Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
Fiona couldn’t sleep.
Every time she blinked, the scene replayed. The square, the joyous hubbub, Rhett’s hand on hers, the fraction of a second when she thought he might kiss her.
And her, standing there like a fool, eyes closed, chin tilted. Fantastic work, Fiona.
He was just holding her steady after the shock of having her bag stolen. Reflex. A decent man keeping a woman from hitting the pavement. She was the one who turned it into something weird.
Mortification burned her face. She pulled the quilt higher, as if hiding could undo her foolishness.
Why would he want her? He was a literal time traveler from 1878—well-mannered, observant, the kind of man you could depend on. And she was the worn-out woman working three jobs who dragged him here because she couldn’t stand on her own two feet.
Her mouth was dry, parched. Thirst pushed her. She swung her legs over the bed and walked into the hall.
The living room television flickered faint blue across the walls. Some infomercial host smiled like her life depended on non-stick cookware.
Rhett slept on the couch, one arm across his eyes. Wyatt’s white T-shirt stretched over his chest, and she hated herself for noticing how easily he fit there.
That was the problem. He fit.
Three days and already he looked like he belonged here. He helped with Jamie’s morning routine, the dishes, and shoveling out her car. He learned so very fast. He made her life too easy. Too convenient.
She crept past him to the kitchen and filled a glass from the fridge.
“Can’t sleep?”
“Eep!” She gasped and jumped. “Just getting some water.”
“I scared you.”
“I startle easily. I thought you were asleep.”
“Are you all right?”
“Fine. Go back to sleep.”
He didn’t. She felt him watch her from the couch.
“Long day,” she said, trying for casual.
“Yeah.”
That one word almost undid her. He sounded kind. Grounded. Safe. The exact thing she couldn’t afford to need.
“Goodnight, Rhett.”
“Night, Miss Fi.”
She walked back to her room before he said anything else.
The snow on the ground outside reflected the streetlight, turning the window into a sheet of dull silver. Christmas lights blinked across the parking lot—red, green, white. On, off, on again. Mindless repetition, like her thoughts.
Jamie was getting attached too. That was the real terror. Her son, who measured trust in months, who took half a year to let his own teacher take his hand, now asked for Rhett first thing every morning. Is he awake? Can he come with us?
And she let it happen. She used him as a substitute for the help she lost, leaning on him because standing alone was a skill she never developed.
Tessa said the Christmas card worked on need. When the need disappeared, the man did too. So she had to end it. Stop leaning, stop asking, stop letting him make her feel less alone.
She could do this. She had to. Tomorrow she would handle Jamie herself. She would tell Rhett she was doing just fine now, that he did more than enough. He could go home. Jamie would be sad for a while, but better now than later. It was the responsible thing. The grown-up thing.
Fiona turned from the window and caught her reflection in the dresser mirror. The woman staring back looked pale, determined, and a little empty.
She slid under the quilt again. The sheets were cold, the space beside her colder.
Sleep didn’t come, but resolve did. Thin, fragile, held together by fear. Tomorrow she would prove she didn’t need him, even if that was the biggest lie she ever told herself.
* * *
Rhett woke up before dawn to pale light sneaking through curtains he didn’t recognize.
He lay there, listening to the heating system ticking away. This place was never truly silent. There was always something hidden whirring, clicking, breathing.
His eyes landed on his old coat hanging over a chair, worn soft from years of use, still smelling of smoke and earth.
In the pocket was the Christmas card, right where he’d left it after that strange moment in Foster bakery kitchen with Wyatt. He could still feel its warmth in his hand, see the glow running through the painting like a heartbeat.
A doorway home.
And he’d turned it down.
Why?
He chose to stay. Now the decision pressed down on him. Had he lost his only chance to go back?
He rubbed his face, feeling the stubble prick his palm. A cowboy didn’t dwell on what-ifs. If the card wanted him gone, it would pull him whether he liked it or not. Since it hadn’t, he still had work to do here.
A faint creak echoed down the hallway.
Jamie.
The kid was always up with the sun. Fiona usually was too, or at least that’s what he noticed after three mornings with them. But she needed sleep. She worked too hard.
Rhett got up and headed to the kitchen, the floor cool under his feet. Everything here felt smooth and tidy, nothing rough or dirty.
Yesterday, Wyatt had shown him how to use the stove and coffee maker. Fiona’s machine was a little different, but he’d seen her brew it before and knew where she kept the coffee, so soon the air smelled like it.
“You’re making breakfast.” Jamie stood in the doorway, his hair sticking up in all directions.
“Trying to,” Rhett replied.
The boy climbed into his chair, peeled off a paper napkin from the roll, and started folding it with perfect creases. Order calmed him. Rhett understood.
The bedroom door opened. Fiona walked out, robe tied at her waist, hair loose around her shoulders, eyes soft with sleep.
