Page 25 of My Favorite Bad Decision
“Always seventy and sunny,” he replies, his mouth twitching. “Isn’t that what they say about Kili?”
“Did you two plan at all? Kilimanjaro isneverseventy degrees,” scolds Gerald, incapable of reading the room. He looks toward Gideon, who’s been listening in with quiet amusement. “You really need to vet your clientele a little better.”
“Yes,” says Gideon, sighing, “we really should.”
After another two hours of climbing—increasingly rocky, with almost no vegetation— we cross a small bridge and arrive at Lava Tower. At 15,000 feet, we are now higher than any point in the United States aside from Denali—and I can tell. The last steps up here were slow, plodding, and miserable. I have the start of a headache. I take a quick glance at Maddie, but she seems fine.
“You okay?” Miller asks, his gaze sweeping over my face.
I force a smile, assessing him as well. “You?”
“I can feel it, but I’m good,” he says. I hope he’s telling me the truth. Even a big, fit guy like Miller can suffer from the altitude, and it’s mostly an issue you can’t exercise away.
He smiles. “I’m really fine, Kit. I promise.”
The porters have set up a tent for us to stay in while we acclimate and have lunch. Unfortunately, they’ve made another stew. It’s good to have something hot, and it’s amazing that they can even get up here and cook this, but God, I’d kill for a steak taco right now.
“We’re thinking about going back through Dubai,” says Leah. “Have any of you been? I don’t think it’s safe.”
“It’s one of the safest cities in the world,” I reply. “Safer than any city in the US.”
“When wereyouthere?” Miller asks.
I don’t love his tone. Why the fuck does he care that I went to Dubai? “My mom was there for, uh, work,” I reply, frowning at him because I’d rather not open this can of worms in front of everyone else. “She ran into an issue, entirely her own fault, and needed some help getting out of the country.”
Miller frowns. “When was this? She’s been with Roger since you were a teenager. Shouldn’t she have askedhim?”
I shrug. “I was in college. It wasn’t a big deal.”
“You were incollegeand she made you leave for Dubai to get her out of trouble instead of asking her fuckingspouse?” he demands.
I huff, exhausted by his illogical peevishness and these continual questions he knows I can’t answer completely with an audience. “She didn’t want Roger to know.”
He’s still unhappy. “You realize that doesn’t actually sound better, right?”
I ignore him. I’ve grown accustomed to my mother falling apart at the slightest sign of trouble and demanding that I fix it. Miller seems to think it’s a bad thing, but I look at it as skill development. I know now how to get someone out of a foreign country when their documentation is stolen. Surely that has broad applicability.
We remain at Lava Tower for well over an hour, adjusting to the lack of oxygen, and then head down to camp. Halfway into the trip, the skies open and the rain starts to fall. We scramble to don rain jackets and ponchos but they barely seem to help. The entire trek back down, I am drenched and miserable, pulling my ball cap low over my eyes just to see a foot in front of me.
And even from a distance, as we approach camp, I can tell that there’s one less tent up for our group than there was yesterday.
Goddammit.That means Miller and I will continue to share for the rest of the trip, and Ireallywant to be alone right now. I want to dive into that tent, strip head to toe, dry myself off, wipe every nook and cranny with a wet wipe, and dress at my leisure.
We unzip the tent and dive in simultaneously, leaving only our lower legs outside so our muddy soles don’t come in with us. I swing around to remove my boots, and he does the same. “I don’t suppose I can convince you to stand outside while I change,” I say.
He raises a brow and laughs. “No,” he says, climbing fully inside.
I sigh heavily.Four more freaking days of this. “Look, I need to get out of all this shit, and one naked person in a tent plus another naked person equals two naked people in my tent, and when one of those people is you, that equation does not appeal.”
“Ourtent,” he replies. “And you’ll live. If we both face in opposite directions, neither of us will be the wiser.”
I groan, turning away from him and stripping off the first of several layers. “This is definitely the sort of situation that leads to a landslide or earthquake knocking the tent over and ends with me being seen naked.”
“If the worst part of a landslide or earthquake is that I accidentally see you naked,” he replies, tossing his jacket and pants into the back of the tent, “you must have really gone downhill over the past ten years.”
I laugh. I guess he has a point.
I peel my soaking wet socks off and sigh in relief. This is followed by the base layer and bra and panties. “Every single thing I wore today is trashed,” I announce, running a towel over my skin.
