. “And this is off topic, but that’s an unfortunate middle name to give your child. You both could have put more thought into it, even if I was the product of Dad’s failed vasectomy.”

My father starts coughing, and my mom forcefully pummels his back. Across the table, my niece’s tiny voice asks, “Mommy, what’s a bah-sec—”

“We’ll talk about it later, Ava,” Carrie quickly cuts in.

I fall silent long enough that Marcus softly starts, “Uh, sis, are you—”

“And another thing!” I pound my fist on the table and the silverware clatters. “I know you all didn’t think I could do it. That I wasn’t cut out for it.” This time I look directly at my brothers. “But you know what? I goddamn did it. And maybe it’s time you all appreciate that just because my life tends to be quieter than yours, it doesn’t make it any less important.” I swallow, and then add, “But you know who did believe in me? Ben Carter. That’s right, I went on this trip with Ben. He was my photographer. And none of you knew because you were all too self-absorbed”—beside me, Jacklyn snorts—“but we had a thing back in high school.”

“Our best friend Ben?” Mason sounds confused, and also like he’s afraid to speak.

“Ha!” I explode, picking up a fork and pointing it at him. “He wasn’t your Ben. He’s always been my Ben. Always! But now I’ve fucked it all up!” Tears overwhelm my eyes now, and all the words that have already poured from my mouth finally scroll through my head. Shame heats me. I push my chair back and rise from the table, dropping my fork and eliciting a final clang as metal strikes Mom’s fancy dishware. “Excuse me.”

I flee the room, barely making it up the stairs to my childhood bedroom before I let the full-blown sobs escape.

Seconds later, there’s a soft knock at the door.

“J, it’s okay. I’m fine.”

“It’s me.” My mother’s soft-spoken voice drifts through from the other side. “Can I come in?”

I should’ve known. Jacklyn wouldn’t have bothered knocking. I wipe my tears away to the best of my ability before I pull the door open.

Seeing my tearstained face, my mom’s expression crumples. “Oh dear.”

Looking into my mom’s kind brown eyes, laden with sympathy, all that comes to mind is Ben telling me how she helped him when he was struggling, and I reach out and cling to my mother for the first time in years.

If she’s stunned by my physical display of affection, she doesn’t show it or verbalize it. Instead, her arms come around me, and she rubs my back in that soothing way only a mother can.

“Thank you,” I choke past my sobs.

“For what, dear?”

“For taking care of Ben all those years ago. For loving him.”

“Ah. He finally told you about all that, huh?”

Pulling back, I see it written in her eyes. “You knew about us back then.”

“Of course. I’m your mother.” Releasing me, she takes a seat on the edge of my bed and pats the spot next to her. I join her, letting my weight sink into the mattress. “I know I’m not the perfect parent by any means, but it wasn’t exactly hard to notice my daughter was in love with the boy down the street. The same boy who I’m certain had loved her since kindergarten.”

I’m not cognizant of my fingers tracing over the M charm that dangles at my collarbone until my mom’s gaze settles there. I haven’t been able to take it off. I don’t want to take it off.

“I wish you would have confided in me back then,” she says. “I knew how heartbroken you were when it ended, how heartbroken you both were, and I wish you would’ve let me be there for you so you didn’t have to go through it alone.”

There’s hurt in her eyes, and I wonder again if I’m the one who screwed up here. If it was me who was putting up the barriers between myself and my family, simply because they had different personalities and interests than me. Maybe I was never understood because I didn’t allow myself to be, and I certainly didn’t seek out trying to understand them, either.

“Why didn’t you tell me what Ben was going through?” The question isn’t an accusation, so I hope she doesn’t take it that way. “This entire time, I thought he changed his mind and didn’t want to be with me.”

“I thought about it several times,” she says. “Especially when you were hurting. But the fact was, it wasn’t my story to share. You also have to understand that as an adult in the situation, I really struggled with what to do. I’d always viewed Ben’s parents as somewhat absent and aloof, which is why I tried to keep him here with us as much as I could, but I didn’t know the full extent of their negligence until his father left. And once that happened, Ben was almost a legal adult.”

Even now, I can see in my mom’s far-off gaze that she’s reexamining every action she took back then. Questioning whether there was more she could have done.

“Ben told me back then that he loved you, but he knew you deserved more than he could give right then…And I had to respect that.”

Ben told my mom that he loved me.

He may not have said it to me, but he said it to her.

“Sweetheart, sometimes the timing just isn’t right. Ben was mature enough, even at seventeen, to realize he needed to walk away and take care of himself before he could be with you.”

My heart is a worn-out battery on its last leg, my core a hollow, desolate cave. My eyes are swollen from all the tears shed over the past two weeks, but I think I’ve finally cried them all.

Mom must notice I’m barely managing to stay upright, because she puts her arm around me and pulls me to her, letting me relax against her shoulder as we sit in silence. I take in her floral perfume scent. The soft warmth of her embrace. And I think about how different things could have been fourteen years ago if I would have let her in when I was hurting. Maybe she would have sat with me while I cried on the bathroom floor. Or stayed up with me during all the sleepless nights. Maybe she would have demanded that I eat something or talked to my teachers when my grades plummeted that fall. Maybe it would have been easier, if only just a little bit.

“I went to Charlotte’s graveside service a couple of years ago,” she eventually says as she strokes my hair. “It was the first time I’d seen Ben in years.”

“I thought you said it was private. Family only.”

“Sweetie, Ben is our family.” I close my eyes, exhausted and spent. “Do you want to know the first thing he said to me after the service? He walked straight up to me and asked, ‘How’s Mona?’ After all those years, his first thought was you. Not me. Not your brothers. You. And I said to him, ‘Don’t you think it’s finally time you find out for yourself?’ ”

I straighten and turn to her, and she takes my hand and squeezes, her palm soft and warm, yet strong enough to carry the weight of battles I never knew she was fighting, battles fought on my behalf. I have underestimated my mother for a very long time.

“He smiled a sad little smile and said, ‘Maybe it is.’ He asked where you worked and all about your life, and I’ve been hoping this entire time he would finally reach out. I guess it took him a couple years before he felt ready.” She pauses. “I obviously don’t know what happened between the two of you in Iceland, but I do know a couple things. I know Ben has a good heart.”

My own heart burns as if it’s been scrubbed with sandpaper. I press my palm there as if that could possibly soothe the hurt.

“And I also know that Ben has loved you his entire life. I know that in my soul. When it comes to you, he’s never been willing to drag you into a messy situation, so if he’s come back into your life now, it’s only because he believes he’s really ready.”

I have to go to him.

The urge swells so big inside of me that I’m on my feet in an instant.

