Saturday dawned crisp and clear, and Hayley set out for Denali National Park shortly before ten.

She’d meant to leave earlier but had stopped by the office to send another batch of profiles of the sexy, eligible men of Golden Falls to Allison Reiss at Devotion.com, along with parameters for target audience. It was painful to look at Josh’s handsome face smiling out at her, but she knew it would do the trick—it would get women to sign up. Who wouldn’t want to be with a man who looked like that?

She’d been thinking a lot since her argument with Josh, and she’d come to the conclusion it wasn’t all his fault. Yes, his behavior at Singles Night ruined things between her and Evan, but she hadn’t been blameless, either. By the time she went to Josh’s for the profile piece, she was starting to date Evan, and while she didn’t owe him exclusivity before he asked for it, she knew herself well enough to know that what she’d done that day with Josh had sabotaged her potential relationship with Evan.

She was going to Denali National Park that day because she was determined to go out in the wilderness alone, something she’d never done before, for the sole reason that it terrified her. She’d begun her dating-coach journey with Josh wanting to know her blind spots, but it turned out her main issue was glaring: Deep down, she was afraid she couldn’t save herself. She tried to connect with men she knew would fail her, like her father had, and it just reinforced Hayley’s own beliefs about herself.

Josh had plenty of issues, but she’d been struck by how it hadn’t even occurred to him she might be afraid, being alone in the woods. He was absolutely capable, absolutely without fear, and she wanted to know what it felt like. Sure, she’d gotten lost as a little girl and a nice lady had needed to rescue her, and sure it had made her afraid of being alone when there was the potential of getting lost—but she was an adult now, and she should be able to find her own way home.

The drive to the Denali Visitor Center took a little over an hour, and she enjoyed driving the two-lane highway and feeling the rhythmic rumble of the road beneath her car. The day was clear, and the colors of nature were so pure. That and the classical violin CD she played made the drive feel almost like a prayer. When she arrived, she was surprised to see how busy it was. As she pulled into the parking lot and saw several dog trailers and pickup trucks filled with large tent equipment, trailers hauling snowmobiles, and even an ambulance, she remembered it was the base for the overnight checkpoint for the Akpaliki Taurtut that had started from Golden Falls that morning. Somewhere out there, Josh was racing.

As she got snowshoes from the checkout desk, she made a point of asking the ranger when they closed. She wrote down her license plate number, pointed out her vehicle, and said if she wasn’t back when they closed, he should assume she needed help.

“Are you going off-trail?” he asked.

“Oh, hell no,” she said. “Definitely not.”

“Then you won’t have any problems. The trails are plowed down, and you can go straight out as far as you want and then come back.”

“I’ve never gone out on my own,” she felt compelled to tell him.

“We have a guide taking a group out in a few minutes,” he said. “You’re welcome to join the group.”

“No, thanks,” she said. “I have a GPS device, and this is a growth opportunity for me.”

“I see.” He smiled. “Good luck with your growth opportunity. You’ll be fine with your GPS. Just don’t stay out past twilight.”

She went outside, marked her GPS start location, got her snowshoes on, and set off on one of the wide packed trails leading from the visitor center. Embracing the crispness of the slightly-below-zero air, which counted as a verifiably warm day for Alaska in December, she lifted her face to the midday sun and breathed in the wintery-fresh air.

She could do this.

She felt positively accomplished when she turned around and was out of sight of the visitor center. As she continued on, the number of people she passed slowed to a trickle. Long minutes passed before she realized she hadn’t seen anyone in quite some time. She looked around in front of her, behind her, and around her. No one. Just snow and sunshine and the rolling undulations of tundra and the occasional sprinkling of pine trees, so dark green they were almost black. And then, of course, the hulking giant of Denali itself, its faces shrouded in a heavy winter cloak of snow.

She was well and truly alone—and she wasn’t afraid. The absence of fear was exhilarating.

She’d gone far enough that she shouldn’t go much farther, but she wasn’t ready to head back yet. She wanted to embrace the silence and the solitude. To understand what Josh felt when he was alone on the trail with only him and his dogs.

