THE WEEK FLEW PAST, in the way time always seemed to whenever something good was happening.
To Ethan’s surprise, and hers, Harriet turned out to be a natural skier.
Tyler commented that the yoga and Pilates had probably helped her balance and strengthened her core muscles, but Ethan thought it had more to do with the new determination she showed in everything she did.
In the relatively short time he’d known her, he’d seen a change in her. A big change.
She had a confidence now that had been lacking in the woman he’d first met in the emergency room. The woman who had stammered and fled from his apartment had been replaced by a woman who didn’t seem much inclined to flee from anything.
Now, instead of having to force herself to meet her daily challenge, she seemed to embrace it. Bring it on. It was as if all those days of doing the thing she found most hard had taught her that her limits didn’t lie where she’d originally thought. She’d stepped outside the walls she’d built for herself and discovered a whole new world.
He’d seen it that morning when Tyler had suggested she take the chair lift up the mountain and tackle a run that would have been beyond the scope of most beginners.
There had been a brief moment when she’d thought about it and then she’d nodded and stomped her way toward the lift in her rigid boots, carrying her skis.
He’d seen the concentration on her face, the frustration when she’d fallen in an inelegant heap, and the determination with which she’d scrambled upright again. It was as if that ski run had been in some way representative of the way she intended to live her life.
Watching her made him wonder when he’d last pushed himself out of his comfort zone.
Marriage, probably.
In a serious relationship that had demanded things of him, he’d been seriously out of his comfort zone.
When he’d come here with Alison, she’d insisted that he stay by her side in case she fell. It had taken a matter of hours for her to decide skiing was an expensive form of suicide, and after that she’d resented the time he spent skiing.
I don’t even get to see you when we’re on vacation.
Harriet actively encouraged him to leave her and ski with Tyler.
“It will be less embarrassing for me if you’re not standing there watching.” She let him haul her to her feet again after yet another fall. “I plan to go up and down this run until I can do it without falling.”
In the end she persuaded him to go and he and Tyler had one of the best days skiing either of them could remember. They skied Devil’s Gully, which, Ethan reflected, probably wasn’t the most sensible thing he’d ever done in his life given that most of the year his fitness was honed on machines. Pounding on a treadmill and hefting weights wasn’t the same as hurling yourself off a cliff and hurtling down a slope so steep it made your thighs scream and your gut churn. For the seven minutes of hair-raising descent, he’d definitely been out of his comfort zone.
He reached the bottom of the run in the same condition he’d started it, and counted himself lucky.
“You’re out of condition.” Tyler grinned at him. “City life is making you soft.”
Halfway through the week the rest of his family arrived. First his parents, who had booked a lodge to themselves, and then his sister, who drove up from New York with her husband and Karen, who seemed to have almost fully recovered from her ordeal.
Much to Harriet’s delight, Madi was with them.
The dog greeted Ethan with an enthusiasm he knew he didn’t deserve.
Maybe Harriet wasn’t the only one who had changed, he thought as he dropped to his haunches to play with the dog. He’d changed too.
His mother cooked and they ate in the cabin. Several times over dinner he caught his sister watching him, and knew she had questions that no doubt she wouldn’t hold back from asking.
The problem was, he didn’t have answers.
His decision to invite Harriet to join him on this trip had been an impulsive one. As it turned out, it had also been a good one. She charmed everyone with her kind, quiet nature and she especially charmed the dogs. They followed her around the resort as if she were the Pied Piper.
The grilling he’d been expecting came as he and his sister washed up.
“So—” Debra thrust a dripping plate into his hands. “Is there something you need to tell me?”
“Nothing.” He dried the plate and placed it back in the rack. “If you’re planning an interrogation, don’t waste your breath.”
“I like Harriet. No, that’s not true. I love Harriet. She is a sweet, kind, dear person. If you upset her, I will kill you.”
“Are you always this protective of your dog walkers?”
“I’ve only ever had one dog walker—” she sent him a look “—Harriet. I don’t want to ever have to replace her, so don’t make me choose because I tell you now if you do that, you’re history.”
“Nice to know where you stand on family loyalty.”
She didn’t laugh. Instead, she looked troubled. “Are you going to break her heart?”
“I hope not.”
“So what’s going on? What are your intentions? Is this about sex and a home-cooked meal? Or is it something more?”
