confront the person behind his back hadn’t given Ginny time to mask her expression. Everything she felt for him had been captured in that moment before she could disguise her feelings.
The knowledge of it shouldn’t have weighed so heavily on him. She had been telling him how she felt with every word and touch from the beginning.
“I was trying not to startle you, which was why I stayed back when I saw where you were standing. Matthew and Isaac were worried you might fall and wanted me to warn you about the drop-off.”
Slowly coming to stand next to him with her hands in a thick blue jean jacket, Ginny looked down at the basin. “Moses lives there,” she informed him when he made no attempt to talk to her.
“How does he keep it from flooding when it rains?”
“Dad rented an excavator.” Ginny pointed to the side of the mountain from where they were standing. “He used the rocks to divert the water to a pond on the other side of the rocks. He moved the cow pins there, too. They roam during the day, and one of the boys pins them in at night.”
“How many cows?”
“When I was little, Freddy usually kept four. Two calves, then two grown ones.”
“Saves the need for foraging for racoon and squirrels.”
Amusement shined on Ginny’s face, uncovering a deep inner beauty that, like the land she was standing on, couldn’t be appreciated from a distance.
The instinct to leave town the day his bike hadn’t worked had been right. She was getting a foothold, and he was even more afraid he would never get her out … or if he no longer was capable of succeeding.
“Yes, it does,” she teased him mischievously. “That doesn’t mean you won’t find a few in the freezers.”
His hand started to rise in a reflex so old that it was almost as natural as breathing. He jerked his hand back, but not quick enough that Ginny missed the action.
She bit her lip so hard it went bloodless before she stopped and let the blood return, like what she was trying to do to his fucking heart.
“You were going to touch me, weren’t you?” There was no longer a sign of amusement on her face.
“It was just a reflex. It doesn’t mean anything.” Lying to himself as well as to her, Reaper found a spot on the ground to sit.
“It means something to me.”
“It shouldn’t.” Picking a stick off the ground, he broke in two, then threw it away.
“You’re determined not to give me an inch, aren’t you?”
“There’s nothing in me to give anymore.” Staring out, he saw Moses’ door open and three dogs came bounding out. Coming outside himself, Ginny’s brother threw a yellow ball for the dogs to catch.
“I don’t need much, wild man.” Ginny walked toward him.
He thought she was leaving when she turned in her brother’s direction, but then he felt her sit down behind him. Her legs on each side of his, she casually raised an arm letting it hover above his shoulders. Despite how close she was, no part of her body touched his.
Feeling her so close, he was going to get up when Ginny raised a finger to point at the dogs.
“The red one is Ruby, the black lab is Cooper, and the grey and black German Shepard is Suki.”
“Pretty dogs.”
Moses quit throwing the ball for the dogs, saying something Reaper couldn’t hear from the distance. Then all three dogs sat down on the grass. Again, Moses said something, and the red dog got to her feet. Motioning the dog to his side, Moses began walking, and the dog moved with him, matching his steps.
“What’s he doing?”
“Moses trains dogs for other people. The only one I believe is not his is the German Shepherd. Moses told me he washed out from K-9 school.”
“When did you talk to him?”
“Chill, wild man. I saw him working with them this morning. I called him from here to say hello. Satisfied?”
“Just checking.”
Ginny rested her chin on his shoulder. “Are you a dog or a cat person?”
“Neither.”
“You don’t like animals?”
“Never really had the chance to have one. My mom never let us. Then, when we grew older, Viper and I stayed so busy that we didn’t think it would be fair to the dog. Which are you? Dog or cat?”
Her sad expression reminded him of what he had read in her file, but it came too late to take the question back.