His to Protect: Book 1 in the Bound to Him Series by Sandra Antoni (the reading list TXT) 📗

my hiking boots and my sweatshirt. I made sure to also pack an extra t-shirt in my backpack and an extra pair of socks just in case my socks got wet. I definitely did not want any blisters.

When the backpack was packed, I headed back to the kitchen for coffee. I was excited for both today’s adventure and for the massage that would come later. After two cups of coffee, I grabbed my sweatshirt and backpack and headed to my car.

Although I had skipped breakfast, I wasn’t about to skip lunch completely, so I stopped at a gas station and grabbed some granola bars and a couple bottles of water. The donut was an impulse buy, and I took a bite as I made my way back to my rental car. Then I headed towards the mountains.

I had a map of the local trails, and I knew that I would be fine with the map. Besides, the view from the mountain would help me keep my direction. The city of Tucson was hard to miss, and I grinned as I stepped out of the car. I was ready for nothing but nature to surround me.

Slipping my arms in the small backpack that held my snacks, water, shirt, socks, sweatshirt, and cellphone, I started towards the trail in front of me. This was an adventure that I was ready for, and my breath hitched in excitement as I began my upwards climb along the path.

I had purposely chosen one of the more rugged trails, ready for the exertion and exercise. This was nothing like the stair-stepper machines that had been at the gym that I had not had much time to go to. This was a real-live mountain that I was ascending, and I loved the burn I felt in my thighs. I craved this adrenaline.

It was over two hours later that I sat down on a fallen tree trunk. The vertical climb had been crazy, but the grin on my face showed exactly how much I was enjoying it. Not that there was anyone around to see it, but that was okay. I felt happy.

Opening a bottle of water, I chugged half of it. Then I looked around me. It was beautiful up here. Peaceful. There was nothing but trees and rock, and the sounds of the leaves overhead fluttering in the wind. It was comforting.

I was not sure why, but being alone in these mountains like this, it made me feel less alone. This was why I had taken this vacation. It wasn’t something that I could have explained to anyone. I just knew that it called to me. It was like something inside of me craved the open spaces, and I had never felt more free than when I was alone like this.

This feeling didn’t happen very often, but when it did, it felt like coming home. There was no way that I could have described it. Definitely not to my parents. They would never understand. It was like I was at peace, and I craved more of it. That craving had me back on my feet and pushing farther up the mountain.

I wasn’t sure when I lost the trail. Sometime over the next two hours, I had stopped looking at the map and followed my intuition. That was what got me lost. Sure, I knew the general direction of Tucson, but the path was gone. I sighed in exasperation. That was just like me to get lost when it was impossible for me to get lost.

Sitting down on the ground, I reached into my backpack for a granola bar. No point in going hungry, but this was my last one. Finishing off the bottle of water that I had opened earlier, I took a look around me.

I was still amazed by my surroundings. There was nothing like this in Kansas City, and I still felt the peace that had called to me. It was like nothing that I had ever felt before, but it made me feel like I belonged here. Like I belonged right here on the side of this mountain.

Once I felt rested, I resumed my hike, this time heading back down the mountain even though I had no path to follow. I came to several impassable ledges, and I had to work alongside the mountain to find a better place to descend.

The ground was rough and rugged terrain, and I was feeling the strain on my muscles in my legs, but the thought of the massage that I had scheduled kept me progressing downward. It was definitely going to feel like heaven.

It was little more than an hour later that I approached an area where there was a lot of rubble from where rock had fallen from a cliff. I had no way of knowing where I had parked the rental car from here, and I had a feeling that when I made it off the mountain, I would have quite a bit of walking to find the car. I sighed again in exasperation and kept moving.

There was nothing I could do when the ground began to shift beneath me. I felt my arms go out to the side as my body was propelled down the steep decline of the mountain. My feet flew out from under me, and suddenly, I was rolling down the rocky slope. It seemed like hours, even though I knew it was just a matter of seconds before everything was finally still.

I laid on the ground for a long few moments, just doing an internal assessment of my body. Man, that massage this afternoon was going to be amazing after all these aches and pains. I had ended up lying on my side, and I pushed myself up so that I was sitting on the rough rocks beneath me.

My hands and arms were scratched from rolling along the jagged rocks, and there was a hole in my jeans. Looking through the hole, I saw a pretty good gash in