“I don’t know what it is. I’m a man. I don’t analyze everything the way you do. But it’s more than sex and a home-cooked meal. And as for my intentions—” Ethan took the plate from her hands “—my intentions are to have the best possible vacation, and make sure she does too.”
And if he was lucky, that was going to include lots of sex.
“And what about when you get back to New York?”
Ethan stood with the plate dripping in his hands.
He hadn’t thought that far.
HARRIET CONSIDERED HERSELF to be reasonably fit, but after a week of skiing her muscles ached in places they’d never ached before. And every moment of the day had been filled with activity.
Some meals they’d eaten with his family, some with the O’Neils, and once they’d eaten in the privacy of their own cabin and then spent the rest of the evening in the hot tub watching snow layer the trees in the surrounding forest.
Tomorrow was the wedding, which meant that today was the last day and Ethan had told her he had a surprise for her.
He’d disappeared after breakfast and told her to dress in warm gear and meet him at the end of the path.
As she eased her aching limbs into her ski gear, she hoped it wasn’t anything that required her to be too athletic.
She closed the door of the cabin—no one seemed to lock any doors here—and trudged through a fresh layer of snow to the gate where Ethan was waiting.
She reached the gate and stopped, staring beyond to the trail.
“You love dogs,” Ethan said, “so I thought you’d love this.”
“This” was a sled pulled by a dog team of eight huskies. They stamped the ground and howled and barked, impatient and excited.
Harriet felt a thrill of excitement too. “This is the best thing anyone could ever have done for me.”
And the thrill she felt wasn’t all a response to the dogs.
Ethan had arranged this for her. She knew there were endless activities on offer at Snow Crystal, but he’d chosen the one he knew she’d love.
Her heart gave an uneven thud.
This wasn’t just thoughtful, it was—
What was it?
He introduced her to Dana, the young woman who owned the dog team, and then Harriet climbed into the sled beside Ethan and the dogs, on Dana’s instructions, took off.
They weaved their way along the main trail and then Dana turned off onto a narrower trail that led directly into the stillness of the snow-covered forest. The trees stretched tall, white sentries lining the path. The overnight fall of snow had added a layer of soft powder to the groomed trail and the surface sparkled under the bright sun.
The only sounds were the rhythmic panting of the dogs and the rush of the sled as it moved through the snowy wilderness.
Cocooned in blankets, Harriet watched the dogs ahead of her and marveled at their energy and how happy they seemed. That and the raw beauty of the landscape took her breath away.
When Dana finally stopped and pulled off the trail it took Harriet a moment to catch her breath.
“This is the best thing I’ve ever done in my life.”
Ethan smiled and helped her out of the sled. “Time for a little refreshment.”
They were in a clearing and she noticed something that looked like a mountain hut.
“Where are we?”
“It’s called the Chocolate Shack. And they serve great food, but they’re famous for their whipped hot chocolate.”
“Hot chocolate?” Harriet tried not to think of her thighs, which was almost impossible since she’d spent the week putting pressure on them while learning to ski.
“Trust me. It’s delicious. And this place is great. Tyler, Jackson and I used to come here all the time.”
She could understand why.
A curl of smoke rose from the chimney and a few skiers wrapped in warm layers were seated at tables outside, a slash of color against a background of white. The sky was Caribbean blue, the temperature arctic cold.
Despite that, Ethan picked a table outside. “Keep your coat zipped and you’ll be fine.”
Harriet settled herself in a chair and he was back moments later with brimming mugs topped with swirls of cream and a dusting of chocolate powder.
Dana had opted to stay with the dogs and Harriet was almost tempted to join her.
Ethan must have sensed it because he put the mug in front of her. “People ski for miles to sample Brigitte’s Belgian hot chocolate. Taste it, and you’ll see why.” He straddled the chair next to her.
Sun glinted off his hair and Harriet noticed the group of girls at the table closest to them turn and look at him.
Ignoring it, she took a sip of her drink, tasted hot velvety sweetness and moaned.
His gaze flickered to hers, then dropped to her mouth.
In that breathless moment of unspoken intimacy, she knew he wasn’t thinking about the hot chocolate. And neither was she.
He leaned forward and wiped away a drop of cream from her lips with his thumb.
The heat and the tension should have melted every last drop of snow and ice around them.
