She knew it was stupid, and if someone had asked what she was doing she would have lied. Well, no. If most people had asked, she would have lied. But she was pretty sure she would have told the truth to Josh. After all, it was his forest. And the way he maintained the trail suggested that maybe he wasn’t immune to the elf-wishing himself. The trees were trimmed back far enough that it was comfortable to ride, but the forest wasn’t denuded and sanitized like some of the parks Ashley was used to back home. There were moss-covered logs for the horses to step over, loose rocks and roots on the trail itself—obstacles that probably should have been cleared in the name of safety, but that made it all feel much more organic and magical when they were left behind. They made it seem like Josh wanted visitors to his forest to step carefully, avoiding the obstacles, the fungi . . . the elves? She didn’t notice the horses in front of her coming to a halt and probably would have ridden Rocky right into Sunny’s yellow butt if the horse hadn’t hesitated enough for her to start paying attention.
