Byron’s face fell, and he turned aside to fetch his camera. By the time he’d straightened again, his expression was neutral.
“Look, Leslie,” Angus began.
“No. No honeyed words to turn my head,” Leslie said. “I won’t be taken in by you again. You’re going to have to work hard to prove your trustworthiness to me.”
He didn’t want to prove his trustworthiness, but Leslie had him on the ropes, and she knew it. She did have twenty-three more days.
“That’s it, I’m doing it,” she muttered.
“Doing what?” Byron asked. He was filming them now.
She pulled a cell phone out of a pocket in her dress and began to tap away at it. “Getting a backup husband for Win. One she can’t resist. Then you’ll have no one to marry but me.”
A backup husband?
Angus didn’t like the sound of that at all.
Pittance Creek. Midnight. I’ll slip out first. You follow.
Win erased Angus’s text, anticipation shooting through her at the thought of being with him again. Making love three days ago had only increased her cravings rather than diminished them. This was what Angus did to her—lit a match to the fuse of her desire.
She spent the rest of the day on pins and needles, terrified Leslie would somehow read their intentions in their faces, but the young woman chattered on like normal, her running commentary as familiar to Win now as Boone’s bossiness and Byron’s puppy-dog expression.
It was amazing to Win that neither Leslie nor Angus seemed to have noticed Byron’s longing for the backup bride. Byron hid his real reason for stalking the newcomer by talking about his need to gain experience for his résumé. He followed her around as if he was documenting the lead-up to a moonshot, and when the first episode since Leslie’s arrival aired, she dominated most of it. The other cameramen seemed glad to let him do the leg work for the next episode, although they kept up following the other inhabitants of Base Camp, looking for interesting side stories to tell.
“That boy is going to trip over himself trying to get close to Leslie,” Addison murmured to her at lunch. Leslie, as usual, was nearly glued to Angus’s side. Byron must have been doing a closeup of her as the group of them chattered, because his video camera certainly wasn’t focused on anyone else.
“I wondered if anyone else had noticed,” Win murmured back.
“You can’t miss it.”
“And yet Leslie has.”
When they returned to the greenhouse, Win hung back to savor a moment or two of silence before spending hours in Leslie’s chatterbox company and noticed Byron picking some of the wildflowers that edged a nearby field.
“Leslie,” he called out, and she waited for him just outside the door, although Angus had gone inside. “Here. For you. I heard you say you loved wildflowers. Thought you might like these.”
Leslie’s face lit up, and for a moment Win pitied her; judging by her reaction to Byron’s small kindness, Leslie was feeling starved of that kind of attention. Angus was almost always polite but distant with her, despite all her attempts to garner his interest. It must be hard to face that rejection day after day and keep trying.
“Thank you!” Leslie went up on tiptoe and planted a kiss on Byron’s cheek. “You’re so sweet. If only other people would learn from you.” She directed this last sentence through the greenhouse door toward Angus and immediately followed him inside, leaving Byron dejected on the doorsill. Win approached and patted his arm.
“Don’t give up.”
“I wasn’t doing anything!” His alarm was clear.
“I didn’t say you were.” She sailed past him and got to work, already wishing it was bedtime.
At midnight, Angus paced the bank of Pittance Creek, straining to see through the darkness. Was Win on her way yet? He didn’t think anyone had seen him sneak out, and if they did, they hadn’t commented. She wasn’t as used to covert operations, however. She might get caught.
Too soon to panic, he told himself. She’d have waited a bit to make sure no one had woken up when he left. Then she had to get her outer things on and sneak out herself. She’d be a few more minutes.
When a rustle sounded nearby, Angus instantly went on alert. “Win?” he hissed, but nothing moved nearby. Had it been the breeze playing through trees or something else?
Angus wasn’t sure, but it occurred to him Win would feel exposed on her way from the bunkhouse to the creek. He should have waited for her much closer.
He began to move back the way he’d come along the path, stepping softly along the rutted track, listening for the sound again.
When he met up with Win, he’d take her back to his tiny house again, he decided. He’d meant to be with her on the banks of the creek, figuring the moonlight and gentle spring air would make the encounter romantic. Win would prefer the safety of walls around her, though, he reasoned, and he wanted her to feel secure. He wanted her focused on nothing other than being with him—
A scream tore through the still night air, long and high, raising the hair on his arms. Angus charged toward Base Camp before he even had time for conscious thought.
“Win!” he shouted. A second later he spotted her, half crouched in the middle of the path. He scooped her into his arms and kept going toward the bunkhouse, where already men and women were spilling out. The tiny houses up and down the slope nearby were lighting up as people came to see what had happened.
“What is it?” Boone shouted.
“Win?” Angus prompted, still carrying her.
“I saw someone—in the woods. A man!”
“Jericho. Clay. Kai,” Boone snapped. The men instantly followed him down the path, spreading out into the trees to look.
