Rally (Treasure State Wildcats Book 3)

The phone that kept vibrating in my pocket, over and over and over again, was ruining camping.

“For fuck’s sake, Halsey.” I dug it from my jeans. Another missed call.

That made fourteen. Fourteen missed calls since I’d left Mission this afternoon.

Three of the fourteen had come while I’d been changing Faye’s tire.

Another notification popped up on the screen, a voicemail. Halsey would fill my mailbox before the night was over if I didn’t answer, but I was done playing this game. I was done letting her push and push and push until I caved.

She could call all she wanted. I was taking this weekend for myself. To stop. To think. To breathe. To figure out my next steps so that when I went home, I’d have a plan.

We weren’t in a good spot. We hadn’t been in a long damn time.

I’d asked her to leave me alone this weekend. To give me a break to decide where we went next. If she couldn’t stop calling, well . . . I guess I knew what had to happen next.

We’d been together for over two years. After all the shit that we’d gone through, especially in the beginning, ending this relationship felt a lot like quitting.

I fucking hated quitting.

But somewhere along the way, we’d fallen apart.

My phone buzzed again, her name appearing along with a picture of us on the screen.

Halsey was standing on her toes, kissing my cheek after a game last year. My helmet was pushed up on my head, my cheeks sweaty and my smile wide after a win. A whisp of her brown hair was blowing into my face as I looked at the camera.

It was a good picture. Halsey was a beautiful woman at any angle. Except the longer I stared at it, the more it seemed . . . staged. Shallow.

Instead of coming up to congratulate me on the game, she’d had her phone armed and ready on its selfie stick. This was one of at least twenty shots she’d taken. Before she’d texted it to me, she’d made sure it was edited and cropped.

Was there anything real between us anymore? Had we always been this fake?

In my gut, I knew the answer. Admitting it to myself wasn’t easy. Ending it with Halsey was going to be brutal.

I declined her call and set my phone on the cooler I was using as my makeshift table beside the campfire ring.

Maybe I should just shut the damn thing off. Everyone important knew exactly where I was this weekend. Mom and Dad would be back Sunday to pick up the camper. Maverick, my best friend and roommate, was at home. If there was an emergency, he knew where to find me. He’d come up here last summer for a couple nights to go fishing.

Except as my phone vibrated again, call number sixteen, I didn’t trust myself to touch it. Not when Halsey would likely say something to piss me off and there was a chance I’d snap.

We’d been together a long time. If—when—I broke it off, I owed it to her to do it in person.

So I let it ring through to voicemail as I reclined in my collapsible camp chair and stretched my legs closer to the fire crackling in the pit.

The scents of smoke and forest mingled in the air, and I breathed them in, holding every inhale until it burned. My vision blurred as I stared unfocused at the dancing orange and red flames.

They reminded me of the woman I’d met today.

Faye Gannon.

Her strawberry-blond hair was shades lighter, but damn, she had fire.

The way she’d clutched that can of bear spray. The tilt of her chin, stubborn and defiant, when she’d asked for my student ID number. The complete lack of recognition when I’d told her my name.

All I’d been to her was a stranger. I was fairly recognizable on campus, but it was refreshing to be just another student at Treasure State.

I glanced over my shoulder, past my Yukon parked beside the camper, toward the road that looped around Gray Rock Lake.

Had Faye turned around? Driven back to Mission?

There was a chance she’d slipped past my campsite while I’d been unloading my bag in the camper. I’d brought a cooler to refill the fridge. But I hadn’t heard her drive by, and since this was the first turnout on the road, she would have had to pass by.

Hopefully, those bald tires would make it back to town.

Gray Rock was over an hour from Mission. There were campgrounds closer, minutes away from city limits, and some with lakes and rivers. But they were always packed. Too noisy for my tastes, Mom and Dad’s too. And Gray Rock was a nice halfway spot between my place in Mission and my parents’ ranch.

It was beautiful. Peaceful. Quiet, with plenty of space between sites. Its only downfall was the damn gravel road.

Every year, Dad swore the narrow dirt track got worse. He wasn’t wrong. Where it wasn’t covered in washboard, it was riddled with potholes.

Not the place to be with shitty, old tires.

Maybe I’d bump into Faye again on campus this fall. Though considering I didn’t cross paths with many human development and family science majors, chances were slim. Besides that, I found myself wandering campus less and less these days.

If I wasn’t in class, I was at the fieldhouse or stadium for practice and meetings. The Wildcats would have a new head coach this year and it was yet to be seen what he’d expect from his players.

No, I probably wouldn’t see Faye again. And that was probably for the best.

She was intriguing. I wasn’t in a place to be interested in any woman but Halsey, so I pushed Faye from my mind and tilted my head to the sky.

A cloud drifted past an opening in the treetops. The wind rustled branches and leaves.

While Gray Rock Lake was a quiet spot, I wasn’t the only guy camping this weekend. Across the lake, a drift boat floated. The girl inside wore a neon pink lifejacket as she cast a fishing line off the bow.

