The rest of the ride, I was as good as alone. Donna kept her whole body twisted toward the window, as if she wanted to jump through it, join the trash strewn on the side of the road.

As I drove, burning in her quiet contempt, I realized just what I had always liked about her. From our first conversation, she had never treated me how other people did, like an unfeeling jerk who’d already done them wrong. No, she had treated me with compassion, with an implicit belief in my goodness, even as I had pushed her away. And now? I took another glance at her turned-away, tense back.

Now, I had confirmed her worst fears, proven all the rumors correct. Tonight, she would give me access to her body, but not her heart. No, I’d lost the right to that.

I returned my gaze to the parking lot I was pulling into. I turned off the car, went over, and opened Donna’s door. She got out without a word.

By now she must have seen the huge “Elitch Gardens” sign, but she made no comment on it. Or on anything else. No, she stood there outside my car as quiet as I had ordered her to be the last time in my office.

Taking her hand in mine, I asked her, “If I order you to talk, will you?”

As I led her to the ticket booth, she gave her sarcastic answer to her shoes, a shiny black pair of ballet flats.

“Sure.”

“Good,” I said, “Do it then. Tell me about yourself.”

As I nodded to Todd—the friend of a friend who was manning the ticket booth and who, upon seeing us, got out and opened the gate—she did, rhyming off things as if they were a speech she’d memorized.

“My full name is Donna Carlene Whitburn. My favorite color is blue, though my ugly house’s door is purple. My parents and I lived and worked on our family ranch, which had been in our family for generations. We raised and sheared sheep and sold the wool. We were happy until we were kicked off our land by—”

I raised my hand.

“That’s enough. Talk about something else.”

As we approached the large enclosure of the merry-go-round, Donna continued her diatribe.

“As a result, I now work at a café in town called Blue’s, where all the furniture is red, and I spend my time serving people coffee and avoiding my boss’s advances.”

She stopped, her face reddening. Clearly, she hadn’t realized what she was saying until she’d said it. Opening the gate of the merry-go-round, I put my other hand on her arm.

“We’re here. Let’s ride?”

Donna nodded sullenly, and, taking her by the arm, I led her up to and onto the still, ornate structure. Each exquisitely sculpted horse looked prouder and nobler than the last. When I spotted the two white horses with their golden-harnessed heads tilted together, however, I knew I had found the winners.

I helped Donna up onto hers, got on mine, nodded to Todd (who had followed us from the ticket booth and would accompany us and man the rides tonight), and then held on as the merry-go-round creaked into motion.

As my horse rose and fell along with the jubilant music, out of the corner of my eye, I watched her. How the gauzy skirt of her periwinkle dress flowed around her legs. How her head swiveled, taking it all in: the picturesque scenes on the center of the merry-go-round, the pale-lit surroundings of the abandoned theme park. How, despite her best efforts, she couldn’t stop a small, pleased smile from coming onto her face.

“You’re beautiful, you know,” I said softly, and the smile fell. “You haven’t said anything about the park, the trip. Would you have rather gone on the vacation?”

Turning to face me, Donna’s eyebrows knit together, rose, and then fell.

“No. I…” She turned to face the park past me. “I’d rather have gone with a man who actually cared for me, actually cared for anything, wasn’t just using me as a pleasant distraction.”

Her gaze flicked to me before returning ahead of her. I frowned. There she went again, expecting something she wouldn’t get.

“You’re being well-paid for being used,” I said coolly, and that settled it.

As soon as the merry-go-round creaked to a halt, Donna was off it, striding out the gate and waiting, arms crossed, by the food stand that was alight and manned by Todd. As if she knew.

Nodding to Todd, I strode over to it. Stopping at its window, I held out my palm to receive the brown package. When I brought it to Donna, however, she wouldn’t even look at it.

Growling “do you want our deal to be off?” did the trick; grudgingly she unfurled the thing. Once she saw what was inside, her dark scowl became a delighted smile.

“You didn’t!”

I shrugged.

“I might have.”

Slowly, Donna turned the intricately detailed cookie in her hands, speechless before the expert swirls of water lilies and water, all done as an exact replica of Monet’s Water Lilies paintings. It had cost me over fifty dollars at a cookie boutique, but she didn’t have to know that.

Donna’s shy gaze was probing my face.

“But why?”

Another shrug, a half-smile.

“A lady’s gotta eat.”

Donna smiled her own half-smile. Taking a bite of it, her cheeks full, she declared, “You do like me—only secretly.”

I took her arm and led her to the bumper cars, because I didn’t know what to say to that.

