Rachel was Brianna’s best friend. He picked up. “Hello, Rachel. It’s Dixon.” Glancing at the girls, he carried the handset down the hall. “There is something I need you to do....”
She could call everyone and tell them that instead of attending the couple’s anniversary party, they’d be attending their funeral.
* * *
HER SPEEDOMETER HOVERING at ninety-five, Aubrey Hanson scanned the interstate for highway patrol cars lurking on the shoulders. She didn’t have time for a ticket. Not today. Not with the good news she had to share with her sister.
Every time she thought about it, an electric thrill ran through her, making her forget altogether the scrapes and bruises she’d gotten in Norway.
She was this close to being sponsored by ALT Outdoors, the top recreation outfitter in the U.S., possibly the world.
The timing was crucial, since her inheritance was almost gone, and the ads on her blog and podcast barely paid her rent, let alone her travel costs.
She’d been saved. She could keep doing what she loved and get paid for it. She couldn’t wait to see the sunburst of pride in Brianna’s brown eyes when she heard. She couldn’t wait to hug her sister, jump around with her, shrieking their joy to the sky. Why did Phoenix have to be almost four hundred freaking miles from L.A.?
It wouldn’t quite be real until she’d told her sister. Brianna alone knew how much this meant. With the sponsorship, Aubrey’s blog—Extreme Adventure Girl: Ordinary Girl on an Extraordinary Journey—would reach thousands more women—hell, millions—and change more lives.
Calm down. It’s not official. The test run would be at the adventure race in Utah next month. Still, she was so close she could taste the triumph.
She was especially glad to tell Brianna because of the odd talk they’d had on their mother’s birthday—they always called each other then—right before Brianna left for Tahoe and Aubrey for Norway.
Brianna’s question had come out of the blue:
You’re sure this is what you want—the blog and the travel and all?
Aubrey had sucked in a shocked breath. Of course. This is what I’ve worked for. You know that.
Aubrey’s blog and her podcast shared her trips and challenges, mostly outdoors. Her purpose was to prove women didn’t have to be amazons or athletes—or even that coordinated—to achieve difficult challenges. The secrets were training, tenacity and guts.
The women who followed her lead became empowered. They found the courage to break up with bad boyfriends, demand raises, go to graduate school, snatch stars they’d thought out of reach. Aubrey was proud to have had an impact on their lives.
I’m saying you don’t have to push so hard, Brianna continued. If you wanted to quit, have a family, go to school, whatever, you can. You’ve done more than Mom could ever have wanted.
Their mother’s bedtime stories had been tales of all the places she’d biked, hiked, climbed and kayaked before she’d had them. They’d lost her to breast cancer the summer after they graduated high school.
Where is this coming from? Aubrey had asked, her stomach bottoming out at her sister’s abrupt doubts about Aubrey’s chosen path. Brianna was her number one fan. I feel like you’re out there for Mom and for me, she’d always said. Now she wanted Aubrey to quit?
Then it hit her. Wait, it’s the money, huh? You know I’m running short. You don’t want me to feel bad if I have to quit and get a regular job, right?
I just want you to be happy.
Relieved, Aubrey had rushed on. You don’t need to worry. I might have big news when I see you. I have a meeting about a possible sponsorship.
Brianna had been excited, but after they got off the phone, Aubrey still felt a shiver of unease. That wasn’t the whole story. Her sister had sounded melancholy. She’d mentioned wanting to find their grandparents, who’d been estranged from their father, who’d been killed in a ski accident before Aubrey and Brianna were born. The girls need more family.
Brianna did have a point. Their other grandparents were gone—their grandfather at forty due to diabetes, their grandmother two years later from pneumonia.
The conversation had gnawed at Aubrey until she finally figured out what was going on with Brianna. She misses you. She’s lonely. The family the girls need more of is you.
Once she’d figured it out, Aubrey burned with the need to fix this, to make it right, to be there for her sister...and for her nieces.
How had she been so blind? Shame flared hot on her face. She’d fooled herself that the Skype chats and occasional visits had been enough.
They grow up so fast, Brianna always said. She’d been gently warning Aubrey, and Aubrey had missed it completely.
Brianna always filled Aubrey in on the cute things the twins said and did, sent Aubrey videos of them at gymnastics and martial arts—classes Aubrey had paid for. They didn’t need more classes from their aunt. They needed more time with her. It made her ache to think that Brianna had held back her feelings for so long.
Aubrey knew why. Brianna understood the pressure Aubrey was under to keep her blog fresh and interesting. To keep her advertisers, Aubrey needed thousands of people glued to her blog and downloading her podcasts. That meant constant travel, research and training. Stay fresh or die was a fact of life in the blogosphere, where it was rare to make a living wage.
Brianna had been too understanding. Aubrey would visit more, starting with this trip.
“Meow.” Her cat, Scout, offered up an opinion from her spot on the passenger seat, where she sprawled to catch the sun that shone on her spotted fur. She was a Belgian leopard cat—a blend of domestic cat and Asian leopard. Scout was brilliant and bold, and could practically read Aubrey’s mind. Because she went with Aubrey on her adventures, usually tucked into a special pocket in Aubrey’s backpack, her fans had dubbed her Scout the Adventure Cat.
“I know it won’t be easy,” she said to her doubtful cat. The ALT sponsorship would escalate her travel schedule, add promotional appearances and other obligations, but it had to be done.
Scout gave a disdainful blink of her topaz eyes.
“I’ll make it work,” she insisted. Family matters most.
Determination caused her to sit taller, drive faster. She’d set off for Phoenix right from the ALT corporate offices, stopping only to grab gifts for the girls, along with flowers, champagne and an anniversary card for Howard and Brianna, as well as a new burner phone. She’d lost hers somewhere in the snow-packed fields of northern Norway. Aubrey went through phones like tissues.
Scout didn’t look convinced. Aubrey projected far too many human emotions onto the cat, but in her mind, a good cat was worth three bad boyfriends any day.
Scout was worth double that.
Not that Aubrey had had all that many boyfriends, bad or otherwise. She had fallen in love only once. Rafael Simón was a freelance travel writer heavy into extreme sports. They’d seen each other for nearly a year. Aubrey had broken it off once it was clear they wouldn’t work out.
Aubrey rubbed her grainy, sandpapery eyes. She was bone-tired and jet-lagged from the flight from Norway.
She finished off the last of her third energy drink, tossed the empty can onto the floor of the backseat, where it rattled against the ice chest containing the champagne.
Maybe they sold caffeinated date shakes at the Date Ranch Market—the halfway mark to Phoenix. She had to stop to get the girls’ favorite treat—the special red licorice only available there—and to use the huge, sparkling