it’ll be hot,” Jami protested, unsure of the wisdom of sticking to her original intention of airing out the pup tent.
“Why’s your frown so big, Mom?” Toby asked, trotting in a circle around a patch of red and yellow, spur-blossomed columbines. “Aren’t you having fun?”
She reluctantly closed the tent flap to shut unwanted guests out of her temporary quarters. The flies were annoying enough. She didn’t need any midnight surprises. “Oh, I’m having tons of fun.”
“You could be.” Grant lifted the pair of binoculars that hung around his neck and handed them to Jami. “Take these in case we spot a bear on the mountain.”
“A bear?” Fear and excitement blended in Toby’s voice as he skipped between his mother and Grant to take hold of each one’s hand.
“Or a deer. Or maybe an elk,” Grant hastily amended, recalling the child’s nightmare about a grizzly bear.
“This is better than the zoo.” Toby scampered across the meadow between the adults, swinging their hands with his.
Grant and Jami looked over Toby’s head to exchange smiles. The mountain wilderness was as far from an urban zoo as imaginable.
“Yes, better than a zoo,” Jami agreed fondly.
“Much better,” Grant added, as he guided them between trees and into the woods. The ground became steeper and rockier, forcing Jami to watch her footing as they hiked up the mountainside.
She enjoyed the hike nearly as much as her son, listening as Grant pointed out dangers to avoid such as poison ivy, poison oak, and stinging nettle. Delighted by rare mountain orchids hidden behind larger, brighter wallflowers, she appreciated Grant’s choice of campsite even without bathroom facilities. Toby threw crumbled crackers to the squirrels and chipmunks, but obediently refrained from touching or chasing the woodland creatures.
As they stopped on the way back at a deep fishing hole along a rugged stretch of the lake shoreline, Grant and Toby immediately caught three trout for supper.
Jami tried her hand at fishing, but she felt a snag. It wouldn’t budge and she was afraid to break the pole.
“Your line’s tangled in a tree branch,” Grant said with a chuckle before carefully disentangling it.
Jami laughed, surrendering her pole back to Toby. Grant had made quite a fisherman of the little guy. She was impressed, yet disturbed at the same time. Toby and Grant were growing closer and it frightened her. What would happen when the vacation ended and Granted walked away from them? What would Toby do? What would she do?
“I’d like to hike up one last trail before we return to camp,” Grant stated, taking their fish to wrap in plastic and pack into an insulated bag he hung over his shoulder. “If you and Toby aren’t too tired?”
“Tired? After sitting here watching you two fish? I think I can handle a short hike.” Jami hopped off her rock, realizing she’d sat on a lot of rocks lately and glad to be moving again. Besides, she didn’t like the direction her thoughts wandered when she was unoccupied.
“I’m not tired,” Toby announced, bounding between them to dash ahead.
“You’re never tired,” Grant responded as he led them on a steep trail that zigzagged up the mountainside.
“Not that he admits.” Jami examined her son’s flushed face, bright eyes, and mussed hair. His jeans were damp around the ankles and his knees muddy, his shirt smeared with dirt, but Toby seemed happier than she’d ever seen him before.
“We’re almost to the spot.” Grant climbed a tricky incline of layered rock and held a hand out to boost Jami up beside him. Toby scampered up the slope of sandstone and shale, sure-footed and frisky as a mountain goat.
Grant did not release her hand, and Jami savored the pleasurable sensations of his strong, warm grasp. Never before had a man made her feel so protected, even if it was born of sheer politeness, and, for the moment, she surrendered to it.
At the top of the rise, Jami realized they had reached a cliff that protruded off the mountainside, offering a panoramic view of the lake below and the other mountains surrounding them. The lake had transformed into a fluid rainbow of colors mirroring the sunset-painted skies above them.
Jami gasped at the beauty. Grant squeezed her hand in understanding. A pastel palette of violet, turquoise, and pink stained the sky and the mountains to the east. In stark contrast, streaks of scarlet, orange, and gold fired the clouds gathered above the mountains rising toward heaven in the western horizon as a fireball sun sank between mountain peaks.