Page 53 of Knot Your Sugar Rush
We reach a clearing rimmed with tall grass, the air thick with the scent of blooming wildflowers. Cam turns slowly in a circle, taking it in, and her cheeks are pink now, her breathing just a little quick.
Dane says something about stopping here to check the map again, but my attention’s caught on how she presses her hands to her hips, stretching just enough that her shirt shifts and I catch a bare inch of skin.
The heat crawling up the back of my neck is not from the sun.
Jamie moves up beside me, voice pitched low. “You catching it too?”
I don’t answer. I don’t have to.
He sighs, but it’s not unhappy. “Thought so.”
The thing is, I’m not just reacting because she smells like she might be closer to her heat than any of us expected. It’s the way she laughs with us, the way she’s slid into our rhythms like she’s always been part of them. It’s the way she looks at this place like she’s already imagining it in candy form—turning flowers into sugar, moss into spun sweetness.
And yeah, maybe it’s also the way she feels like something we’ve all been missing without realizing it.
“Alright,” Dane says, folding the map. “We push on toward the old mansion site. Shouldn’t be far now.”
Cam flashes him a grin, and then we’re moving again, deeper into the island’s green heart. The air gets thicker, the scents sharper, and every step feels like we’re heading toward something—something big, though I can’t tell if it’s the island’s secrets or the shift in her that has my pulse running this fast.
Either way, I’m not sure I want to find the end of this trail too soon.
***
The hollow feels like a place out of time.
The air is damp, cooler, carrying the scent of moss and something faintly metallic, like rain that hasn’t yet fallen. Our boots sink slightly into soft soil, dark and rich, veined with roots. Overhead, the branches knit tighter, the leaves filtering sunlight into shifting emerald patterns that ripple over Cam’s hair when she steps forward.
Dane scans the space like he’s checking for tripwires, while Jamie’s gaze is glued to the vines spilling down one sloped wall of the hollow, small cream-colored blossoms nodding in the faint breeze.
Cam drifts toward them, fingers hovering just shy of touching. “Not it,” she murmurs, almost to herself. She moves on, eyes sweeping the ground for any sign of the elusive flower from Zae’s notes.
A drip of water catches my ear, and I follow the sound to a trickle running down the side of a mossy rockface. The water disappears into a narrow channel lined with stones—too straight, too deliberate to be natural.
“Hey,” I call softly. “Come look at this.”
Cam joins me, crouching beside the little stream. She traces one of the stones with her fingertips, brows knitting. “These were cut.”
“Part of the mansion’s gardens, maybe,” I suggest. “Could’ve been a decorative channel, leading water to fountains.”
Dane steps over. “If that’s true, then the house can’t be far.”
Jamie grins. “Haunted mansion treasure huntandrare botanical search? We’re really covering all the bases.”
Cam’s smile flickers, then steadies. “Zae would’ve loved this,” she says quietly. There’s a note in her voice—something tender but aching—that makes me want to step closer, but I don’t.
We follow the channel deeper into the hollow, where the plant life changes subtly—ferns with fronds the size of our torsos, clusters of jewel-bright berries, the sharp scent of wild mint crushed underfoot. A fallen archway appears ahead, half-buried under ivy and lichen, its stone carved with curling patterns worn soft by time.
Jamie whistles low. “If that’s part of the estate, this place must’ve been incredible.”
I imagine it—the grand staircase, the ballroom echoing with music, candlelight glinting off crystal. And then, silence. The forest swallowing it whole.
“Any chance the flower could’ve been cultivated here?” Dane asks.
Cam tilts her head, scanning the perimeter. “If the records are right, it would’ve thrived in a place like this. Humid, sheltered, and—” She stops mid-sentence, crouching suddenly.
“What is it?” I move closer.
She brushes aside a mat of creeping vines to reveal a cluster of pale green leaves, their edges serrated, the stems tipped with buds not yet in bloom. “It’s not the same as in the sketches,” she admits, “but… it’s close. Might be a relative species.”