“I need to talk to him,” I say. “I need to talk to him now. He’s in Hudson Springs, and I need to find him.” But my body isn’t cooperating. All I’m doing is rocking back and forth, my pulse jumping and my mind reeling. I have no idea what I’ll say when I see him, but I know I can’t wait any longer to have this conversation. Ben may have messed up, but I messed up, too, and I’m not willing to lose him from my life again. “I’m ruining the twins’ birthday dinner. I’m sorry.”

My mom grasps my arm, stilling me. “Don’t worry about that. It’s about time you let your guard down. Mona, I know you’ve always felt distant from this family, or maybe not distant…maybe just different. And you are different. Different from your brothers. Different from your father. But you know what? I’ve always thought, in this family, you were the most like me.”

“Really?” I think back to all the times I felt like the last priority on my mother’s list.

“Really,” she says, standing and taking my shoulders in her hands. “There were a lot of times I was overwhelmed as a young mom, a lot of times I messed up.” Her soft brown eyes meet mine. “But I swear, me and you, we had our mother-daughter moments, too. Maybe we just didn’t get enough of them.”

Something inside me softens, but before I can react, she pulls me toward the door.

“Come with me, I want to show you something.”

Moving on autopilot, I let her lead me to the end of the hall and into my father’s home office. She flips on a small lamp on the corner of his oversize desk, casting the sterile gray room in a soft yellow glow. I’m not sure what’s going on here, but my mother looks to be on a mission as she opens the closet door in the corner and stretches her petite frame up on her tiptoes to pull a paisley fabric memory box from the very back of the highest shelf.

Pulling the lid off as she walks back to me, a nervous grin plays over her mouth. But in her eyes, there’s an earnestness that tells me whatever is in that box is important to her.

She holds the box out to me with no explanation. Taking it from her, I glance down at a stack of old newspaper clippings yellowed with age. I place the fabric box on my father’s desk, scooping up the first few clippings from the top of the pile. The headlines cover an assortment of topics. Hudson Springs Citizen Sets Record with Six-Pound Tomato, String of Car Thefts Ends after Suspect Arrested, and Quadruplets Born at Hudson Springs Memorial the First in City History.

“I don’t understand what I’m looking at here.”

She reaches over the current clipping I hold and points her index finger at the byline. That’s when I see it.

Mary Ellen Miller.

“You wrote these?” I ask, thrown for the umpteenth time tonight. “You worked for the newspaper?”

She laughs, but it comes out as more of a sigh. “I did. For a couple years when your father and I were first married anyway. I stopped during my pregnancy with the twins. Tried to return once you all started kindergarten, but they didn’t hire me back. They didn’t say it explicitly, but I don’t think they wanted to hire a mother with three kids to take care of.”

I swear it’s as if everything I ever thought I knew about my mother was wrong. “Is that why you wanted me to start kindergarten early with Marcus and Mason? So you could go back to work?”

Her expression takes on a guilty grimace. “Not that it ended up mattering in the end. Sorry about that.”

My mind rewinds back to my first day of school when she looked so relieved to drop us off, not sticking around for tearful goodbyes like the other parents. She had her own dreams she wanted to get back to, but it never worked out for her. “Why didn’t you make Dad work less so you had more time for yourself?” I ask, livid on her behalf. “You could have insisted the newspaper take you back. Or found a job writing for someone else.”

She smiles and shakes her head, collects the articles and returns them to the box. “Believe it or not,” she says wryly, “a local newspaper writer doesn’t make quite the same income as an ER physician. And these are mostly just fluff pieces, it’s not like I was up for a Pulitzer or anything.”

“Fluff pieces still matter!” I protest. “They really matter to people. That mom of the Hudson Springs quadruplets probably still has that article you wrote tucked away in a baby book somewhere, and I bet that tomato person had that clipping hanging on their fridge for months so they could brag to anyone who came over, and—okay maybe the carjacker didn’t keep your piece, but you get what I’m saying. It’s like the festivals I cover, they bring a lot of happiness and joy to people, and that’s really hard to find these days—”

I stop, suddenly reexamining my career as well. I was so dismissive of the pieces I’d written for Around the Globe because they weren’t the pieces I’d always envisioned writing. But that doesn’t mean they weren’t equally worthy and important in their own way.

Mom returns the box to the top of the closet and closes the door, shutting away her own past, then walks back to me and smoothes a hand over my hair. “I didn’t tell you this for you to feel bad for me. I love being a mother to all three of you, and I wouldn’t change a day of it for anything in the world. I just wanted you to know that you and I are a lot alike. Mother to daughter. Writer to writer. You do have an ally in this family, Mona. You always have.”

The tears I thought I’d run out of return with a vengeance, and I throw my arms around her and hug her tight for the second time tonight.

She returns my embrace for a moment, then pulls back and firmly tells me, “Now, go find Ben and make things right. You two owe that to each other after all this time.”

She’s right. I can’t wait another second. I make my way to the door but hesitate and turn back. “Thanks, Mom.”

Smiling, she wipes away a tear of her own. “You’re welcome, sweetheart. Now go already!”

Chapter 26

My footsteps pound the sidewalk pavement as heavy rain drenches my ivory cardigan and soaks through my denim jeans. Nerves churn in my stomach, and due to the myriad of questions swirling through my mind (What if I messed this up by ignoring him for two entire weeks? What if he won’t talk to me? Worst of all, what if he already left for South Africa?), it’s not until I’m halfway between our houses that I realize my crucial mistake.

It’s dark.

I have no flashlight.

Not even my phone.

I freeze in my tracks, fear working its way through my body like a toxin. My breaths turn shallow, and my hands—cold moments ago—become clammy with sweat. The sleeves of my cardigan squeeze my arms too tightly. And the weight of the wet denim on my legs makes it impossible to take another step. Fear fully blossoms into panic, a poisonous oleander with debilitating effects.

I close my eyes, concentrating on taking deeper, steadier breaths. The rise and fall of my chest. The cool air and raindrops on my face. The bursts of wind that rattle through the leaves of the old maples lining the street. I think about Iceland. About Ben’s soothing voice on the other side of my door when the power went out. How he talked me through it one step at a time. It’s what I’m going to have to do for myself right now.

I open my eyes.

I focus all my attention on one spot in the distance.

Ben’s house.

All I can see from here is the highest point of the angled roof, but it’s enough. I force one foot from the pavement and put it in front of the other. Then I do it again. And again. My hands tremble, so I twist the ends of my sleeves in my fists to keep them occupied. Each time a thought attempts to creep into my head about being alone in the dark, I concentrate harder on taking step after step with laser focus on getting to Ben. If he’s not home, well…I can’t think about that right now.

Then the greatest thing happens.