She continued on with a newfound clarity of mind. She felt free. She’d accused Josh of being stuck in his life, but she realized she was as stuck as he was, only in a different way. As determined as he was to remain a lone wolf, she was equally determined to find forever.

What was the urgency? Why was she trying to force it?

It wasn’t just the profile with Devotion, she realized. They might not like it, but she could tell them she was once again single and on the market herself. She could instead offer up Cassie and Cody as an example of how an out-of-towner could move to Golden Falls and find love.

No, Hayley now understood that she hadn’t stopped the misunderstanding, because at the time she thought a boyfriend—any boyfriend who was decent—would do.

In the sunny cold, in the clarifying brutality of her alone-ness, Hayley changed her mind about that.

She didn’t just want forever. She didn’t just want a husband. She wanted the right forever, the right husband.

And that was Josh.

She knew it; he at least felt it. And maybe he wasn’t ready right now. Maybe he still had healing to do which could only be done alone. What he needed was a woman who wouldn’t try to rush or change him. A woman who had faith he’d sort things out eventually.

He needed a woman who was willing to wait for him—and she was. She could wait for her forever.

She could wait for Josh.

Hayley lifted her face to the sun and stretched her arms wide.

“I love you, world,” she declared. “And I love you, Josh.”

Then she turned around and set out again, finding her own way home.

* * *

It was a brutally cold, clear twilight when Josh arrived at the Denali checkpoint for his mandatory rest period after a grueling but successful day, landing in the middle of the pack of racing teams.

Normally after a day of running the dogs on wilderness trails, Josh had a feeling of calm afterwards, of peace, but not this time. All day he’d been on edge, feeling anxious to get to the checkpoint, almost wanting to be done with the race already. And more than once—okay, if he was honest with himself, it was every couple minutes—he thought of Hayley. Wondered what she was doing. Thinking about what he should do, because getting her out of his head just wasn’t working.

Bruce, along with the other handlers, had been at the checkpoint all day, having driven out there in the morning after the start of the race and then going by snowmobile to the remote location within Denali National Park. Once there, Bruce would help prepare the hospitality, communication, and sleeping tents. In addition, he would have unpacked Josh’s equipment and set up their personal tent, which had two camping cots, sleeping bags, food, supplies, and dry clothes for Josh.

Always in the past, Bruce met Josh as he approached the checkpoint and guided the team to its parking spot, where hay, water, food, and drop bags waited—but that day, Josh slowed the sled and searched in vain for his father’s face amongst the handlers.

He found a volunteer handler. “Hey, have you seen my dad?” Josh asked. “Bruce Barnes. Older guy.”

“Sure, I know him. He’s here somewhere.” The handler looked around. “Last I saw him, he was setting up your tent.”

“Would you mind finding him while I get the dogs settled?” Josh asked.

“No problem.”

Handlers weren’t allowed to feed or water the dogs, only the mushers could, and Josh didn’t want the tired huskies to have to wait for attention while he went searching for his dad. They needed to be checked, fed, watered, and bedded for the mandatory six-hour rest period, and it all had to happen before Josh himself could get out of the cold and get some much-needed hot food and warm liquid in him.

The handler was back within a minute. “He’s asleep in your tent, and he doesn’t look too good.”

“What do you mean he doesn’t look good?”

“I don’t know,” the handler said. “He looks a little off. His breathing’s real shallow, and his lips seem a little bluish, but I suppose it could be from the cold.”

Or pneumonia, Josh thought grimly. “Did you try to wake him?”

“I did, but he just groaned and ignored me.”

“Do you know if there’s a doctor around?”

“There’s a medic tent, but I’m not sure they’re set up yet. And I think there’s an ambulance from Golden Falls staged in the parking lot.”

“I need to check on him. Do you know anything about sled repair?”

“Oh, yeah. I race myself, just the short ones.”

“Would you take a look at my left brake?” Josh said. “It felt a little soft.”

“Of course.”

“I’ve got my tools right there.” Josh pointed to his sled. “In the red box.”

“I’ve got it,” the handler said. “You go look after your dad.”

“Thanks, man. I appreciate it.”

