I’ve spent the past several years with the outdoors as my office, but the beauty of the natural world never fails to take my breath away, and this part of New Zealand is over-the-top stunning. The blue-green water flows in a peaceful ribbon through farmland and gently rolling hills, under high steel bridges and between rock formations sharply eroded on both sides, hinting at the violence of the current when the river is high. Trees on fire with orange and red leaves bend down to kiss the surface of the water and the cool breeze carries a clean mineral scent. Just pulling in a breath is an exercise in bliss, and for the first time in years I want for absolutely nothing.
I look over at Sam as we paddle in silence behind our guide—a burly man named Blake with a bright red beard and a warm smile who looks like life on the river is good to him—and realize our dream has finally come true. I have everything I’ve wanted since I was thirteen years old. I have Sam with me all the time, the health and freedom to do the kind of work I love, and the confidence that we’re going to go all the way.
I can see our future stretching out ahead of us, filled with adventure, love, and maybe someday, not too terribly long from now, a couple of kids in the front of our kayaks. After the stress of helping Caitlin raise Ray, Sean, and Emmie when I was younger, I used to think I didn’t want kids, but I want everything with Sam. I want to make plans and babies and memories as beautiful as this one for the rest of our lives.
She smiles back at me, a wide, excited smile that makes me certain she’s read my mind, but we don’t say a word. We don’t need to.
Everything I need to know is right there in her blue eyes, shining with hope and happiness.
Even when we stop at the hot springs, changing into our swimsuits behind some rocks before easing into the water of our own private pool a good ten yards away from the family and our guide, we don’t talk much.
Sometimes you need words, but sometimes words just distract from the experience. Sitting in the hot water, with my arm around Sam as we look up at the blue sky and the fall leaves going out in a blaze of glory, I know words couldn’t make this any better.
This day is beyond words, beyond perfect, so magical I can’t even be sad when it’s over and we’re pulling our kayaks out of the water three hours after we went in.
I just take Sam’s hand and follow her into the roadside café up the hill from the river, knowing I’ll never forget a single detail of this morning. We get settled in a corner booth as far from the television blaring in the corner as we can, and warm up while our guide brings cocoa to our table.
“Two cocoas, extra marshmallows,” he says, setting the cracked mugs down in front of us. “Feel free to bring it outside if you can’t hear yourself think. Rick’s a hell of a guy, but the man’s going deaf. The news gets louder every time we come in.”
Sam and I thank him and he heads out the door, joining another burly man at the ashtray outside to have a smoke with his coffee.
“Let’s do it again,” Sam says with a happy sigh when we’re alone.
“We will,” I promise, taking her hand beneath the table. “At least once before we go.”
“Or maybe we’ll never go,” she says, smiling. “Maybe we’ll decide to become official Kiwis and have little Kiwi…”
She trails off, smile fading and eyes going wide as she stares at something across the room.
I turn to see what’s captured her attention, but she grabs my arm and surges to her feet so fast her chair legs squeal across the tile floor.
“Let’s go,” she says. “Let’s wait outside for the van.”
I’m about to ask what’s wrong, but before I can get the words out I hear the news anchor mention a scandal at Sterling University in Los Angeles.
“That’s your school,” I say, frowning up at Sam.
“Come on, Danny,” she says, desperation in her voice. “Please, let’s go.”
But it’s too late, I’ve already turned to face the television screen, just in time to see her stepbrother Alec’s picture in the upper right-hand corner.
There are shots of five college-age guys floating in the air beside the blond anchorwoman’s face, but my eyes are drawn to Alec immediately. I’ve looked into that smug pretty boy face enough across the dinner table that it is intimately familiar, though I’ve never seen him looking as shaken up as he does in that picture.
“Danny, I need to go,” Sam says, making it hard to concentrate on the story, but the television is turned up loud enough that I hear the phrase “rape trial” and “suicide” with crystal clarity.
“What the hell, Sam?” I say, turning back to the screen. “Is this why you’ve—”
Sam’s picture appears in the middle of my sentence, stealing the words out of my mouth, and making me feel like I’ve been punched in the stomach.
It’s a shot of her from some college party. She’s got a red solo cup in her hand and she’s laughing so hard her smile is a mile wide. She looks like she doesn’t have a care in the world, which I’m sure is part of the reason the news station chose that picture.
It makes for more interesting news to paint the girl who’s fled the country to escape testifying in a rape trial as a party girl who couldn’t care less that one of her classmates is dead.
“Fuck,” I mutter beneath my breath as the segment ends with a sound bite from the father of one of the accused boys, some B list celebrity who insists his son will be proven innocent once the truth comes out.
I have no idea what the truth is, but I know my decision to let Sam keep her secrets can’t stand. She can’t run away from this because she doesn’t want to testify against Alec, or whatever else is going through her head. If she ignores a subpoena, she could go to jail.
Which is why you’re in New Zealand right now, dumbass.
I turn back to Sam with my brows furrowed, determined to find out if this is why she dragged me halfway across the world, but her seat is empty. Sometime in the thirty seconds I was sucked into the news, she must have made good on her threat and went outside. I stand, searching the café just in case, but there’s no one here but the family we kayaked with and the old man running the joint who’s still glued to the news.
I hurry outside, but there’s no sign of Sam in the parking lot, either.
“You looking for your girl?” Blake asks. For the first time today he isn’t smiling.
“Yeah, you seen her?”
He nods and points toward the road. “She got into a truck with some fella like ten seconds ago. I told her the van was almost here, but…she didn’t seem to hear me.”
I curse as I run a hand through my hair, my pulse racing.
Where the fuck is she going? And what did she see in L.A. that has her so messed up she’s willing to run away and leave me in the middle of a foreign country without so much as a “see you later.”
“Did you see which direction the truck went?” I ask, prepared to run after her if that’s my only option.
Blake points back the way we came. “Toward Taupo. Sit up front with me, bro and we’ll look for it on the way back. I didn’t like the look of the driver.”
I’m about to tell him thanks, but no thanks, that I can’t wait even a few minutes to go after her, when a van with the Waikato River Tours logo painted on the side pulls into the parking lot.