Chapter Twelve - Julianna

“You’re doing amazing,” Julianna told a young girl who couldn’t be older than thirteen.

“I don’t know if I can do this,” the girl called down, her voice shaking. Her left hand held a rope in front of her, with her right hand pulling it behind her back, which would act as the brake when she rappelled down the side of the barn. Except she had no need for it because there was no way she was going anywhere anytime soon.

Scott stood at the top, trying to soothe her, but it only seemed to make her more nervous.

Penny was walking past, and she threw a sympathetic glance toward the girl. “I know the feeling.”

“Want to go up and talk to her? The poor girl is scared out of her mind, but she’s been determined to conquer the wall for the past twenty minutes. I’m not sure Scott’s the best person to help her. Pretty sure the only thing he’s accomplishing is making her hands sweat more.”

Penny swallowed hard. Julianna knew that the top of the barn made Penny nervous—having to climb three flights of stairs to get there—but to her credit, she gave a small nod and said, “I’ll see what I can do.”

She disappeared back into the barn and appeared at the top a couple of minutes later. Julianna had to bite back a smile when Penny ordered Scott to back up three steps to give them space before kneeling on the platform next to the girl. Julianna couldn’t hear what was said, but whatever it was, it worked. The girl’s movements were slow and halting, but ten minutes later, she’d managed to walk down the side of the rock wall.

The grin that girl wore was something Julianna would never forget. The pride that came from overcoming an obstacle lit up her eyes, and she was jumping around so much, her fist punching the air, it made it difficult for Julianna to get the harness off her.

Julianna laughed as the girl handed her the helmet. “Am I going to see you back on this thing tomorrow?”

The girl’s smile dipped. “Uh…” But then it returned in full force. “Yup. Is…uh…Scott Dallenforth going to be up there again?”

“I’m not sure, but you’re going to rock it either way.” Julianna lowered her voice to a whisper. “Between you and me, I think you’ll do even better if he’s not around.”

The girl scrunched her eyebrows together. “Was it that obvious that he was making me nervous?”

“He makes everyone nervous,” Julianna said with a smile.

“Even you?”

“Even me.”

“Awww, I thought we’d gotten past that stage, Jules,” Scott said from just behind her, causing her to jump.

The young girl’s cheeks turned a bright shade of pink, and she ran off toward a middle-aged couple who had been watching from a bench next to the barn.

“I had to say something to help that girl feel better about things,” Julianna said, turning to face Scott. Her breath caught at how close he was standing. She could see the dirt streaks from when he’d taken a group out on the four-wheelers earlier.

“Well, that’s a relief,” he said, pretending to wipe sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. He grinned. “You coming camping tonight?”

Julianna cocked an eyebrow and studied Scott. This was the first she’d heard about a camping trip. And weren’t they supposed to be working on the “just friends” thing? Going camping together seemed…intimate. Forget the fact that it involved sleeping in dirt and wearing enough mosquito spray that she doubted he’d want to come within six feet of her.

There were also stars and the romantic glow of a campfire. And no adult supervision.

“We have work tomorrow. Weekend isn’t here for another three days,” she said, her words coming out quick.

Penny walked up and must have seen the panic in Julianna’s expression, because she laughed and said, “Relax. There’s a bunch of people going right after dinner, and we’ll be back in time for breakfast. It’ll be fun.”

Julianna’s gaze moved from Penny to Scott, then back to Penny. “How does everyone know about this stuff except me?”

“You were out leading that hike for most of the day,” Scott said. There was something about the way his eyes crinkled, and the reassuring nod, that immediately put her at ease. That made her trust him. That made her feel like she could follow him anywhere, and it would be all right.

That was a very dangerous feeling.

* * * * *

Julianna emerged from their apartment under the lodge, a backpack slung over one shoulder. “So, who’s driving us to this thing?”

A guilty expression flashed across Penny’s face, and Julianna didn’t need any more info than that.

Sandra and Blair. That was who. Apparently, Sandra had bought a Suburban just before making a road trip out of coming to the ranch. It wasn’t the nicest-looking thing, but it could fit eight people.