As more of the little white house comes into view, an interior light flicks on and illuminates one of the windows. Ben is home, and I still have a chance at making this right. Tension unspools from my shoulders, and the fear encasing my chest eases the slightest bit. My steps increase in speed. Then I’m running. Not walking fast. Not jogging. I’m full-out sprinting with tunnel vision on that window.

Reaching his driveway, I maintain my pace, hurdling the few steps leading up to the cracked concrete porch and barely avoiding a collision with the front door. I pound my fist against it in rapid succession. My heart races faster than a Thoroughbred at the derby, and my cheeks burn from exertion. I’m out of breath and sweaty, my hair so wet I may as well have just stepped from the shower. I can only imagine how wrecked I must look. I also couldn’t care less.

The seconds I stand in anticipation of the door swinging open feel like an entire lifetime, and when it happens, when Ben stands before me in a white tee and those same light gray sweatpants he wore throughout our trip, his golden hair tousled and backlit by the warm interior lights, it hits me: I’ve already found my favorite spot on earth.

Not this house. Not this street. Not even this city. Not a location at all.

It’s Ben.

Ben is my favorite place whether we’re here or three thousand miles away standing on top of a volcano.

“Ems,” he says, voice scratchy before he clears it. “What are you doing here?” His eyes are wide with shock, looking at me like I’m a ghost. Perhaps that’s exactly what I look like, hair plastered to my cheeks and mascara surely accumulating under my eyes. There’s a guardedness to his posture, shoulders stiff and jaw taut, and that’s what brings me crashing down to reality as an overwhelming sense of déjà vu settles in my bones. The last time Ben and I stood at this door things didn’t go so well for me.

“I, uh…” I trail off, at a loss for words.

Ben shakes his head like he’s clearing his thoughts. “What’s wrong with me? Come inside. You’re soaked.”

He steps back and pulls the door farther open, allowing me to walk past him into the warmth of his house. A house I’ve never been inside of until this moment. As he closes the door behind me, I take a quick appraisal of my surroundings. I’m standing in a mostly barren living room, the only furniture a well-worn brown leather sofa and a scratched-up coffee table opposite a media console and television along the far wall. Hardwood floors lead to a brick fireplace where a heap of orange ash burns in what’s left of a fire. The walls have been freshly painted a neutral creamy white, and the small space might feel cozy if I didn’t know the history of this home. If these walls weren’t tainted by the pain and neglect I now know Ben experienced here.

“Here, come with me.” Ben gently takes my elbow and leads me toward the fireplace. “You must be freezing.”

He leaves me standing at the edge of the hearth and retrieves a neatly folded plaid quilt from the back of the sofa. Then he wraps it around my shoulders.

“Are you okay? What happened? Did you run here in the dark?”

Still breathless, I nod.

His eyes skate over me like he’s searching for the source of my pain. “Ems, you’re scaring me. You’re shaking.”

“I…I’m okay.” I pull the quilt tighter around my shoulders.

“You should sit.” Ben maneuvers me to sit on the brick hearth. The flames may be dying out behind me, but the remaining warmth envelops me. “Do you want me to add another log to the fire? Or I can make you some hot tea. Or soup. I probably have soup. Tell me what you need.”

I reach from underneath the quilt and take hold of his wrist. At my touch, his eyes drop to our connection. “I need your permission to use some of your photos for my article.”

His eyes narrow in on mine as he looms above me, confusion knitting his brows. “What?”

“I got my job back at Around the Globe. Calvin got fired and Suki’s running things now. She’s going to use my article as the December cover after all.”

“Oh.” He pauses. “That’s really great news. You deserve it.” I know he means it, but there’s disappointment in his voice. “So that’s why you came then? To ask to use my photos? Of course you can use them. I’ll send all the rest to you and you can use whatever you want. I know how much this means to you.”

You mean more.

The words are on the tip of my tongue, but my nerves and anxiety churn and crash together, leaving me unsure of what to say. I need to summon my boldness from earlier and just tell Ben how I feel and what I want, but the bourbon has worn off and I’m terrified it’s too late.

But maybe…

“I want you to read it. My article.” Releasing his wrist, I shrug the quilt from my shoulders and stand. If he reads how much what we shared in Iceland meant to me, maybe he’ll stay. Having put no thought into this plan, I reach for my phone in my back pocket only to realize it’s not there. “Shit. Where’s your laptop?”

“Uh, I’ll go get it.” He eyes me curiously, but then disappears down a hallway, returning with his laptop in hand a moment later.

He passes it off to me, and I sit on his sofa and pull up my email to Suki. Then I open my article and set the laptop on the coffee table. “Please just read it.”

“Yeah, of course.” He takes a seat at my side and leans forward to see the screen.

Unable to stomach sitting here and attempting to decipher his every expression while he reads, I say, “Can I grab some water from your kitchen?”

“Yeah,” he tells me, already absorbed in the screen. “Help yourself to anything you want.”

But I don’t want water, I just want a reprieve. I stay in the kitchen, pacing back and forth, taking in the newly installed butcher-block countertops and the freshly painted white cabinets, telling myself that if he reads it, he’ll know. And then I won’t have to beg him to forgive me for shutting him out the past two weeks. Won’t have to beg him to turn down South Africa. He told me to give him a reason to say no to the trip, and I need him to find that reason in my article.

“It’s beautiful,” I hear from behind me after an unknown amount of time has passed. “It’s engrossing, and nuanced, and just really, really beautiful work.”

I spin around and lean against the counter at my back. “It’s also the story of us falling in love in Iceland. Are you okay with that being published? If you’re not, I’ll rewrite it and take you out completely. No questions asked.”

Ben comes closer, stopping just out of reach. “No. Leave it. It’s perfect.”

I yearn to sink into him, to dissolve in the comfort of his arms. But he’s giving me no indication that’s what he wants.

Until…

“Ems.” Stepping forward, he lifts his hand and slowly traces my M charm with a fingertip, and I stop breathing. Then he leans closer, sweeps the shoulder of my wet cardigan aside, and presses a kiss just above my collarbone. “If you came here tonight for another reason besides the article, all you have to do is say so.”

I shiver as he pulls back, the cold air replacing his warm breath on my skin.

“I’m sorry I messed up,” he says. “Fourteen years ago and now. I should’ve told you the truth both times. I know I still have a lot of things to work on.” He comes close again, settling his hands on the countertop next to each of my hips, framing me in, giving me nowhere to look other than the depths of his green eyes. “But I love you. And I know you love me, too. So ask me to stay. Because here’s another secret for you, I’ll say yes.”

My throat is raw, emotion strangling me, but I swallow hard and somehow manage a hoarse, “Stay?”

The smile that breaks over his face warms me from the inside out, soothing all the aching parts of me. “Of course I’ll stay,” he says as his mouth tenderly meets mine.

