Page 69 of Every Little Kiss
He wasn’t saying Liv was the one, but when he was with her he wasn’t thinking about the last job or the next job. In fact, he wasn’t thinking about the job at all. And that was as much the appeal as the problem, Ford admitted as he crossed the lot.
He turned the corner and saw Harris standing by his vehicle. He was completely suited up, which meant he was headed out on a search.
“If you’re here about the pee on your tires, it wasn’t me. The dogs got confused and thought your Jeep was a tree.”
Harris didn’t laugh. “We just got a call, and I need you.”
“If it’s about a missing dog or Mr.Gordon, my shift ended with my class.” Ford walked past him, and Bullseye gave Harris the stink eye.
“Father and two sons, fifteen and eleven, went hiking at Canyon Ridge,” Harris said. “One of them called his mom twenty minutes ago to say the father was teaching them how to anchor a rope, when he slipped. The oldest stayed to try to get his dad, and the youngest hiked down to where he could get a signal.”
Ford immediately kicked into crisis mode. No one climbed down Canyon Ridge—it was too steep. The only way down was to rappel or fall. “Did he make it to the bottom?”
“Nope, he got halfway down and landed on an outcropping of rocks.”
“So we’ve got a boy and his dad stuck on the side of a cliff?” Ford asked, unlocking the metal storage box bolted to the bed of his truck.
“And an eleven-year-old somewhere in the woods with a dying cell,” Harris said. “Ty’s working at the lodge today, I have a team working a missing kid over by the high school, and I don’t have time to call them back here.”
Which meant Ford was officially off desk duty.
“Sixty seconds to gear up, and Bullseye and I will meet you at the chopper.”
It was past sunset by the time Ford walked through his front door. Exhausted and covered in blood, he dropped his cap on the table, a six-pack in the fridge, and his dirty clothes in the hamper. He should have taken a hot shower and called it a day, but he was too wired to sit still.
Needing to clear his head, Ford slipped on his wetsuit and headed out to the lake, grabbing his board on the way. Usually standing on a board in the middle of a current helped Ford find balance, but tonight the control he needed to stay afloat was a struggle.
Seeing the look on the kid’s face when they’d handed off his still-unconscious dad to the EMTs had unearthed things better buried. But no matter how hard he paddled or how far he went, he couldn’t rid himself of this feeling that he wasn’t finished.
He’d rappelled down to secure the father, getting him on a backboard and into the chopper headed toward Mercy General. He’d even doubled back out and helped locate the missing eleven-year-old and got him safely to the hospital.
Ford had done his job. Logically he knew this, but the feeling that it still wasn’t finished settled like lead in his chest, making every breath that much harder. The farther out he paddled, the heavier the paddle got, until it felt as if he were moving through tar.
He could have stayed at the hospital until the kids’ mom had arrived. Or maybe waited until they heard the status of the father. Though, technically, he wasn’t privy to that kind of information. Nope, Ford’s job was to locate and rescue. Period. Whatever happened after that—with the subject, the family—was out of his hands.
Ford paddled faster to get it out of his head. This case was over. Soon there’d be another. And if he had any plans to be there when the next family needed him, then he needed to start focusing on his certification and not shortcomings.
His or the job’s.
Arms exhausted and breathing heavily, Ford paddled back to shore, going under the water, welcoming the jolt to his body as he sank beneath the cold ice-cap runoff. Unzipping his wetsuit and freeing his arms, he grabbed his board and walked up the beach to his house.
The moon was high, reflecting off the lake and illuminating the beach and the surrounding area. The shoreline was lit with a million twinkle lights, which hung off the back of nearly every deck lining the shore.
Including Liv’s.
Which was how he noticed her small shadow sitting on the bottom step, a few houses down. Wrapped in an oversize sweater, feet in the sand, with Bullseye’s head in her lap.
Not trusting himself to be around her right now, Ford considered heading straight inside the house and letting Bullseye enjoy a sleepover at the pretty neighbor’s house. Only that would leave Ford alone. And alone was the last thing he could stomach right then.
Not when she was sitting there, those fathomless eyes locked on him, looking like a safe shelter in the storm.
He walked down to the sand and headed toward her house. He was a few feet away when she spoke.
“I was cleaning up Paxton’s room and found a stowaway,” Liv said, standing and making him wonder if she had anything on under that sweater. It was baggy and hung to midthigh, leaving nothing but silky, bare skin and pink-tipped toes. “I saw you go out on your board, so I let him stay for dinner.”
“I hope it wasn’t pizza.”
“Nope.” She walked toward him, her feet sliding in the sand, her hair swaying beneath the breeze, not stopping until he was standing close enough to touch. Close enough to smell—and she smelled like redemption. “Chinese, but I offered the delivery guy a special gift if he picked up a bag of dog kibble at the market on the way.”