Except, Julianna didn’t want to be in a Suburban with seven other people, least of all the four of them. It wasn’t that they weren’t nice—they were—but she’d rather they not be. Whenever Julianna was with Sandra and Blair, her breaths immediately shallowed. She hated the jealousy that still rose up, but more, she hated the guilt. They didn’t know what she had done the past school year.

But she did.

And as they bounced along a dirt road toward their campsite, it gnawed at her.

“You okay?” Scott asked, placing his hand lightly on her knee. His eyebrows were knit in concern. “You look a little pale.”

“Y-yeah. Just a little motion sick.” Julianna was starting to feel a bit nauseous, so it wasn’t a lie.

“I told you that you should have let me drive,” Sandra scolded Blair through a smile. “You always take the turns too fast.”

“A gentleman always drives,” he said, his lips quirking up into the half-smile that Julianna had never been able to get enough of.

“And what would you know of being a gentleman?” Sandra retorted.

Okay, guess they were turning her motion sickness into a chance to flirt and exchange witty banter.

Great.

Julianna really did think she was going to puke.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Scott asked again.

Penny squeezed Julianna’s arm on her other side, as if letting her know she was there for her, then folded her arms across her chest and glared toward the front row. She didn’t do more, considering the three of them were squished together in the very last row of seats, but it was enough. Julianna had confided in Penny about Blair and Sandra the week before when she’d declined Sandra’s invitation for a late-night swim, and just the fact that Penny was silently letting Julianna know that she had her back was enough.

The more Julianna thought about it, she didn’t know why her friend had taken her side at all. It wasn’t like Sandra and Blair had done anything wrong. Blair hadn’t meant to break Julianna’s heart, and Sandra hadn’t meant to swoop in and steal something that had never belonged to Julianna in the first place.

It was Julianna who had been mean and petty.

But Penny seemed to understand everything that Julianna wasn’t saying. She reached over and squeezed Julianna’s arm, while Scott’s gaze flicked from Julianna to Blair, then back again.

Scott leaned in close and whispered in Julianna’s ear, “I told you before, I can help you get him back.” His breath tickled, and Julianna had to fight back the desire it ignited in her. Good thing she had already made it clear that she was off limits. That she wasn’t like all those other girls whose hearts stalled at every dimple and every stolen glance. That her heart still belonged to someone else.

“Thank you.” She gave him a sad smile. “But there’s nothing to fight for. He doesn’t see me. Not really. Not like I see him. Saw him. Used to—kinda still do.” She released a sigh. “I don’t even know anymore.”

“And you think he does? High school boys don’t have a clue.” Scott said it as if he were on a loftier plane than boys like Blair—like he hadn’t just graduated high school himself.

It was adorable.

“Got that right,” Penny said with a satisfied nod, and she and Scott fist-bumped.

“He doesn’t know what he wants,” Scott said, his tone firm.

Julianna would have given anything to hear those words just a few months earlier.

Now?

They made her sick to her stomach.

“Please don’t say that,” she said, her voice so soft, she didn’t know if he’d heard her.

“Why not?”

It was a simple question, but Julianna knew it was going to have a complicated answer—one that she was still trying to figure out. And thank goodness she wasn’t going to have to come up with one that made sense, because the Suburban abruptly stopped, throwing them all forward. Blair backed up a couple of feet, then turned off on an even narrower dirt road. Up ahead, several other cars were parked next to a clearing.

“Safe and sound. Just like I told you,” Blair said, throwing Sandra a grin. She rolled her eyes but was laughing at the same time.

“Barely.” Sandra jumped from the Suburban and opened the sliding side door. “Ride’s over, folks. Once you get out, turn to your left if you managed to make it through relatively unscathed. To your right are some bushes if Blair’s driving left you a little worse for wear.”

“No one’s going to puke,” Blair said, jumping from the driver’s seat.

“Actually…” His best friend, Cameron, then slid out of the side of the vehicle and stumbled to the designated puking bush.

Sandra shot Blair an I-told-you-so look.

Blair raised a shoulder and grinned. “He’s always had a sensitive stomach.”

“Which only seems to be sensitive around you,” Cameron called before returning to his bush.