Josh grabbed his medical kit from the sled and gave his dogs pats on the head as he jogged past them in the direction of the tent. He would have to neglect them for just a minute.

As soon as he opened the flap and knelt beside his father, it was obvious to Josh that Bruce most likely had pneumonia, all right, and fairly advanced. He was feverish and sluggish to wake up. His lips were indeed a bluish tint, and his breathing was short. Josh went through his med bag to see if he had anything that would help, but his kit was mostly geared toward injuries, not illnesses, and certainly not an illness like pneumonia which required antibiotics. The strongest medicine he had was ibuprofen, which he had Bruce take to reduce the fever.

“We need to get you back to town, Dad.”

His dad looked at him with regret and reached his hand out. Josh took it in his own.

“I’m so sorry, Jack,” his dad said. “If you only knew how sorry I am.”

Josh blinked, startled. Had it been a slip of the tongue for his dad to call him Jack just then, or was his illness causing him to become confused?

“Hey, no worries, Dad.”

“It was wrong of me,” Bruce said. “So wrong.”

He was referring to whatever had caused the rift between him and Jack all those years ago. And maybe it was unfair to take advantage of his dad’s obvious disorientation, but Josh wasn’t above it.

“What’d you do exactly, Dad?”

“I let you down,” he mumbled. “I let everyone down.”

“What did you do that let everyone down?”

Bruce opened his eyes halfway. “Can you keep on with the race?”

“No, Dad! Of course not.”

“You should.”

“The race means nothing,” Josh said. “Viktor can come stay with the dogs overnight and bring them back in the morning. I have to leave you for a minute now and go get help, okay?”

“Okay, son.” His eyes fell closed. “You know what’s right. You boys have always known right from wrong.”

“Because you taught us, Dad. Hang tight. I’ll be right back.”

Josh jogged the short distance to the parking lot where the ambulance was staged. He recognized the ambulance crew—he’d run calls with them before. “Hey, guys. I’ve got a handler—my dad—with a nasty case of what looks like pneumonia. Difficulty breathing, fever, the works. He needs to be transported.”

The other medics knew and trusted Josh’s assessment. They jumped out and readied the gurney to be pushed across the snow.

One of them said, “We’ll call it in, you lead us to the patient.”

Josh led them to the tent. No time was wasted getting Bruce loaded onto the gurney. He was semi-conscious, delirious with fever. The ride into Golden Falls would be another hour at least. The ambulance wouldn’t have antibiotics on board, only drugs and equipment for immediate life support. Supplemental oxygen would have to be enough to get Bruce to the hospital.

It had to be enough.

“Thanks, guys,” Josh said. “I’ll ride in with you, but first I’ve gotta take care of my dogs and get them set for the night. I have someone coming to pick them up in the morning. It’ll only take me a few minutes.”

It wasn’t until Josh unharnessed his lead dogs, Kodiak and Truman, that it hit home. For him, the race was over. He wouldn’t win. He wouldn’t even finish. And with the Iditarod a mere three months away, Josh didn’t know if he had time—or money—to find a new handler, train them, pay them. He could barely afford Viktor on a part-time basis as it was.

He led the dogs to their bed-down spot and got to work feeding and watering them. The dogs were alert and yet quieter than usual, sensing the dramatic difference in their leader’s mood, and ate and drank with a minimum of their usual excited frenzy. Or maybe they were just as tired as Josh was.

“You were all such good dogs today,” he said. “Even you, Scout.” He petted the dog that had run away and caused him so much trouble with Hayley. “You ran hard and good.”

One thing was certain. He wasn’t going to abandon his father like he’d abandoned Hayley.

Sure, he could continue the Akpaliki Taurtut without Bruce. He could rely on volunteer handlers, let the medics take Bruce back to Golden Falls, and go forward. Prioritize his commitments to himself and to the race. That’s what he’d done when Scout got lost, when he’d left Hayley on the trail: he’d prioritized.

It had been the wrong choice. If his father had taught him anything, it was about the difficulty of living a life full of regret.

He left his sled in its parking spot and turned toward the ambulance, where his dad waited with the medics.