All I knew was that I had to get out before bad turned to worse.

It wasn’t the first time I’d left my parents’ house angry and disappointed. And there wasn’t a helluva lot of hope that it’d be the last time, either. I was thirty fucking years old and it was still the same old story. I was their son, but we lived in separate worlds altogether. Our latest clash was our oldest one. The family fortune they prized so highly depended on unrelenting development and expansion. The Stokes family owned four of the finest ski resorts in Colorado, and they still weren’t content. They wanted more. And I was the one standing in their way. Well, me and my foundation. I’d spent the last three years pouring every ounce of strength and grit I could muster into creating ways that business and environmental conservation could exist in harmony. After Ember had left, it was all I had to care about. Maybe the great Leighton and Catherine Stokes didn’t give a shit about the protecting the beauty and majesty of the Rocky Mountains, but I still did. And I was hell-bent on making a difference in the world. Without accomplishing that, what point was there in the mountain of riches at my feet? It wasn’t worth having, if I couldn’t save the land I loved so much…

I glanced at the six-figure luxury sports car my father drove, and climbed into my own pickup truck. No bells, no whistles… mud and slush smearing the floormats. I tossed my beat-up old Stetson on the seat beside me and ground the gears into reverse. I took a huge lungful of crisp air and hit the gas. It didn’t matter where the hell I went, as long as I got out of Aspen and back into the wilderness where I belonged. Only when the city finally thinned out behind me and the trees grew taller and thicker, did my shoulders loosen and relax. The truck, like a horse heading for the barn, pretty much took the lead. And I let it. I shifted my long legs and ran a weary hand through my hair. It was evenings like this one that I missed her the most.

Three long, lonely years… and I could still smell her scent, like spice cake and warmth. The hole she left in my heart was still there, and I had only myself to blame for it. Sure, she left. But what real choice had I given her? She’d watched her parents’ difficult relationship slowly dissolving right in front of her eyes and couldn’t live with the idea of the same thing happening to us. Ember came from a family in which all the men she loved put their lives on the line with every call to duty. The tiniest spark within a hundred miles could mean first responder crews might never make it back home. It could mean wives without husbands… and children without fathers…

When I made the decision to join up as a volunteer along with her brother, Randy, I’d crossed that one line that stood between us. Like a fault line, it had been the only thing powerful enough, important enough to break us apart. And it had.

I’d lived every day of the last three years without her. I’d learned that a single decision made alone can be the most disastrous choice a man can make. I don’t know if she even thinks about me anymore. I do know, in the deepest part of my soul, that not a day will pass in my life that I won’t ache for her. We’d been so close, right on the edge of what should have been our own happily ever after...

It was well past the New Year, but Copperton’s lights were still up, swaying and twinkling with a holiday cheer I sure as hell hadn’t shared. This had been our third Christmas apart, and I still couldn’t shake the connection I felt to her. She’d been the one. The only one. And she always would be.

“...fucking goddamn truck takes me back here, of all places…” I leaned forward to take in the view of Main Street. It looked exactly like it always had… except that Ember was gone. If I closed my eyes I could still see us walking into Henry’s Grill together, Reilly padding along on his little leash… and Ember wearing the engagement ring I’d designed just for her…

I jerked the truck over to the curb, killed the engine and climbed out. My legs were stiff with cold and my stomach rumbled, empty. I turned my back on Henry’s and crossed over to Cliff’s Dugout. I needed food, but I also knew damned well it wouldn’t fill all of the emptiness. But four fingers of whiskey would keep me warm enough to climb up to the hot springs. Call me a glutton for punishment, but I knew I’d end up there again, sooner or later. It was our place. Where Ember and I turned the spark between us into a full-blown conflagration. I hadn’t seen her for months that summer and when I did, she’d turned from a freckled, gangly kid into a copper-haired beauty that made my blood turn to fire in my veins. She’d given me her virginity. And I’d surrendered my heart. For life, it seemed…

“Well, hell if it ain’t Jace, you old son of a bitch. Where the hell you been, boy?” Cliff threw the soggy bar mop in his hand, hitting me squarely in the chest. I kicked it aside and sat down at the bar, smiling in spite of my mood. “Thought you disappeared with that sweet little honey o’ yourn an’ forgot alla us.” He grinned, showing a missing front tooth. “That, or went an’ got yourself burnt up the usual way.”

“Failure on both accounts,” I replied dryly and pointed to a bottle behind him. Cliff nodded, poured generously with a practiced hand and sat it down in front of me.

“You look thin,” he said. I downed half my glass and raised my brows skeptically. I was all of six foot three and 195 pounds of pure fucking muscle. “Awright,” he conceded, “you look… well, unhappy. But I got a sandwich here I’d be willing to share with ya’… somethin’ to keep that whiskey company…”

“I’m good,” I answered, emptying my glass. “I just came up for a soak in the springs and a few old memories.”

“Got both, that’s for certain,” he answered, eyeing me hard. “You back to make things right this time?” His wrinkles softened and his watery blue eyes crinkled at the corners. “Word gets around, ya’ know,” he said gently, “small place like this…”

I pushed the glass across the bar and held out one big hand. He shook it, holding on.

“Hot springs and memories,” I replied with a grudging smile. “Nothing more. Some things can’t ever be made right again. No matter what.

“And I don’t believe in second chances.”