Kissing Ben again only confirms what I’d felt the second he’d opened the door tonight. He’s my home. His voice my favorite sound. His summery cotton scent my favorite smell. His vibrant green eyes my favorite color.

His arms my most favorite place in the entire world.

I break away and run my fingertips over his sandpaper jaw, needing to make it clear that while I want to be with him more than I want anything in this world, I would never want him to give up something he wants to do. “About South Africa though…I know I asked you to stay, but I think we both know I was really asking you to be with me. If this trip is something you want to do, I won’t be the thing that stands in your way. We can be long-distance, or I could visit—”

“Ems.” He shakes his head. “No assignment could possibly mean more to me than getting to be with you after fourteen years. There will be other assignments. I’m not going anywhere.”

He takes hold of my hand that strokes his jaw, kisses my open palm, and then leads me out of the kitchen and down a short hallway. We turn into a small bedroom with the same freshly painted walls, barren other than a metal-framed bed, a wooden dresser against the far wall, and a small desk in the corner where Ben’s camera resides.

I’m guided to the bed, and I sink back into a white down comforter and rest my head on fluffy pillows that smell like Ben. He settles over me, lowering his head to trail kisses down my throat, but my focus is on the tiny room, the single-pane window framed with a solid-navy curtain, the old soccer jersey hanging in the closet.

The emptiness of it all leaves my heart hurting for the boy who grew up here. I try telling myself it’s because he’s getting the house ready to sell, and he surely packed up all of the childhood trinkets and trophies and books and pictures that still fill my childhood bedroom to this day.

But no matter how hard I try, I can’t convince myself of something I know isn’t true.

“So this is your childhood bedroom?” I ask.

Ben lifts his head. “Do you not want to do this here?”

“No, it’s not that.” My heart swells in my chest, crowding my lungs and making it impossible to take a deep breath. Everything Ben makes me feel is just so…big. “I’ve just never been in your bedroom before. That’s all.”

He dips down again to kiss my mouth, and I’m overwhelmed by the need to give him at least one good memory he can cherish in this house.

Ben rises onto his knees and pulls me to a sitting position, stripping off my top before pulling his own overhead. When we’re both down to our underwear, he pulls back the comforter, and we slide between the sheets, both trembling from need as much as the cold. When he tries to settle on top of me again, I push him flat on his back and straddle his hips, wanting to be the one to take care of him tonight. He pulls the comforter up around my shoulders for warmth, but the heat of him beneath me already warms me through.

Fingertips sweep up my belly, trace over the edge of my bra, fan out over my heartbeat as Ben presses his palm there. “Ems, I need you to know something. I saw your mom a couple years ago, and I asked her about you. She told me all about your job and that you were living in the city.”

I don’t tell him I’ve already heard this from my mother tonight, I just let him say whatever he needs to say.

“The very next day, I started going to therapy. I’ve worked really hard since then to come to terms with my past. And I realized that as much as traveling and photography saved me, they also gave me a great excuse to keep running and never deal with any of the stuff I needed to sort out. I’m sorry I wasted so much of our time, and that it took me so long to come back to you.”

“Don’t.” I press a finger to his lips. “We’re together now. That’s all that matters.”

Ben kisses my fingertip before I slide it away. “There’s one more thing.” He diverts his gaze somewhere over my shoulder, tears gathering at the corners of his eyes as he bites his lower lip. “I don’t want you to ever think…”

Whatever he’s trying to say is wrecking him, so I take his face in my hands and pull his focus back to me. “Think what? You know you can tell me anything.”

He swallows, and a tear falls over his temple, but he doesn’t look away. “I don’t want you to think we’re ever going to be anything like them. Despite what I came from, I’m never going to let that happen.”

“Ben. No.” I adamantly shake my head, my body refuting the mere notion. “If you think I’ve even considered that possibility in the slightest, you are so wrong.” I cover his hand with my own, pressing it against my heart. “You’re the boy who stayed with me on the first day of kindergarten so I wouldn’t be alone. You’re the boy who didn’t stop searching for me until you rescued me from that trunk. You’ve saved me from the dark more times than I can count. You’ve kept my secrets and made me feel safer than anyone ever has. I know your heart, Ben, and it’s gentle and kind and good.”

I fall forward until my chest presses against his, drawing him into a long, languid kiss. Then I take my time kissing his wet cheeks, his jaw, his neck. I work my way lower, over his chest and down his stomach. I want to make him feel good. I want to spend forever making him feel good.

He lifts his hips, allowing me to pull his boxers off. I slide my own underwear off and cast my bra somewhere over my shoulder before settling back on top of him, taking him inside me inch by inch, letting him fill me up in so many ways that go beyond the physicality of the act. We don’t speak, other than sighs of pleasure and moans of need. But we communicate an entire novel with our bodies, our history imprinted on our hearts, the promise of our future spelled out in our eyes.

Chapter 27

Afterward, we shower together while my clothes tumble-dry in Ben’s laundry room. Then I towel-dry my hair as best I can and get dressed. Ben changes into jeans and a sweater—the charcoal gray one he wore the night we made dinner at the suites in Iceland—and we’re heading out of his bedroom when something catches my eye.

“Wait,” I say, making my way over to his desk.

I pick up a black square picture frame and stare down at teenage Ben and teenage me. I don’t remember when the photo was taken exactly, only that it wasn’t long before we got together that summer. It was at some sort of party or get-together, location unknown, and now I recall someone making a snide comment about us spending the whole night talking in a corner.

Someone take a picture of Ben and Mona so we’ll know they were actually here.

And someone had.

In the picture, Ben wears a snarky smirk, one arm slung around my shoulder, the other extended toward the camera, middle finger raised. As for me, I’m not even looking at the camera. I’m beaming up at Ben like he hung the fucking moon.

Way to not be obvious, young Mona.

“How’d you get this?” I ask.

“Whoever took it texted it to me back then. Logan Fletcher maybe? I don’t remember.” His arms encircle my waist from behind. “It’s only my favorite photograph of all time.”

I place the frame down on his desk, gently, and turn in his arms.

He grins down at me. “What’s that look about?”

I don’t know how I’m looking at him, but I imagine it’s similar to the look teenage Mona is giving him in that photo, the look of someone who is one hundred percent, cannot possibly be in any deeper, head-over-heels in love—even if she didn’t know it yet. I shrug. “I’m just really happy, that’s all.”

Ben smiles, recognizing his own words from our night in Akureyri. “I’m really happy, too, Ems.” He presses a quick kiss to the tip of my nose. “But if you really want to do this, we should go.”

I’ve convinced Ben to come back to the twins’ party with me because I think it’s well past time he made his reappearance in all our lives, not just mine.

