Page 54 of Seizing Mack
Chapter Twenty-Six
~ Mack ~
One of the reasonsMack moved to Pennsylvania was because she’d fallen in love with the mountains. They weren’t the biggest, or the most well-known, but they were some of the prettiest and least spoiled she’d seen. Being here reminded her of the times she used to go hiking with her father, before his inventions were patented, before he became a self-made multimillionaire.
Life had been so much simpler then. In preparation for their adventures, her mom would make them ham and cheese sandwiches, and her dad would fashion walking sticks out of branches that had fallen from the stoic, centuries old maple trees in their backyard. Then, with their wrapped sandwiches safely tucked into her Nickelodeon-themed lunch box and a couple of juice boxes in her father’s knapsack, they’d go exploring.
They never went very far, she realized much later, but to her younger self, it seemed as if they had. He taught her all about different kinds of trees and plants, what was safe to eat and what to avoid. She learned how to read animal tracks and scat, how to fashion a splint from sticks, how to tell time by looking at the sky and gauge the approach of a storm by watching the trees and listening to the animals.
When they’d find the perfect spot, they’d make a small fire and roast their ham and cheese sandwiches on y-shaped sticks and talk until the sun started going down and it was time to head back home. Her mom would be waiting for them on the back porch, gently rocking back and forth on the swing her dad had put up for her on Mother’s Day...
Those were the things she thought about as she climbed higher and put more distance between her and the rest of the world; that’s where her love for the great outdoors had been born. Away from civilization, that connection to something much larger gave her the focus she needed.
When her lungs were burning and her legs were screaming, she found herself a cozy spot to make camp. She filled her canteen from the nearby stream, gathered some dry kindling, and dug a pit for a small fire. Once she’d ringed the hole with rocks and set up her wood in the shape of a teepee, she lit a tiny blaze and used some pine needles to create a soft base for her sleeping bag. Only then did she pause and allow herself to process the events of the evening.
Tears fell silently for a few minutes, the only ones she would shed. She had gotten nothing less than she deserved, a just punishment for trying to be something she was not.Be true to yourself. Maybe she should have that embroidered on a pillow. Better yet, she should have that tattooed on her body where she could look at it often and remind herself of the wisdom in those four little words. Yeah, when she got back, she was definitely going to pay a visit to the ink shop over in Birch Falls and have Tiny, the local tattoo artist and master inker, sketch something out.
Having made that decision (a plan that involved doing something always helped), she settled back and tried to relax. She took deep, cleansing breaths, filling her lungs with the crisp, clean mountain air. A sense of awe filled her at the sight of the perfect velvety canvas above, the expanse of deep midnight blue-black serving as a reminder of just how small she and her problems were in the overall scheme of things. She needed this, needed the time and the perspective to heal her bruised heart.
No, that wasn’t quite right, she realized with startling clarity. It was herpridethat had been damaged, not her heart, because she really didn’t have feelings for Kent beyond a superficial kind of friendship, one based more in business and convenience. He was an acquaintance, nothing more.
That little epiphany made it a bit easier to take the next breath. Pride wasn’t all that important in the overall scheme of things. She was stillMack, still whole. Her heart was still intact, and that’s what really mattered.
Now if it had been Nick instead of Kent... well, thatwouldhave really hurt. But thank God no one knew that, not even Jay, and Mack was going to make damn sure it stayed that way. Her feelings for Nick were her dirty little secret, and if no one knew, then no one could use them against her.
Tonight and maybe tomorrow night, she would recharge under the moon and stars. Then she would head back to town, refreshed and ready to kick some serious ass.
