I bolted out of the Ranger station and yanked my clothing off, tossing it inside my car. I shifted and took off at a sprint. There was nothing to do but run.

I couldn’t tell if the pain was greater in my heart or my head. If I could stop thinking about it all, would it stop hurting? If I didn’t feel anything about it, would the thoughts be so troublesome? It didn’t matter because neither the thoughts nor the feelings were going away anytime soon.

My body felt like it might explode, but I kept running, as hard and as fast as I could. I ran for a long time, then slowed to a more sustainable, long-distance pace.

I just didn’t get either of them. How long had I known the Hurst family? Something like fifteen years? And just like that, they both turned on me. Cooper pissed me off. I could see if he thought I was a player and was going to treat Kylie badly, but he didn’t know the reasons behind me being a ‘player’ to begin with. Cooper wasn’t much the problem, though. I figured we’d get over it eventually. And if not, my loyalty was to Kylie over him, anyhow.

But Kylie? Kylie who had kissed me just days ago? Who had slept with me? I certainly didn’t think she was the type of woman to be intimate with a guy she had no feelings for. So, why the rejection? How could she have slept with me, then be angry that I loved her? How does my loving her ruin everything if us sleeping together hadn’t? I couldn’t make sense of any of it.

If both of them were going to be like that, I might have to cut the whole family off. If that was how it was going to be—me fighting with Cooper and crushed by Kylie—then why stick around Glacier Bay at all?

I tried to be logical. Okay, what was my part in this? I had been known to be a player. Right. So, Cooper’s side made sense, and I could prove to him that Kylie was different. But Kylie… what had I done wrong there? I hadn’t told her I loved her sooner. That was a major mistake. I shouldn’t have slept with her so quickly and while not in a relationship. I left her while she was sleeping. Probably the biggest mistake right there.

I tried to convince myself that I really hadn’t lost them both. I couldn’t imagine my life without them, without their parents. Our families had picnics together and spent minor holidays together for years. My family knew the Hursts so well that Kylie and her friends, some years back, had joked that my dad was a DILF. It was horrifying, and of course, Cooper found out. Every so often, it still comes back to haunt me. Point is, there was history there. Long history.

So, why are they doing this to me? I couldn’t recall ever feeling so rejected in my life. My two best friends—my only close friends—had just ditched me. At the same time. And for something that should have brought us all closer together. For something neither of them should have been angry about.

I ran hard again, trying to burn off the pain, and only started to circle back when I grew hungry. I’d been gone many hours already. It was time to go home and face whatever awaited me.

As I neared the more civilized area of the park, I came across a strange scent: a human smell and footprints. It wasn’t a camping area, and there were certainly no homes around those parts; no one was allowed to live—or camp—in that section of the park. So, who was out there and why?

The mystery was the perfect sort of distraction. I followed the funky scent as long as I could. Whoever it was must have had a vehicle of some sort because his scent ended where I saw tracks. As I trailed the tracks, I finally saw the vehicle. It was smaller than a car, more like a golf cart. And the guy getting out of it was filthy. A breeze blew his scent toward me, and I gagged when it hit my nose like a train. Goddamn! This dude hasn’t showered in weeks! And that gave me my best guess: he must have been an off-grider, trying to live off the land.

In my searching, I didn’t find much: an apple core and a food wrapper, nothing major. No more trails besides the ones I’d already followed. He was probably innocent, just trying to survive, but it was my duty to report it anyhow—especially with another female tourist reported missing just the day before. That guy could’ve been involved somehow. He might have even been abducting the women, for all I knew.

I headed back to the station and went inside after dressing. I avoided Kylie’s office and went to write up my report, including as much information as I could. When I was done, I turned it in and walked by Kylie’s closed door on my way out.

Pain stabbed through my heart, filling me with an icy cold sensation. But I had something now. A lead. Something to research. Something to find an answer to. And maybe I’d be the one to figure it out. Maybe it would lead to a promotion, and I’d figure out a way to get out of the area or out of the state altogether.

And as far away from Kylie and Cooper as possible.

Or maybe I’d be a hero—the one who’d jumped in to rescue the women who went missing; the one who searched and never gave up. Maybe seeing that side of me would change things, reminding them both who I really was. Maybe then they’d both come around.