Never in her life had she felt anything like this.
She wanted to freeze time and stay in this moment forever. Blue sky and snow. The dog team waiting impatiently on the edge of the forest. Hot chocolate and Ethan.
Ethan, Ethan, Ethan.
A burst of sudden laughter from the girls at the table next to them cut through the tension and Ethan slowly pulled away and reached for his own hot chocolate.
She noticed his hand wasn’t quite steady.
His dark brows met in a frown, as if he was puzzling about something and she looked away quickly, hoping that what she felt didn’t show in her eyes.
Unlike her twin, she wasn’t good at hiding her feelings.
And right now her feelings were overwhelming.
Did he know? Had he guessed that her feelings had changed?
And what exactly were his feelings?
He’d arranged for her to go dogsledding because he’d known she’d love it beyond anything. No one had ever done anything like that for her before.
She finished her hot chocolate, wishing that they didn’t have to go back to New York. Whatever happened, it wasn’t going to be like this.
“We have another hour with the dog team.” His voice was casual. “After that I thought we’d go back to the cabin. As this is our last afternoon on our own, I thought we could relax.”
She didn’t care where she was, as long as he was there too.
“Is that an indecent suggestion?”
“Definitely.” There was a wicked gleam in his eyes. “Just doing my bit to help you earn your bad-girl credentials.”
Her heart pounded a little harder. She put her mug down and stood up. “So what are we waiting for?”
The rest of the sled ride was as idyllic as the first part and for a moment Harriet seriously considered giving up her job and coming to live here. She had to remind herself that she knew nothing about handling sled dogs, and that her life was in Manhattan.
And so was Ethan. He was there too.
And she was determined to make the most of their last day.
They barely made it through the door of the cabin before falling on each other.
Trying to remove ski gear wasn’t easy, and there was much laughter and some swearing before finally their warm outer layers hit the floor.
He pursued her up the stairs to the shelf.
“It’s still daylight.”
“Good. I want to see you.” He reached out, stripped off her underwear and tumbled her back onto the bed. “I love you naked. You should never wear clothes.”
“You want me to show up at a wedding naked? That would be a first.”
And she wasn’t sure about making love in daylight. Not because she wanted to hide her body, but because it would make it harder to hide her feelings.
He buried his mouth in her neck and then followed a trail down her body, discovering secret places. Sensation swarmed though her, and she wriggled under him but his hands and his mouth were everywhere. He paid attention to every movement she made, every quiver, every tremor, every moan and every gasp. He drew out the pleasure until she was shivering and shaking with desire and then he was inside her, filling her. He surged into her, his hand beneath her bottom as he drove into her with a slow, relentless rhythm. His forehead dropped to hers and then he kissed his way to her mouth. His breathing was unsteady, his shoulders slick with sweat. She felt the rough scrape of his jaw against the sensitive skin of her throat, and then the erotic stroke of his tongue as he teased the corner of her mouth.
He demanded everything and she gave everything, not because she’d planned it that way but because she couldn’t help herself. It wasn’t possible to give this much and still hold back.
“I love you.” The words left her lips without thought or design. She breathed the words against his neck, and then his mouth. “I love you.”
She felt the tension rip through him. Felt the sudden rigidity of his shoulders as he absorbed her words. If she’d said it at another time it might have changed everything, but they were too close to the edge for him to stop now so he simply thrust deeper, drawing her closer, kissing her and smothering the words until they came together in a rush of heated pleasure.
Afterward he gathered her to him and held her tightly.
She waited for him to speak. To say something. Anything.
But he said nothing, and any secret dream she might have had that he felt the same way, that their relationship might have changed for him too, died right there and then.
HE FELT GUILTY, leaving the bed before she was even awake.
He also felt like a coward. After what she’d said to him the night before, she deserved an answer. She’d taken a risk, put her heart out there, willingly making herself vulnerable. She deserved something in return, but he had no idea what to give her. All he knew was that he couldn’t give her what she wanted.
He trudged through the snow to the farmhouse, opened the door of the kitchen and the heat hit him, melting away the cold.
It was early, but the room was filled with delicious smells of baking.
He saw bread rolls and small pastry cases. Gingerbread Santas lay in uniform rows on the cooling rack, waiting to be iced. He was transported back to a time when he and Tyler used to tumble into the kitchen, cold and elated after a day on the slopes, and eat their way through whatever treats Elizabeth had cooked.
