“I’m fine now that everyone is safe. Do me a favor and get in touch with Trip. I’d call him, but I have more immediate things to deal with, first and foremost convincing Wyatt that he needs help to keep this from happening again.”
“Done. I’ll have Trip call you.” Avery sighed. “Always something, right? Tell my brother I said ’bye. See you later.”
Emma paced the lobby, waiting for Andy to return. She wanted to speak with Wyatt alone. As soon as Andy appeared, she asked, “How’s he doing?”
“Brushing it off.” Andy’s envious smile spread. “He’s one tough dude.”
Tough dude? No. Emma suspected Wyatt’s ego demanded he pretend to be okay in front of Andy.
“I’m going to take some things up to his room. Hang here in case Mari or someone surfaces and needs anything, okay?”
“You got it, boss.” Andy pulled out his phone and replied to the text that had just pinged. Emma set a cup of tea, a small plate of vegetables, and the ice pack on a small tray and ascended the stairs.
Her head ached from the heaviness in the inn. No one wanted to see Wyatt hurt or fail, least of all him, she suspected. Taking a moment outside his room to pull it together, she told herself the accident wasn’t her fault. She hadn’t caused it merely because she’d supported Ryder’s boycott. Of course, although Emma had grown quite good at lying to the world about aspects of her private life, she’d never been good at lying to herself.
No matter. She must convince Wyatt to hire Trip, even if he barked at her.
She knocked on Wyatt’s door. “May I come in?”
“Yeah.”
Déjà vu caused Emma to catch her breath when she saw Wyatt stretched out on his bed. Then again, the last time they’d been alone near a hotel bed together had been quite different. Her heart pounded at the memory of him wearing only a towel around his waist. Of him dangling a robe sash in one hand with a question in his eyes. “Do you trust me?” he’d asked. Emma had been so carried away with the thrill of her adventure, she would’ve said yes even if she hadn’t trusted him. As it turned out, it had been a good decision. Very good.
Clearing that thought from her mind like an unwelcome cobweb, she set the tray on the nightstand.
“I brought this ice pack for your knee.” She handed it to him. “I thought maybe you’d be hungry or cold, so I prepared herbal tea and some snacks. But if there’s something else you’d prefer, please let me know.”
He sighed, clearly putting effort into carrying on a normal conversation. “Did you know herbal tea isn’t really tea at all? Comes from a blend of all kinds of plants except for tea leaves.”
“I didn’t realize that.” She smiled at his attempt to act normal after just having survived an avalanche. Although she had things to say, she stood, waiting for him to take the lead.
“Thanks for this.” He tossed the ice pack on his knee, barely looking at her. “But I’m not hungry. Just tired.”
Her gaze caught sight of his hand balling into a fist. A proud athlete like Wyatt probably hated any setback, let alone a major one like he’d been dealt today. Given what she knew about him sexually, and what little she’d seen of him this past twenty-four hours, this man preferred to control his environment. Ryder’s rebellion and the avalanche had thrown him against the rocks, hard. Not so hard that he’d broken, but hard enough to rattle him.
“Oh. Then I’ll take this out of your way.” Before she lifted the tray, she finally looked him in the eye, needing to apologize for her role in his shitty day. “Wyatt, I’m so sorry about your day, but mostly I’m sorry if anything I did or said this morning contributed in any way to what happened. I never meant to plant doubts or break your concentration. I only wanted to help settle your brother.”
“I know.” He grimaced. “Relax, Emma. You and Ryder didn’t cause the avalanche. That’s on me.”
The sound of defeat tugged at her chest. Thanks to Ryder’s mutiny, he had no one he could confide in. She knew a little something about that kind of loneliness. It took all of her strength not to wrap her arms around him in comfort. “It must’ve been terrifying.”
He nodded with a grimace. At first she doubted he’d speak, but then he gazed at her and poured out a bit of his soul. “I won’t lie. I could barely think until it stopped, and then panic nearly did me in. Scariest fuckin’ thing that’s ever happened to me. Worse than seeing Ryder after his crash. Even when I heard Buddy calling through the snow, I didn’t think he’d dig me out in time. Every second it got harder and harder to breathe. When I finally saw some light coming through the snow, I cried.”