After we had chased, attacked, and smacked into each other’s bumper cars, it was time for the next food booth. Although this one smelled of cotton candy and was even filled with great pink and blue clouds of it, I instead received an iris-patterned paper-wrapped package from the boy inside it.

Turning the purple and white package in her hands, smiling wide, Donna remarked, “You couldn’t possibly top the last one.”

As it turned out, she was wrong. After she unwrapped the package, as soon as her eager blue eyes landed on the shimmering fabric underneath, I knew I had hit gold.

“Oh, Carter,” she said, her face alight. “It’s beautiful.”

And, as she took the dress out of its wrapping, it was. Made of thousands of sparkling white sequins, it reflected light and color from all directions. It was one sea of magnificent, multicolored shimmers.

“You want me to wear this now?” Donna asked me.

No sooner did I nod then, letting out a little whoop, Donna disappeared in the direction of a nearby bathroom. As she left, Todd, still in the food booth, watched with something like envy on his young face. He was right. Right now, I was the luckiest man in the world—and a fool.

By the time Donna came back, she was a vision. A sparkling, stunning vision.

I couldn’t tell her that, however. No, all I could do as I took in the gorgeous woman before me was take her hand and lead her to the next ride—the swings. When we stopped in front of the hanging-down metal seats, Donna shot me a dubious, sidelong glance.

“You sure I should wear this here?”

In response, I kissed her cheek before getting into a swing. I couldn’t explain it to her, not really. That, as the swings creaked to life, as they soared through the clear night air, she had to wear it here, on the swings, because this was how I saw her: an impossible, sparkling beacon of light in the night—an ever-changing, ever-delighting surprise.

When we finally touched down, Donna poked me.

“You’ve sure been silent lately.”

I took her hand and squeezed it.

“I… It’s nothing. You’re just…you’re beautiful, you know.”

This time, when I said it, her eyes shone with tears. This time, I knew she just might have really heard me—the words behind my words.

We hadn’t even gotten to the grand finale yet. As we climbed onto the Ferris wheel and Todd got to work at the booth, a quick glance confirmed that Donna had no idea what was awaiting us at the top. Slowly, the Ferris wheel ascended, our hands clasped, my excitement growing as Donna peered all around us and wondered at the view.

“Carter, oh, can you see it? It’s beautiful.”

I nodded without turning. I hoped this was going to work out; I mean, I was paying the guy $5k for it after all. At a light hit on my chest, I turned to see Donna, with a peevish look on her face, gesturing out into the night.

“Carter, I mean it. Look at it—really look at it.”

All the way up here in the night air with all of Denver below me and a pretty girl holding my hand beside me, for some reason—maybe it was the pretty girl—when I turned and looked at it, I really saw it. I saw it how she must have been seeing it: the far-off buildings with their symphony of lights, this play of illumination and darkness, this incredible, man-made, yet pure sort of beauty. Donna squeezed my hand.

“It’s…”

“Beautiful,” I whispered.

Our gazes met, and, for the first time, I understood her—this easily hurt, easily awed girl with the big heart and the big blue eyes, who saw goodness and beauty everywhere she looked. The only thing to do next was to kiss her, to take this glistening beacon of a face in my hands and press my lips to hers and let our bodies do the talking.

I had forgotten about the helicopter until I heard the whirring. Pulling away and seeing it, Donna screamed. Laughing, I clasped her hands.

“It’s mine,” I said, and, her eyes still bulging out of her head, Donna nodded.

As the helicopter lowered beside us and the pilot, Steve, waved, I helped Donna out of her lap bar.

“Be careful,” I cautioned her.

I held her by the waist until she’d stepped into the helicopter. Then, it was my turn. As I stepped from the Ferris wheel compartment to the helicopter’s ladder, grabbing onto Donna’s hand for support, it occurred to me how precarious this all was. How, with one push of a certain billionaire, Donna could end all her and the other protestors’ problems for good. But the next thing I knew, I was inside the whirring thing, which was lifting off, and in the arms of the woman who could’ve ended me. She was laughing.

“You’re crazy.”

Grabbing her neck, I said, “You like it.”

Her kiss on my lips seemed to indicate that she did.

For the ride to the forest, our hands picked up where they’d left off, mine snaking over the sequined dress to that ass I loved so well, while hers unbuttoned the first button on my shirt and then the second. We continued feeling each other up, shedding clothes until the helicopter started descending. Frantically, we scrambled back into our clothes just as it finally touched down.

“You’re crazy,” I told Donna, and she laughed.

Peering his head around, Steve asked us, “You two all right?”

I nodded, taking Donna’s arm so I could help her step down onto the ground.

“We sure are. Thanks, Steve.”

Climbing back into the cockpit, Steve nodded and gave us another wave.

