“You’re stubborn, Evelyn. Outspoken. Bossy. And … stubborn. But I forgive you.”
Lila and Ronin grinned at Graham’s display. Everything had to be on his terms.
The hug.
The apology acceptance, even though I didn’t actually extend a real apology.
“Lucky me,” I mumbled.
As Lila turned toward Ronin to give him a grin, because her pleasure over Graham and I making up was obvious on her face, Graham kissed my cheek and whispered in my ear, “I miss you.”
His rise to governor hadn’t changed him as much as I thought it had. He still excelled at being an asshole with me one minute and reminding me why I loved him as my friend the next minute.
“I miss you too.” I leaned my head against his and sighed.
“Careful …” Lila smirked. “People are taking photos. I can already see the front-page news story tomorrow: Governor Porter shows PDA toward his mistress in front of his wife.”
“Well…” I wiggled out of Graham’s hold on me. “We definitely wouldn’t want that.”
“Let’s go! I can’t wait to see what Evelyn’s learned from Ronin. I bet she’s going to school us today.” Lila looped her arm through mine and led me toward the door.
Ronin followed behind us with Graham. They both chuckled. No one could ever say I didn’t make huge sacrifices for my friends.
I made it down two runs without breaking anything, but I feared pushing my luck wasn’t a great idea since I needed to be in one piece to take care of two kids and be there for my mom.
“I’m done. There’s a hot drink and chocolate chip cookie calling my name in the lodge.” Hugging Ronin, I buried my cold face into his warm neck.
“But you were just getting the hang of it.”
I giggled. “I was so not getting the hang of it. It’s best for me to quit while I’m ahead. Now you can have some actual fun.”
“What makes you think I wasn’t having fun?”
I lifted onto my toes and kissed him. “Humor me and try to have fun without me. Then we’ll find a different kind of fun to have later.”
“You’ve thrown down the gauntlet now, babe. There’s no picking it back up.”
“As if I would want to.” Biting his lower lip, I playfully tugged it. “Go be awesome. Put Graham and Lila in their place.”
“I’ll do my best.”
Finally, things felt right again. Making up with my friends didn’t cure my mom’s cancer. It didn’t dissolve the stress of their jobs or guarantee that I would get to see them more frequently. Just like I couldn’t rush winter or slow down summer, Graham and Lila were in a different season of their lives than Ronin and me. If I wanted to keep my relationship with them, I had to accept that.
After my cookie and hot tea, I found a comfy chair in the lodge by the fireplace and drifted off to sleep. Sue had our kids while I took a nap—a rare, yet glorious opportunity.
“Ma’am?”
I peeled open one eye, unsure of how long I’d been asleep—but it felt like quite a while. An hour or two? A man I vaguely recognized from Graham’s security detail stood above me, lips pressed into a firm line.
“Ma’am, I need you to come with me.”
“Where? Why?” I sat up straight.
“There’s been an accident.”
Sitting up straighter, I combed my fingers through my hair. “What do you mean accident?” I stood, leaning to the side to see past him, looking for Graham, Ronin, or Lila.
“I’m not at liberty to go into detail. I apologize. Governor Porter asked me to escort you to the hospital.”
Sliding my phone out of my pocket, I tried to call Ronin, but he didn’t answer. Then I tried Lila. It went straight to voicemail. And while I didn’t expect to reach Graham, I tried him anyway as I followed the man out to an SUV and climbed in the back as he held the door open for me.
“Evelyn …” Graham answered. “Did Barry find you? You … you need to get here.” That voice wasn’t my Graham Cracker’s, my best friend’s husband, and it definitely wasn’t the governor’s. The voice was too tortured, too broken, too insecure.
“Graham, what’s going on? You’re scaring me. Where’s Lila and Ronin?” I gripped my phone tighter as I gazed out the window at the busy late afternoon traffic on the streets of Aspen.
“She …” his voice cracked.
She.
Lila.
“Graham!”
“She got off course. I … I don’t know how. And she fell … Jesus, Evelyn … it’s like she fell off the side of the fucking mountain. It was so far.”
Biting my lips together, I swallowed hard as everything outside of the window blurred behind my tears. “Is she …?” I couldn’t say it.
“I don’t know. They’re working on her. She wasn’t breathing. Ronin did everything he could. They airlifted her out, and he went with her, straddling her, compressing her chest over and over. God … what if she doesn’t …”