I watched her until she reeled in a fish, then after releasing it back into the water, she took the oars and rowed away to the opposite shoreline.

There wasn’t much to do out here, the beauty of camping. Mom loved Gray Rock because she could sleep in and read. Dad loved to fish and hike, and being out here forced him to disconnect from the ranch.

No chores or office work. No phone calls or emails. No cattle to move or fences to fix.

Other than the weekends when they came to watch me play, they worked all year without much of a break. But camping at Gray Rock was an activity they never missed.

I sagged deeper into my chair, crossed an ankle over the other and let the fresh air fill my lungs. Out here, it was easier to breathe. This year and next might be my last at Gray Rock for a while. If everything went according to plan, I’d be leaving Montana after college, so I soaked in the sounds of the forest and let them chase away the noise in my head.

My stomach growled. I’d been too angry after that fight with Halsey to eat lunch, and breakfast had been early this morning.

I stood, tossed another log on the fire and was almost through the camper’s door when the sounds of an engine and tires on gravel pulled my gaze to the road.

From beyond the thicket of tree trunks that bordered the lane, an old two-tone Explorer emerged, bouncing and swaying as it avoided one pothole just to hit another.

Faye. She hadn’t left after all.

It shouldn’t have made me smile. But it did.

She parked beside my truck, shut off her car and hopped out, hesitating before she slammed the driver’s side door closed, like maybe she wasn’t so sure about coming here yet.

“Hey.”

Faye jumped at the sound of my voice, her eyes whipping to where I stood beside the camper. Her hair was in the same messy knot it had been earlier, though more of the strands had slipped free. She brushed a lock behind an ear. “H-hi.”

“I almost didn’t recognize you without your bear spray.”

The corner of her mouth turned up. She twisted, turning sideways, to reveal the can tucked into the waistband of her jeans.

“There it is.” I chuckled. “Figured you’d be halfway home by now.”

“I was, actually. I drove all the way to the highway before I turned around.”

So she’d been driving on this shitty road for hours. I swallowed a comment about her tires. It would only send her away. “Why?”

“I forgot to say thank you.”

“You came all the way back here to say thanks.”

“Well, yeah. I was rude.” She shrugged. “Thank you, Rush Ramsey. I appreciate your help with my tire.”

“You’re welcome, Faye Gannon.”

She looked around the area as she rocked from her toes to her heels. Back and forth a couple times, like she wasn’t sure if she wanted to take a step forward or backward. “I’ll, um, let you get back to camping. Thanks again.”

“Wait.” I jerked my chin toward my chair and the fire. “Want to stick around?”

“Uh . . . that’s okay. I need to find a camping spot.”

“You’re staying?”

She nodded. “I think so.”

Good for her. She hadn’t let the flat ruin her plans. “Way to rally.”

“Thanks. Anyway, I’d better go.”

“Just to warn you, the best spots beside the lake are probably already taken since it’s Saturday. Most campers come up midweek to claim the good sites. You’re welcome to stick around. Set up your tent over there.” I pointed to a clearing between two large fir trees on the opposite side of my site. “That’s where I always set up my tent when I was a teenager.”

“Oh, that’s okay.”

I held up both hands. “If you’re set on finding your own place, I get it. But if my mother was here, she’d kick my ass for not offering. She wouldn’t like the idea of you being out here alone.”

“I’m not actually excited about it either.” Faye worried her bottom lip between her teeth, her gaze darting from me to the camper to me to the fire to me to the chair.

Was it me? She had to know she’d be safer here than in some isolated corner of the woods, right? Or was she seconds away from taking out that bear spray?

“What’s it going to take to convince you that I’m not a bad guy? I’m just trying to do the right thing.”

Her shoulders sagged as she exhaled. “I finished a book the other day where the villain kidnapped a woman and plucked out her fingernails but gave her a pedicure because he had a foot fetish.”

What the fuck? What the hell kind of book was that? “I don’t have a foot fetish.”

Faye let out a dry laugh. “I’m a bit paranoid today. Or every day.”

“Understandable. Though I think maybe your reading material isn’t doing you any favors.”

“Probably not.” She sighed, then took a step forward, followed by another. Both were slow but it was forward progress.

“How about a hot dog?” I asked. “I was just going to make a couple. I’m hungry.”

“Oh, I’ve got my own snacks.”

“Or you can save them for the drive home and eat a hot dog. I even brought relish.” Before she could tell me no, I snagged another chair that was collapsed beside the camper’s door. I shook it out as I walked to the fire, setting it down. Then I smacked the Wildcats logo printed on its back. “Have a seat.”

Faye stared at the royal-blue canvas, unmoving.

“It’s just a hot dog, Faye.”

She thought about it for a moment, then walked to the chair and lowered herself into the seat, testing it out. Except before her spine touched the back, she stood again, reaching behind her.

Out came the bear spray.

Faye studied the silver can for a moment, and I was sure she’d leave it on her lap. But when she sat back down, this time all the way, she put the can on the ground beside her feet. “I don’t like relish.”

I grinned. “More for me.”