“You two enjoy yourselves,” he said, and then the helicopter was roaring once again, lifting up, and he was gone.

Donna took a look around, squinting in the dark at the black of the nearby trees.

“Where are w—” she asked, falling silent as I pressed a finger to her lips.

“Fewer questions, fewer clothes.”

I unzipped her dress, and Donna frowned.

“What—you don’t want me to talk again?”

I shook my head.

“No. I like it when you talk. It’s just now, here”—I took hold of her dress—“I want to fuck you.”

Then, with one motion, her dress was off and she was revealed to be naked underneath, a cheeky little surprise for me, this thin bare body amid these wide trunks of trees.

Donna was working away at my buttons, murmuring, “It’s only fair…”

Grabbing her by the neck, I growled, “It’s not about being fair.”

After she’d scrambled to undo more shirt buttons and I’d scrambled out of my pants and slid them and my boxers off, pressing myself into her, I declared, “It’s about giving me what I want.”

Her mouth a pouty ‘O’, her hands finally ripping off my shirt, she asked, “And what do you want?”

Shoving her to the ground and flipping her around, I let my loud spank be my answer.

Stroking her ass cheeks, I said, “I want to fuck your ass.”

As I jerked my fingers inside her pussy, Donna let out a low moan.

“I don’t know. I’ve never done that before.”

I consoled her. “I know. I’ve got lube. It’ll be fine. We’ll only go as far as you want to.”

He body was already trembling with anticipation. I squirted some lube onto her tight hole and rubbed it in, then whispered in her ear, “Only problem is, I think you’re going to want to.”

Indeed, as my two fingers twirled inside Donna and another began stroking and playing with her ass, Donna pushed her ass up and out, asking for it. Obliging her, I began easing in my finger, just the tip at first as she moaned and shook with pleasure.

“What’s that?” I asked. “You like?”

Her letting out an “uhh” and shoving her ass out farther was her response. So, farther in her ass my finger slid, while faster in her pussy my other fingers pumped. God, she was so wet, and I was so hard…

Soon, she was shoving her ass out onto my finger while I burrowed it in deeper. Once it was in as far as it’d go, it was time to try something bigger. As soon as I slid out my fingers, Donna knew.

“Oh, I don’t know, Carter,” she said, while simultaneously shoving her ass up.

Pulling her head back by the hair, I positioned my cock at her asshole, and then paused.

“What’s that? You want me to stop?”

Her whole ass shaking, Donna could only shove her ass up farther. Rocking back and forth, I eased the tip of my dick in, and she groaned.

“What’s that? I shouldn’t go any further?”

Another groan and shoving up of that beautiful, ivory-white ass. Grasping her tits now, I slid in even farther, causing her to moan even louder. Easing myself out a little, I said, “Oh babe, you want me to stop?”

In response, Donna shoved her ass back and I rocked my dick forward at the same time. Now, pleasure was rocketing through both of us and Donna was howling like I’d never heard her before as I fucked her tight little ass and played with her clit.

I went back and forth, in and out, harder and deeper while she came, hard, her whole body quivering with her yelled-out nirvana of an orgasm while I released my own inside her.

Flopped on the grass, we lay there for minutes, maybe hours. Her body was warm atop mine, wrapped in my arms. I didn’t want to open my eyes, to have this pleasant calm end, but finally, I did. Donna was looking at the sky. Her face was serene, enrapt, her gaze locked on the night sky. But not just any night sky. This night sky’s stars were clearer than I’d ever seen them before. They were spectacular.

“You see it, too,” she said softly, catching my eye.

I nodded. For the second time that night, I was truly seeing things as they were, as if I had Donna’s eyes, her powers of perceiving beauty.

“It’s not like that in the city,” I said.

Turning to me, she nodded.

She didn’t say it, and I was glad. That this—the nature, the view of the stars, the deliciously clear air, all of it—we were destroying it. And not even just the impersonal, collective “we” of humans with our pollution and consumption, but me. I was destroying it, me personally, my company, RayGen.

This was precisely what we were proposing to destroy, to callously bulldoze through to make way for a metal snake that would carry oil to feed our addiction for “more”: more fuel, more cars, more products. I wasn’t part of the problem; I was the problem.

I glanced over at Donna, but she had closed her eyes, the ghost of a smile on her face still visible in the moonlight.

Funny, this realization. This moment now was so poignant, so heartrending, I could’ve sworn she had planned it to get me onto her earth-loving, pipeline-hating side, to change my mind. I could’ve sworn the one to blame was the pretty girl with her eyes closed. But the joke was on me, because the longer I took in the innocent, guileless face before me, the more I realized that the only one to blame was the one who had his arms around the pretty girl.