Although we could walk, it’s still raining out, so we make the quick drive in his old red pickup that was parked in the garage and somehow still runs. When we pull in the driveway, Ben cuts the engine but doesn’t get out immediately, instead fidgeting with the keys on his old Mets key chain.

“What’s wrong?” I say. “You can’t possibly be nervous.”

He looks over at me, the moonlight casting uneven shadows over his face. “Wouldn’t you be? I haven’t seen your brothers in fourteen years, and I ghosted them, too. I’ll be lucky if they don’t hate me, and that’s before they find out I’m sleeping with their sister.”

“To be honest, it’s probably my father you should be most concerned about.”

His eyes flash wide, and he slumps forward and lays his forehead against the steering wheel with an emphatic groan.

“I’m joking, I swear.” I run my hand soothingly up and down his back. “My family loves you. They’ve always loved you. You have nothing to worry about.”

Ben lifts his head, expression laced with uncertainty. “Are you sure?”

“I’m positive. I’ve always thought they loved you way more than they loved me.”

He kisses my forehead. “Impossible.” Pulling back, he sighs heavily. “All right. Let’s do this.”

We make our way inside, and it’s bustling with noise from every direction. With dinner wrapped up, everyone has scurried off to different parts of the house. I take Ben’s hand and entwine our fingers, pulling him along with me into the kitchen. My father, Marcus, and Carrie stand around the island, still picking at the chip bowl. All three look up as we approach, and Carrie’s mouth tugs into a grin while both my father’s and brother’s fall open.

“You guys remember Ben,” I say, breaking the silence that has fallen over the room, squeezing Ben’s fingers between mine. There’s a rigidity in his forearm, a stiffness in his shoulders and spine, and I don’t think I’ve seen Ben this nervous before. Aside from his fear of transportation.

“Ben Carter,” my father says, pushing his eyeglasses farther up the bridge of his nose as if he needs a better look to believe his eyes. “I’ll be damned. How the hell are you, son?”

With that, he abandons the chip bowl and makes his way over to us, extending his hand in front of him. Ben shakes my father’s hand with his free one, and I hide my smile against the sleeve of Ben’s sweater, knowing this is as close to a physical display of affection as it gets with my father.

“I’m good,” Ben answers as my father continues to vigorously shake his hand. “Really great now, actually.”

“I’ve kept every single issue of National Geographic that’s featured your work.” My dad finally releases him. “I have a whole collection.”

“Really? That’s very kind of you,” Ben says, and I feel the tension ease from his body. He clearly has my father’s approval, not that he needed it.

“Upstairs in my office. Right beside Mona’s Around the Globe articles.”

“Wait. What?” I ask, dumbfounded. “You keep my articles?”

“Of course I do.” His thick brows form a single line over his frames. “Why would you think I wouldn’t?”

“I…I don’t know.”

Over the next few seconds, I reconsider my past as though I got the whole thing wrong. Like Ben switching lenses on his camera to get the clearest picture, when I look at what’s right in front of me from a different perspective, I realize I mistook my differences for being an outlier, never grasping that my family loves me for me, regardless of my propensity for quiet and calm. And if I needed any further proof of how much my family does in fact see me, the fact my studious, science-driven father, Dr. Matthew Miller, has my article on New England’s Tarot Card and Crystals Expo tucked away on a shelf somewhere in his office, well, that’s all I need to know.

“Okay, my turn,” Marcus interrupts, shoving me out of the way to throw his arms around Ben. “It’s good to see you, man.”

They do that man-hug thing where they roughly clap each other on the back, and then Ben tells him, “Look, I know I owe you an explanation on why I suddenly disappeared back then. I want to apologize—”

“You don’t owe me shit,” Marcus cuts him off. “I’m just glad you’re standing here now. But if you really want to tell me about it, how about you buy me a beer next week? I think it’s long overdue. In fact, we haven’t had a beer together since that kegger Mase and I threw—”

My father clears his throat.

Marcus abruptly switches gears. “I don’t know what I’m saying. That never happened. Anyway, lets grab dinner next week.”

“Sounds good, man,” Ben says, suppressing laughter.

My family’s reaction to Ben warms my heart, and I revel in the fuzzy feeling of it all while Marcus introduces Ben to Carrie—who says she feels as if she already knows him after hearing so many stories from our childhood—and points out two of their three children as they run through the kitchen in search of the third, who is off hiding.

“Where’s everyone else?” I ask, just as my mom enters the kitchen and stops in her tracks, her hands covering her heart.

“Ben,” she says softly. “You have no idea how happy I am to see you.”

“Mary Ellen.” Ben crosses the room to my mother, sweeping her into an embrace that lifts her petite frame off the floor. I let them have their moment, knowing I’m the only one in this room other than the two of them who understands how deep their connection runs and how much my mother did for him.

“So, you and Ben are like…a thing?” Marcus questions, drawing the attention of my father and Carrie.

“We are one hundred percent a thing.” The answer flows naturally from my lips. “He’s going to be around. Long-term.”

Marcus smirks. “I don’t really know how I feel about my best friend dating my little sister.”

“Good thing neither one of us really gives a shit how you feel,” I reply, copying his smirk.

Marcus looks from me to our father, then to Carrie, perplexed. “Who is this person and where is my quiet, docile sister?”

Carrie laughs and pats him on the chest. “I think she stayed behind in Iceland, and I, for one, am loving this new version.”

“Yeah.” His eyes sweep over me like he’s seeing me in a whole new light. “I think you’re right about that.” He lowers his voice and adds, “Hey sis, I know Mase and I can be real assholes sometimes—”

“Sometimes?” Carrie interjects with a snort.

“Okay, I get it.” Marcus directs a Thanks a lot look to his wife. “We’re probably not the easiest people to have to claim as siblings, but I didn’t realize until tonight how overlooked we made you feel. I’m sorry about that.”

I smile, partly because it’s good to hear this acknowledgment from my brother and partly because I recall my dramatic outburst that led to it. “Thank you for that,” I say. “Sorry if I scared your children.”

“Are you kidding?” he laughs, pulling me into a hug. “I’m sure they’ll be talking about Aunt Mona’s profanity-laced rant for weeks. Let’s just hope they don’t tell their teachers at school about it.”

I shove him away from me with a laugh of my own.

“Okay, okay.” My mother approaches the island, swiping tears from her eyes. “Someone go find everyone we’re missing and tell them it’s time for cake.”

“We’ll do it.” I curl Ben’s fingers between my own and pull him in the direction of the entranceway. When we’re back in the foyer, I smile up at him. “See? That wasn’t bad.”

“No, it was really great actually.” He bends forward and kisses my forehead. “But I still have one brother to go.”

Right as he says this, three small heads run past us in the direction of the living room. “Hey,” I yell at their shadows, “time for cake!”

