whirled toward his voice, turning on her light again. He squinted so she lowered it, swiping at the tears on her cheeks, embarrassed to have been caught crying over a fox den. Embarrassed to have been caught crying at all. How had he snuck up on her like that anyway?
“She came back,” Harper said quietly. She inclined her head toward the den. “The mother.”
He paused for a moment. “Good.”
She shivered again, and he nodded toward her truck. “Bring your gun and sleep inside.” And with that, he turned, heading back to his house, but leaving the door open. It looked warm in there—warm and lit by candlelight. Cozy.
She grabbed the blanket from the truck, pressing her lips together as she considered the rifle. It felt rude to take it inside when he was offering her a warm place to sleep, even though he didn’t have to. But . . . well, he was still a stranger, and a wildcat, and a person of interest in a murder investigation. Not to mention, lots of bad things in this world had happened to girls because they were worried about appearing rude. She grabbed the weapon and walked up his steps and through his door, closing it behind her.
“Thank you. I, um . . . you won’t even know I’m here.”
He looked confused. “I’ll know you’re here.”
“I just mean, I won’t be any bother.” She considered the three empty beds, but none of them had mattresses, and sleeping on bare metal springs didn’t seem comfortable at all, and so she sat on the floor, leaning against the wall and laying her gun on the floor next to her. She wrapped herself in the blanket again and let out a pretend yawn so he’d know she was all taken care of. “This is very nice of you,” she said. “If I can repay your kindness in some way, let me know.”
She swore she saw his lips tilt slightly, but then he turned away, lying on his own bed, his back to her. “If you could try not to shoot me in my sleep, that would be good,” he said without turning, and she swore she heard a smile in his voice. Was he joking with her? The idea shocked her, but it also caused a burst of pleasure too.
“I promise I won’t,” she said, and she could hear the smile in her own voice before she realized there was one on her lips.
His shoulder moved slightly but he didn’t answer, and after a moment she closed her eyes, reveling in the warmth enveloping her, her shivering ceasing completely.
She was comfortable, but she knew she wouldn’t sleep. Harper had trouble sleeping in general, much less sitting against a stranger’s wall with said stranger sleeping twenty feet from her. Yet, despite the cabin and its lack of refinement, she felt comfortable. Was it the fire? The man? The deep, enfolding silence of the forest surrounding them? Or was it that she felt peace? Always together, never apart.
No, she wouldn’t sleep, but thank God she was warm. Content. And there were only a handful of hours until dawn.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Ribbons of powder. Puffs of wind. Both dancing across the frosty field. Jak stepped through it, moving around the buried rocks and hidden holes he knew by memory.
Driscoll’s house came into view, smoke trailing from the chimney, and Jak picked up his pace, moving quickly through the falling snow. He didn’t like visiting Driscoll. He did it as little as possible, but there were some things he didn’t want to do without, now that winter had arrived.
Especially matches.
He could cook now but chose not to. When he did that, he couldn’t taste the life in it anymore. He remembered his baka had talked about vitamins and minerals, and maybe those were the same thing. Now that words were hardly ever in his mouth, Jak had learned that pictures in his head explained things better. He saw vitamins and minerals like tiny grains of life that flowed through the living being and when you ate them, you could taste all the things that animal had experienced. Its life flowed into you and in that way, never really stopped living. Life went on and on and on. Never stopping.
But he didn’t want to go back to a winter without the warmth of fire, even though he now had a roof over his head, a blanket, and Pup’s body heat. Warmth was worth the walk—and worth a few minutes with Driscoll. Jak