The food and the cozy atmosphere were as much a part of his memories of Snow Crystal as the snow and the skiing.
Elizabeth was in the process of removing something from the oven. She placed it on a rack and turned.
“Ethan! You’re up early.”
“So are you.”
“I have things to do.” She pulled off her apron and gestured to the table. “Sit down. I’ll make us a coffee.”
And suddenly he felt guilty. It was her wedding day. The last thing she needed was his problems. “I’m disturbing you. I shouldn’t have come.”
“Having a chance to catch up with you is more important than anything I’m doing now.”
She’d always been like that, he remembered. She’d always had time to listen.
“You shouldn’t be cooking on your wedding day.”
“I love to cook. I’m doing what I love. And anyway, Élise and the kitchen staff are doing most of it. So what are you doing here so early?”
“Couldn’t sleep.”
Elizabeth put a cup of coffee in front of him and then poured one for herself. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“What?”
“Whatever it is that has you wandering along frozen trails when the sun is barely up.”
“I just—I have a problem. I haven’t decided how to handle it. I thought walking might clear my head.”
“And did it?”
“Not so far.” He took a mouthful of coffee. “It’s good. I wish we had this at the hospital.”
She waited a moment and then sat down next to him, picked up the first Santa and started icing it. “How is the hospital?”
“Same as ever.”
“Do you enjoy it?”
“I guess I must, or I’d be doing something else.”
“Not necessarily. Sometimes we do things because that’s what we’ve always done. We don’t question it.” Elizabeth placed the Santa on the rack to let the icing dry and picked up the next one. “I like Harriet. I’m guessing you do too, or you wouldn’t have brought her here. Is she the reason you’re awake so early?”
He put the cup down. He remembered being nine and sitting in this kitchen telling Elizabeth about his plans to be a doctor. Being sixteen and talking about a girl he liked. He loved his parents, but there were things he’d been able to tell his godmother that he would never have been able to talk about with his family.
“I shouldn’t have brought her here. It was a mistake.”
Elizabeth stroked icing onto the next Santa. “Why was it a mistake?”
Because she’d fallen in love with him.
“By bringing her here, I sent out the wrong signals. Harriet is a home and family person. That’s what matters to her. She runs a successful business with her sister, not because she wants to conquer the world but because she loves dogs and because working with animals is something she’s good at.”
“I suspect conquering the world might be a little overrated.” Elizabeth dipped her knife in the icing again. “There isn’t one definition of success, just as there isn’t one formula that will make everyone happy. The secret is to know what you want. To know what makes you happy and do it. It seems Harriet knows that. Smart woman.”
“She is.”
“And how about you?” Elizabeth’s voice was casual. “Do you know what makes you happy?”
“I always thought it was my work that made me happy. I accepted that, which is why I haven’t had a long-term relationship since Alison.”
“What does work have to do with relationships?”
Ethan stared at her. “Everything.”
“Since when did a person have to choose between work and a relationship? Is there a law I didn’t know about? Or has Harriet issued you with an ultimatum?”
“No!” He frowned. “Harriet would never do something like that. She’s not an ultimatum kind of person.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
He thought about everything they’d shared the night before. “She told me she loves me.”
Elizabeth put the knife down. “Just to clarify, the bad news is that a warm, smart, kind, incredibly lovely woman loves you?”
He eyed her, feeling like a jerk. “It’s not as simple as it sounds. I enjoy her company. I like being with her, that’s true. But—” He picked up one of the gingerbread Santas and stared down at it. “I never should have started this, but I didn’t expect it to get so serious so fast. And now I have to find a way to unravel it without hurting her badly.”
“Why would you want to unravel it?”
“Because it has no future.”
“Are you sure about that? You don’t feel the same way? You don’t love her?”
He waited a beat. “No.”
“Are you sure? Because watching you together I thought—” Elizabeth put the iced gingerbread back on the rack. “Ignore me.”
“You’re thinking that I love her too, but I don’t. Honestly? I think there’s something missing inside me—” He put the gingerbread down untouched. “I don’t feel deeply anymore. I taught myself to switch off and detach and now I can’t switch it back on again. And Harriet deserves more than that.”
“So you’re not making this decision for you, you’re making it for her? Why don’t you let her decide what she needs?”