They continue on, paying me no attention.

That just leaves Mason and Jacklyn. With Ben trailing me, I climb the stairs, curious as to where they could’ve disappeared to. I get my answer when I reach the second-floor landing and the bedroom door at the opposite end of the hallway opens. Mason and Jacklyn emerge a second later, and unfortunately for my eyes, Jacklyn is straightening her miniskirt and Mason is wiping what appears to be her bright red lipstick from his mouth. When they look up and see me approaching, both sets of eyes go wide like two deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car.

“Isn’t that your friend from work?” Ben whispers.

“Yep. That’s Jacklyn. My best friend and roommate.” My voice comes out clipped. “And you remember Mason.”

“Are they…together?”

“That’s an excellent question, Ben. A goddamn fantastic one.”

As we draw near, I see the moment Jacklyn’s guilty expression morphs into one of resolve with the set of her jaw. She’s not going to acknowledge it. By the way Mason’s eyes plead with me, he’s practically begging me to do the same.

So fine. I won’t. At least not tonight.

“Mason, it’s been a while,” Ben says, cutting into the weird tension in the hallway. “How are you, old friend?”

Mason recovers quickly, shifting his focus to Ben as they, too, exchange that same odd handshake / hug / shoulder pat. “I sure as hell can’t believe you’re standing here. It’s like seeing a ghost.”

“Yeah. I’m sorry about that.” Ben slides an arm around my shoulder, and I tuck my hand against his chest. “But hopefully I’ll have time to make up for it.”

Mason looks back and forth between us. “You know, now that I think back on it, you two were kind of obvious about the whole thing.”

“Please,” I scoff. “You had no idea.”

“Okay, maybe not,” Mason admits with a slow grin. “Guess I should’ve paid more attention. Then and now.”

As he says it, his gaze falls solely on me, and he opens his arms in invitation, waving me to him with a hand. I leave Ben’s side and hug my brother, and it’s not lost on me that I’ve hugged my family members more in one single evening than I have in the past decade. Who knew raging out at the dinner table earned this kind of affection?

“Sorry for being kind of a dick,” Mason says to me. “Promise I’ll do better, okay?”

I nod against his shoulder, throat constricting all over again.

“But you have to make me a promise, too.”

“What’s that?” I manage with a sniffle.

“Promise me you’ll never, ever bring up Dad’s vasectomy again.”

A deep laugh bursts out of me as I push my brother away and wipe at the watery edges of my eyes.

“Wait a second,” Ben says. “You brought up Dr. Miller’s vasectomy? To his face?”

“Dude, it was badass,” Mason replies, eyes lighting up. “Dad’s face was so red it was practically purple. I really thought I might have to intervene.”

Ben looks to me, perplexed, and I just shrug. For the rest of the night I’m going to revel in the fact my brother kind of just called me a badass.

Across from me, Jacklyn loudly clears her throat, and I pick up on her not-so-subtle hint.

“Jacklyn, this is Ben Carter.” I make the formal introduction that never took place in my cubicle that god-awful day we met with Calvin. “Ben, this is Jacklyn Spencer. My best friend, roommate,”—brother’s fuck buddy?—“coworker, confidant, swimsuit connoisseur, et cetera, et cetera.”

“Nice to officially meet you, Jacklyn.” Ben reaches out to shake her hand, and Jacklyn allows it, although her cool blue eyes sweep over him in keen assessment.

“Oh, I’ve heard lots about you,” Jacklyn says, and my breath hitches in my throat. Jacklyn has never been known for subtlety. “Look, I’m going to give you a chance here because you make my friend happy. However, I’m a hell of a lot meaner than Mona could ever dream of being, so if you hurt her again, just know that I don’t play nice with others.”

“J, I don’t—”

“No, Ems,” Ben cuts me off. “That’s fair.”

“Glad we understand each other,” Jacklyn says, then her stern expression relaxes into a smile and she also pulls Ben in for a hug.

“Okay, well, listen,” I say. “J, do you think you’ll be okay getting back to the city alone tonight? I’m going to stay over at Ben’s.”

I cannot fathom the thought of another night without him sleeping next to me, and while he could come back to the city with us and stay at my apartment, I know from experience how thin our walls are and don’t want to subject Jacklyn to the things she might overhear.

“I’m a big girl,” Jacklyn says as if she’s offended. “I’ll be perfectly fine.”

My gaze shifts to Mason, who nods his head almost imperceptibly, communicating that he’ll make sure she gets home safely. I’m just not sure if it will be our home or his home she ends up at, but that’s a conundrum for a different day.

“Okay then,” I say. “It’s time for cake.”

Downstairs everyone gathers around the dining room table as my mother carries in a perfectly iced cake with thirty-two candles, but they’re split down the middle so each brother will have his own wish to make. We do the customary singing of the “Happy Birthday” song, the kids raising their voices to drown everyone else out while my father doesn’t contribute at all other than rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. Then the twins blow out their respective candles.

It’s funny, it may be my brothers’ birthday, but I’m the one whose wish is coming true as I squeeze Ben’s hand in mine, as I lay my cheek on his shoulder and tuck my opposite hand around the inside of his biceps, as he reflexively leans down and kisses the top of my head.

A ridiculously large smile pulls at my cheeks.

Because it doesn’t matter if Ben and I make it to a hundred more countries or none. As long as we’re together like this.

And as I stand in the warmth of my childhood home, surrounded by a family who may not be perfect but loves me no matter what, a best friend who supports me unconditionally, and now the man I’ve been in love with my entire life, it suddenly dawns on me…Maybe my puzzle piece fits perfectly after all.

Epilogue

8 months later…

“Time to wake up, Ems.”

I ignore the soft-spoken words and the fleeting brush of Ben’s lips against my cheek, opting instead to keep my eyes closed in the pursuit of a few more minutes of rest. Unfortunately, Ben is persistent.

“Breakfast is waiting on the deck,” he calls from across the room now, “and we don’t want to be late for this morning’s safari.”

Finally opening my eyes, I blink against the sunlight and take in the well-appointed room of our lodge. Actually, well-appointed is an understatement. We’re currently staying in an upscale eco-friendly resort in South Africa’s Kruger National Park. One so fancy we even have our own temperature-controlled plunge pool on the deck, and just yesterday I watched a herd of elephants pass by in the distance while taking a late-afternoon swim. Four-year-old Mona with her safari library book could have never imagined this for her future, that’s for sure.

I stir in bed, catching Ben’s attention. He stands over a desk, fidgeting with his camera. “There she is,” he says with a smile, and my heart flutters in response. God, I love this man.

“How was the sunrise shoot?” I ask, sitting up in bed but not ready to climb out and start the day yet. Unlike Ben, who has been up for hours now.