Julianna slid out of the Suburban after Amanda and grabbed her stuff from the back. “I didn’t bring much. Just a sleeping bag, a pillow, and a toothbrush. Think I should have brought more?”

Penny grabbed her sleeping bag, tucked a pillow under one arm, and followed Julianna. “That’s all I brought. Figured we’d get back in time to clean up and grab breakfast.” She held up her toothbrush. “This is just in case…you know...” Pink crept up her cheeks. “Well, it was Andy that invited me. Or at least, he’s the one who told me about it. Which is kind of the same thing as an invitation—”

“Who’s Andy?” Julianna interrupted. Penny was the closest thing Julianna had to a best friend, and she didn’t even know that Penny had a crush? What kind of friend did that make Julianna?

Penny’s blush deepened. “He’s on maintenance duty, so kind of keeps to himself.” She pointed to a tall redhead that Julianna had seen in passing. He was setting up some logs for a fire, while everyone else watched. “He’s a good guy. Funny too, once you get to know him.”

“It looks like he could use some help with the fire,” Scott said.

Julianna started, not realizing he’d been standing just behind her. He gave Penny a pointed look.

“Oh, I-I don’t know anything about campfires.” Julianna didn’t often see Penny at a loss of words, but she was sure struggling to come up with an excuse right now.

Scott laughed. “Neither does he, by the looks of it. But he’s trying when no one else is, which says something about the guy.”

Penny nodded slowly. “Okay. Yeah. And it’s not like I don’t know the guy. I talk to him every time he comes through the barn to fix a lightbulb. It won’t be weird. Not at all.” And she was back to rambling.

“Just go,” Julianna said with a laugh, and she gave her friend a little nudge.

After another minute of hesitation, and then slowly leaning her sleeping back against a tree and balancing her pillow on top, Penny glanced at Andy. If she had been hoping that he’d have the fire going by the time she’d painstakingly set her belongings down, she’d have been disappointed, because Andy was nowhere closer to having that fire lit.

“Going to help with the campfire now,” she muttered, as if giving herself a pep talk. “I shouldn’t be nervous. It’s not like I’m asking him to make out with me. But maybe I should brush my teeth first, just in case.”

And she continued to talk to herself like that all the way over to the campfire.

“Glad it’s not just us guys that feel like we’re constantly tripping over our own feet,” Scott said with a smile. “It usually feels like you girls have it all figured out and you’ve somehow managed to become the puppet master, holding the strings. Like you know if you give a smile in a certain way, it will make me scoot closer. Or if you rub your arms on a cold night, I’ll offer my jacket.”

The way Scott was looking at her—his gaze piercing—left Julianna wondering if he was talking generically, or when he said “you” he really was talking about her.

His eyes in that moment—they were honest. Searching. Vulnerable. And she felt her resolve crumbling. Not completely, just enough to scare her.

“Well, I guess I should find me a good sleeping spot,” Julianna said, readjusting her grip on her sleeping bag and pillow and surveying the clearing. “Do you think anyone happened to think of a tarp?”

Scott seemed startled by the abrupt shift of mood, and disappointed. “Um…maybe. I don’t know. All I brought was a sleeping bag. Forgot to even grab a pillow.” He busied himself looking at the ground. “Maybe if I can just find a soft enough rock…”

Julianna knew what she should do, but she hesitated. She’d known Scott was different than she’d expected since the hike they’d taken on their third day at the ranch. But she kept treating him as if he were exactly what he presented himself to be—a shallow rock star. A player. Someone to be careful around.

“You can share mine,” she said, her words escaping too quickly. Otherwise, they may have never escaped at all.

Scott’s gaze snapped up, and he raised an eyebrow, like he didn’t think he’d heard right.

“Your….”

Ugh. He was going to make her say it. Fine.

“My pillow. We can share. What kind of friend would I be if I let you sleep with your face in the dirt?”

“That’s nice of you. Thanks. You’re a great…friend.”

The way he said it, it seemed like Scott didn’t like the word “friend” much. And truth be told, seeing Penny and Andy sharing shy smiles as they worked together to get the fire going, neither did she.