“I don’t want to see her hurt.”
“I’ve known you since you were a little boy and you’ve always been the same. Always first there to save anything injured or damaged.” Elizabeth reached across the table and took his hand. “I knew when I gave you your first Superman costume that you were going to try and save the world.”
“Yeah, well even Superman struggled to save the world and have a relationship. Relationships are complicated.”
“Anything that involves people is complicated. That doesn’t mean we should walk away. Have you talked to her about it?”
“No.” And he realized that while Harriet was constantly forcing herself to face challenges head-on, his own approach was less impressive.
He’d walked out.
Elizabeth smiled. “It seems to me, an honest conversation would be a good place to start.”
“You’re right.” He stood up, gave her a hug and walked out of her kitchen.
No matter how hard it was for him to say, and how hard it was for Harriet to hear, he needed to be honest.
Challenge Ethan.
HARRIET WOKE FEELING EXHAUSTED. She’d lain awake for half the night, thinking about what she’d said, and finally fallen asleep as the first fingers of light had poked their way through the trees.
The bed next to her was empty and cold, indicating that Ethan was long gone. For a moment she wondered if he’d packed and left, but then she saw his things strewn around the shelf.
She flopped back against the pillow, staring at the trees.
Way to go, Harriet. How to drive a man out into a blizzard.
He seemed to think that what he did, who he was, wasn’t compatible with love and family life. He blamed himself. Felt responsible. She disagreed, but it wasn’t what she thought that mattered.
You couldn’t make someone love you. That wasn’t how it worked. And a relationship between two people whose feelings were unevenly matched could only ever end in disaster. Feelings became a fault line, which would crack under pressure.
All her life she’d wanted love. To suddenly find it and know that it wasn’t returned was the most exquisite agony.
Was this how her father had felt? Had he lived through every day knowing that his deeply felt emotions weren’t returned? How hard must that have been to deal with?
It wasn’t an excuse, but it was an explanation.
Harriet realized there could have been any number of reasons why her father hadn’t loved her. Maybe she reminded him too much of her mother, the woman he loved so deeply and who didn’t love him back. Maybe loving deeply had hurt him so badly that he’d been afraid to love again, even a child. She didn’t know his reasons but what she did know was that his reasons had nothing to do with her. She wasn’t responsible for the fact that his feelings for her weren’t what she wanted them to be. If she could have gone back in time and spoken to the child she’d been then, she would have told her to stop trying so hard to please other people. She would have told her that life was hard enough without twisting yourself into knots trying to be someone you weren’t, or trying to live up to some ridiculous standard that you weren’t part of making.
Deciding that she was going to attend Elizabeth’s wedding even if she had to go by herself, she took a shower and dressed in the outfit she’d bought for the occasion. It was a wool dress with a high neck and narrow sleeves. It had looked good the first time she’d tried it on in the store, but now she’d had her hair cut it looked fantastic.
Ethan appeared as she was wrapping the gift she’d bought.
From the way he was dressed, it seemed that he’d been skiing.
“I’m sorry I disappeared early—” He closed the door against the blast of cold air and she smiled at him, forcing down all the emotions that tumbled inside her. Those emotions weren’t his problem. They were hers.
“It’s your vacation,” she said. “Of course you want to ski. Was it fabulous out there?”
He shrugged off his coat, his gaze fixed on her face as if he was trying to work out what was going on. “Perfect powder. And now I have less than eight minutes to get ready for the wedding.”
Which gave them no time for conversation.
And maybe that had been his plan.
Harriet looked at the snow clinging to his dark hair, the roughness of his jaw, the incredible blue of his eyes. She loved him so much it was hard to look at him and not want to tell him.
“It’s the perfect day for a wedding, and it’s not like we have far to go.” The wedding was taking place at Snow Crystal. A small wedding with family and friends in one of the barns on the resort.
It was a five-minute drive away, but they made it in good time.
Elizabeth and Tom stood side by side, hand in hand, exchanging vows they’d written themselves.
Watching them together, Harriet thought about all the time she’d wasted wishing her family could have been different. Her family would never have been any different. To build something strong, you needed solid foundations and her parents had lacked that solid foundation of love.
It didn’t matter what she felt for Ethan. It didn’t matter how much she loved him. If he didn’t return those feelings, then that was the end of it.