“Really good.” Setting his camera aside, he comes and sits on the bed with me. “Jaylen got an unreal shot of a lion cub drinking from the waterhole. Suki is going to be obsessed when she sees it. You were right about him. He’s really developing his eye, and I think he’s definitely one to watch out for.”

In the past eight months, Ben and I have had to navigate making our assignments work in a way we can be together, something that hasn’t always been easy. A couple of things have helped though. For starters, Suki’s flexibility in allowing remote work (for all employees, not just the Internationals) has given me the ability to tag along with Ben on some of his assignments when I’m not on my own.

Another thing that has helped, and the current reason we’re here in South Africa, is Ben signing another contract with Around the Globe. No, he still isn’t willing to join the company full-time, and that’s perfectly fine with me. However, after our Iceland article was a huge success and sold more issues than any other edition in the past five years, Suki used her persuasive prowess to tap Ben for another type of assignment—mentoring Around the Globe’s youngest photographers. So here we are halfway around the world on another joint assignment, only this time there are three other photographers here, too, and they’re getting a once-in-a-lifetime master class on wildlife photography from the Benjamin Carter.

This is only his second trip as a mentor, but already I can see the positive effect it’s having on Ben. In a lot of ways, I think it brings back memories of his own mentor, Dan, and being able to pass on his knowledge and skills has given him a purpose beyond photography.

“That’s really great,” I say, taking his hand and running my fingers over the map of veins along the back. “How lucky for Jaylen to get to learn from a world-renowned photographer.”

His green eyes spark with amusement. “I believe once upon a time you called me cocky for labeling myself world-renowned.”

“Ah yes, I did. However, that was before I knew I was going to be Mrs. World-Renowned.” I look down at my ring finger, and a diamond glitters back at me.

Ben surprised me with a proposal two months ago at my parents’ house, although looking back on it, I probably should have known something was up when he asked me to walk down to the lake on a cold March evening. We haven’t set a date yet, with all the travel we’ve been doing it just hasn’t been feasible. But when the time does come, I know exactly what I want. I want to get married in Iceland, at Hótel Búðir so Joseph can attend. We’ll keep it small and invite only my family and Jacklyn, probably a couple of the photographers Ben seems to be developing deeper friendships with, and our Iceland friends like Cassandra and Natalia and, fuck it, even Fridrik (though I do worry he might try to talk one of us out of going through with it).

“I guess that does make a difference,” Ben laughs, leaning over to kiss me.

The kiss lingers in a way that makes me want to forget about breakfast, forget about the morning’s safari, forget about everything other than pulling Ben in between the sheets with me. But alas, I have a job to do. So I climb from the bed and pull a robe on over my pj’s, then make my way out to the deck with Ben at my heels.

Hot coffee and a basket of pastries waits on a table next to the plunge pool, and I take a seat as I again remind myself how lucky I am that this is my life.

“By the way, I don’t know if you’ve checked your phone yet this morning, but Marcus sent another string of messages about the camping trip next month.” Ben pours steaming coffee into a mug and slides it my way before pouring another mug for himself.

“Does he not understand we are on the opposite side of the world right now?”

“To be fair, we’re often on the opposite side of the world.”

Okay, Ben has a point there.

“And also, you wanted your brothers to include you so…”

Damn. Two for two. But while I wanted to be included, being added to their group text with my father—along with Ben, who has picked up their friendship as if a single day wasn’t missed—is something I could have done without. Along with their monthly weekend camping trips when weather permits. While Iceland gave me an appreciation for hiking and being in the great outdoors, I still prefer a fancy hotel to shower and sleep in. It’s not all bad, though. Carrie is there to commiserate with, and there are s’mores.

I’ve invited Jacklyn along on these weekends, but she always declines. I’m not sure if it’s because camping is literally the last thing she would ever want to do, or because she knows Mason will be there. Every time I mention his name now she gets weird on me and changes the subject, and Ben has said the same thing happens if he mentions Jacklyn around Mason. We haven’t figured out what exactly happened in that bedroom the night of the twins’ birthday party, but something clearly did and neither Jacklyn nor Mason will talk about it.

“I know. I know,” I relent. “I’m just not sure I wanted to be included in a way that involves me sleeping in a tent on a monthly basis.” I add sugar and cream to my coffee and stir. The truth is, I can see how hard my parents and brothers are working to make sure I feel like an equal part of the family. Ever since my outburst at dinner, I get calls and texts whenever I return from a trip, and when we’re all together, no one talks over me or interrupts me when I’m speaking. I do appreciate the effort, and I know I have my own work to do, too.

If I want things to be different with my family I have to be willing to open myself up to them, to share the details of my life with them in a way I haven’t in the past. This isn’t always easy when I’ve spent the majority of my life feeling inferior, but it’s something I’m actively working on in therapy, along with my anxiety.

Yep, turns out I also have an anxiety disorder. Who could have guessed?

I’d started going to therapy about six months ago after hearing Ben talk regularly about its benefits and the impact it’s had on his life, figuring what could it hurt. My motivation was mostly that of wanting to learn how to best support Ben in our relationship when he’s gone through so much trauma in his childhood. And we do talk about Ben and his past. And we do talk about my family. But what I hadn’t expected to discover was that my feelings of never being good enough stem from a place of deep anxiety, and that manifests in a myriad of ways. In my very first session, my therapist was quick to point out that people who say No worries are often the ones with the most worries, and yeah, that was an eye-opener.

Honestly, I’d always thought that everyone had the same unrelenting voice in their head that overanalyzed every single situation and fully dissected every possible scenario. But as I learned, it’s not everyone. There are some people who go through life without ever worrying about things that haven’t happened yet. There are some people who don’t need to see their gate at the airport three hours early to know it exists. There are people who manage to leave their childhood fears in the past. I recognize that those are small examples, but they accumulate into something bigger, something that can define a life.

I also recognize that anxiety isn’t something that can magically be solved, it doesn’t get wrapped up in a neat little bow like at the end of a movie when everything works out. Anxiety is ongoing. But at least now I can see it for what it is, and that acknowledgment does wonders for combating it and not allowing it to become too loud.

“You okay over there?” Ben asks, bringing me back to the moment.

I look down and realize I’m still absently stirring my coffee. After removing the spoon, I lift the mug to my lips and take a sip. “Yeah,” I answer after I swallow. “I’m good. Just thinking about how lucky we are to be here.”

Ben smiles and takes my hand across the table, his gaze falling to my engagement ring. “We are lucky, Ems. Incredibly lucky.”

There’s movement over his shoulder, and my gaze travels to the muddy, flat plain behind him where in the distance I spot the yellow and brown patches of a giraffe. “Babe, look!” I exclaim, pointing past him.