She wouldn’t build a future on anything less than solid foundations. She didn’t want that.
Back in the cabin, she packed her things, vowing that she’d come back to this beautiful place again one day, even though Ethan wouldn’t be there.
She’d bring Fliss, and maybe Daniel and Molly. Maybe they could book a few cabins and invite her friends Matilda and Chase. Maybe Susan would come.
And they’d definitely go dogsledding.
Her love might not have a future, but life hadn’t ended.
As she dragged her case into the living room, she saw Ethan standing there.
“Have you been waiting for me?” She let go of the case. “I’m all done. Ready whenever you are.”
His gaze held hers. “We didn’t get much of a chance to talk today.”
“It was a wonderful day. I’ve never seen two people so happy.”
“I wanted to talk about us. About last night.”
She could have pretended not to know what he meant, but what was the point of that? “It’s okay, Ethan. We don’t have to talk about it.”
“It’s not okay.” He spoke softly. “I didn’t say what you wanted me to say, I know that. You’re a wonderful person, Harriet—”
Oh no, not that!
Horror rippled through her. “Please—” She lifted her hand. “Spare us both the awkwardness. We do not have to discuss this.”
“I think we do.”
“Discussing it is a choice, and I choose not to.”
“I’m not the perfect man, Harriet. I’m so far from the perfect man.”
She stared at him, bemused. Was that what he thought? That she’d fallen in love with some false image of him? “I know you’re not perfect. How could you be? There is no such thing as perfect. Strengths and weaknesses are as much a part of being human as the bones, blood and muscle you deal with every day. And here’s the thing—I don’t want perfect, Ethan.” Oh what the hey, she might as well say it one more time. What did she have to lose that she hadn’t already lost? “I didn’t fall in love with you because I thought you were perfect. I fell in love with you for a million other reasons.”
He looked pale and tired. “I like you, Harriet. I like you a lot. I care about you.”
All good words, but not the one word she needed.
“I know. You don’t have to explain.”
“Everything has happened so fast—”
“Yes.” She was surprised by how calm she felt. “Yes, it has.”
“When we get back to New York we should spend more time together, and—”
“No.” The word came out sharper than she intended, maybe because she was panicking. Spend more time together? Not in this lifetime. “Once we’re back in Manhattan, we won’t see each other again.”
He looked bemused. “But you said—”
“I said that I love you, and I do. But you don’t love me, and I’m not going to be one of those people who stays around in the hope it will happen, losing a little part of myself every day. I won’t fight for your love, Ethan. I did that once before with my father, and I’m never doing it again. If someone can’t love me the way I am, then it’s not enough for me.”
“Wait a minute—” He looked shocked. “You’re ending it? That isn’t what I want. I still want to see you—”
“That isn’t going to work for me. If there is one thing living with my father taught me, it’s that expecting someone to love you back just because you love them, is a shortcut to misery. It took me a long time to accept that my father didn’t love me, and never would. A long time to stop trying to force myself into being a person I thought he might like more. These past weeks, with you, I’ve been me for the first time in my life. And I want to carry on being me. If we carry on seeing each other I’ll be twisting myself into knots trying to get you to love me. And you’ll be feeling guilty that you don’t, and anything that develops from there will be shaky and unreliable. I can’t do that to either of us.”
“Harriet—”
“It’s okay.” She managed a smile. “Really. You can’t choose who you love, but you can choose to be honest about it. You’ve been honest and I appreciate that. But I hope you understand when I tell you I can’t see you anymore. I’d start to want things. Hope for things. And don’t think for one moment that I regret any of this, because I don’t. I’ve learned a lot over the past few weeks. You taught me how to be more relaxed on a date. Being with you has boosted my confidence. Being with you has taught me I have so many more resources at my disposal than I thought I had.”
“Because I made you nervous. I made you stammer.”
“And because of that I learned that stammering wasn’t the end of the world. Life carries on.” And her life would carry on. And at some point, hopefully, her heart would stop feeling as if it had shattered into pieces, each one inscribed with Ethan’s name.
Knowing what she had to do, she picked up her case and walked to the door, her heart aching and her legs shaking, and realized that of all the challenges she’d set herself over the past few months, nothing came close to this one.
She was walking away from love.
That, she thought, was the biggest challenge of all.