Ben turns in his chair, and we both watch silently as the giraffe makes its way closer, stopping at a clump of trees and grazing on the branches. Slowly but surely, more giraffes appear on the horizon, at least ten to fifteen.

“Holy shit!” I rise from my chair and make my way to the edge of the deck to get a better view. Ben’s right behind me, and he wraps his arms around me as we stare out at the majestic wildlife enjoying their breakfast.

We stay that way for as long as we can, until I know we’re about to risk being late to meet up with our guides.

“Ems,” Ben says gently.

“I know, I know,” I reply. “I need to go get dressed. I’m going, I swear.” But I stay exactly where I am, wrapped in Ben’s arms, for another minute or two.

Eventually, I feel the press of Ben’s lips on my neck, then a gentle bite. “Ems…”

With a sigh, I turn in his arms, rise onto my tiptoes, and kiss him slow and deep. My fingers sink into the back of his neck, and I press my hips against his.

“On second thought,” he says against my mouth, “we could probably be a little late.” His hand finds the tie of my robe and pulls it loose, the sides gaping open to reveal my skimpy camisole-and-short set underneath.

We make our way back toward the sliding glass door in a tangle of messy kisses and desperate touches. “Okay, but we have to be super quick,” I say, pausing at the threshold to our room. “The world awaits, after all.”

Ben smiles against my mouth, his arm around my waist holding me close. “Yeah, Ems. It certainly does.”

Acknowledgments

Here’s the thing about writing acknowledgments: As a debut author, it’s something I’ve dreamed of for a very, very long time. Then the time actually comes, and it’s truly quite terrifying. The truth is there are so many people who have helped in so many different ways to get this novel to where it is today, and attempting to eloquently state my gratitude within a few paragraphs feels both overwhelming and insufficient. But alas, I shall try my best.

First and foremost, my eternal gratitude to each and every person who took the time to read this book and, in doing so, made my childhood dream come true. It will never not be wild to me that there are (real!) people who want to read these stories I invent in my head, so endless thanks for indulging me.

In case it wasn’t obvious, this book is my love letter to the country of Iceland. I was fortunate enough to go on the very same trip that Mona and Ben take in the book, and saying it was the trip of a lifetime feels like an understatement. I remember driving from the Blue Lagoon to our hotel that very first day and saying to my husband, “It feels like we’re on a completely different planet.” And that feeling stayed with me throughout the entire trip. Every beach, hot spring, geyser, volcano, glacier, and waterfall (so many waterfalls!) we visited left its own unique imprint in my mind, and I can only hope the descriptions in this book do them a single ounce of justice. Like Mona, I was woefully unprepared for the physical aspects of the trip (never owned hiking boots a day in my life), but pushing myself outside of my comfort zone made this trip even more special. I also must shout-out the many Icelanders we met on the trip who were all so welcoming and genuinely kind. I’ve traveled quite a few places now, but the most memorable will always be Iceland. There is no comparison. I cannot wait to come back someday! (Also, hi, Joseph!)

To Esi Sogah and Genni Eccles, working with you both has been a literal dream come true. Your editorial genius and love for these characters blew me away from the first phone call, and this book is immeasurably better because of you both. To the entire team at Berkley, thank you for all your support and for believing in this story. And many thanks to Liza Rusalskaya for the stunning cover I still find myself staring at for minutes on end.

To my agent, Laura Blake Peterson, you’ve been a true champion of my writing since day one, and I’m so lucky to have you and everyone at Curtis Brown in my corner. Thanks for taking a chance on me, and thanks for putting up with my one million Hey, quick question…emails!

Countless people in my life have come along on this journey with me (willingly or not), and I need to express my utmost appreciation for the following:

Abby, who read the very first manuscript I ever wrote and had the grace to pretend it was good when we both know it very much was not. Jasmine, for reading the second manuscript I ever wrote and texting me all the things you loved about it. Jessi, who I feel like I’ve known for a lifetime, thanks for listening and always talking me down (pretty sure being around you somehow makes me cooler). To Katie and Cassandra, I will forever value our friendship and am so grateful to you both for being by my side every step of the way. (Never would have made it to so many cool places in Iceland without your PowerPoint, Cassandra!)

Amanda Hopkins, I’m so grateful that years ago one of us introverts worked up the courage to slide into the other’s DMs—a true miracle!—because I can’t imagine a better friend and critique partner. (Seriously, there’re only so many people on this earth I’d brave the Atlanta airport traffic for.) Heather McBreen, the way we met can only be described as fate, but the stars aligned and now you’re stuck with me! I’m so lucky to have your brilliant feedback on my work. Audrey Goldberg Ruoff, I know for a fact this book wouldn’t be what it is without your thoughtful insights. Thank you doesn’t feel like enough. I’m so glad we got to go on this journey together. Alicia Thompson, who I somehow convinced to be my friend, thanks for your unwavering support over the years. You really do light up a room!

This book took on many versions throughout several rewrites, and somehow I had a whole DREAM TEAM of writers willing to read and offer feedback through its many revisions. So thank you to Aurora Palit, Cara Stout, Karsyn Zetah, Katy Jakes, Naina Kumar, Sarah Slusher, Sarah T. Dubb, and everyone else who read a chapter or two along the way. All of your comments helped shape this story and these characters in invaluable ways.

I consider myself incredibly fortunate to be part of the romance writing community, so thank you to everyone I’ve exchanged work with or interacted with on social media about our shared love of romance books. And thank you to the writing Discord groups I’m a part of for having me, even though my social anxiety usually keeps me from posting. I really appreciate just being included.

To my family, thank you for putting up with me along this roller coaster of a ride. (Remember when my emotional meltdowns were reserved solely for my birthdays? LOL, those were the days.) Thanks to my mom for allowing me to take a book everywhere I went as a child. And to my sister, growing up trying to make you laugh made me funnier. To my son, thanks for saying you’re proud of me; it means more than you know. And to my very large, very loud extended family of aunts, uncles, and cousins, thanks for being the kind of family that doesn’t bat an eye at the very spicy scenes I write, but let’s please not talk about them at Thanksgiving.

Finally, to My Husband, thank you for being the most calm, steady, reliable presence in my life. Thank you for encouraging me, always. Thank you for traveling the world with me. Thank you for being my home. And thank you for making me laugh. Every. Single. Day. (But I’m still funnier.)

Image by Danika Corrall Designs

Megan Oliver is a writer, an avid romance reader, and a travel enthusiast whose vacation mishaps provide plenty of inspiration for her characters on page. She lives with her husband, two dogs who refuse to cuddle as much as she’d prefer, and a cat who barely tolerates the presence of any and all above. Secret Nights and Northern Lights is her debut novel.

Visit Megan Oliver Online

MeganOliverBooks.com

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