“You’re cooking?” she asked.
“Least I could do. Thought I’d be useful.”
“You didn’t have to.” She crossed her arms.
“I know.”
Fiona moved closer. “You’re using the stove.”
“Wyatt showed me how yesterday.” Rhett poured coffee into a mug, added two spoons of sugar the way she liked it, and held it out to her.
“For me?”
He nodded.
Their fingers brushed for a moment during the handoff. Every time he touched her, it jolted him like breaking a wild mustang.
They ate together at the small table. Jamie’s fork tapped his plate as he counted under his breath. Fiona watched her son, then glanced at Rhett.
He wished he could read her mind.
“Come on, Jamie,” she said, standing up. “Get dressed for school.”
Fiona went down the hall and came back wearing black pants, a white shirt, and a red vest, her hair pulled back, keys in hand. She looked nice. “I’ve got an unusual day today.”
“Oh?”
“I’m going in to help set up for the Chamber of Commerce Casino Night, but then I’ll be back here for some downtime until I have to go back for the event, so I’ll be out late. Probably until midnight.”
He had no idea what Casino Night was, but he figured it didn’t really matter. Not his business.
“Do you want me to watch Jamie for you?” he asked, hating how hopeful and needy he sounded.
“No.” She shook her head, her snowflake earrings dancing. “I’ve hired a babysitter…” She paused, but it seemed like there was more she wanted to say.
He met her gaze, searching her face. Something was going on in her head, but he had no clue what it was. “Yes?”
“I talked to Tessa this morning.” She let out a long breath.
He waited, letting her take her time.
“She and Cade need help with their horses, and they were hoping you could stay with them for a few days.”
Rhett absorbed the news. She shifted her weight, ducked her head, and moved her bag from one shoulder to the other. Nervous.
“You want me gone,” he said.
“I have to work at the movie theater over the weekend,” she said.
Not an answer to his question, but he didn’t need one. Her body language said it all.
She stepped back, edging for the door, talking fast. “Tessa and Cade will come get you this afternoon.”
“If that’s what you want.”
“We both need…” Another sigh. “Some space.”
“I never meant to crowd you, Miss Fi.”
“You didn’t…I…this isn’t about you, Rhett. I want you to know that.”
He nodded. It sure felt like it was about him.
“I’ve spent my life relying on other people.
First my parents, friends, coworkers, and now you.
Every time something goes wrong, I look for someone to hold me up instead of managing on my own.
I can’t keep doing that. Not with you here.
You deserve more than to be the next person I lean on just because I’m scared. ”
“I don’t mind if you lean on me…Fi,” he said, dropping the Miss. It felt like getting closer to her.
“But I can’t let you,” she said. “If I do, I’ll never know if I’m with you because you make me feel safe or because I want to be.”
“What’s wrong with making you feel safe?”
She confused him. Where he came from, a woman needed a man to build a life, and a man took pride in being needed. But this world wasn’t like that. Women here had their own roofs, their own jobs. They didn’t need a husband to get by.
Jamie reappeared, his backpack slung over his shoulder.
Rhett reached for the boy’s coat, but Fiona was already at the peg. “I’ve got it.”
He let go. “Right.”
Jamie wriggled into the coat. “You coming, Rhett?”
“Not today, partner.”
“Rhett has plenty to do here,” Fiona said, guiding Jamie toward the door.
The door shut behind them. The apartment felt empty. Lonely.
Rhett liked the quiet, enjoyed being alone with his thoughts, but not today. His mind kept circling around Fiona.
She thanked him for helping her, polite, nothing more. That was fine. It should be fine. But things had shifted between them since yesterday, and he felt like he was in the way.
Maybe he had already stayed too long.
He rubbed his thumb against his palm. The palm that had held her hand yesterday. He thought about the parking lot, how he almost kissed her after getting her bag back from that kid.
Was that what had changed? Was she reconsidering everything? He certainly was. If she didn’t want him, then he should go.
But leaving wasn’t that easy.
He paced the living room, unsure what to do with himself. If he wanted to go home, how would he do it? Ask the card the way Wyatt said he did?
If Fiona didn’t need him anymore, maybe the card would take him like it did with Cade.
His gaze landed on his old coat. He crossed to the chair and picked it up. What if he asked the card to take him back, and it did?
He would be home before she got back. Before he had to see her careful smile one last time and thank her for letting him know her and Jamie and 2025.
But what if the card didn’t take him?
He pulled out the Christmas card from his coat pocket. He held it up to the light. His painted image stared back at him.
His jaw set, shoulders squared, eyes cool, blue, distant. A man who looked like he had all the answers.
Rhett studied himself, the memory of that kind of certainty feeling foreign now. He had lived most of his life. The guy people turned to when they needed something fixed or had a question, but never when they needed him. That had suited him fine.
He spent his life gathering information.
How a storm built. How a horse thought. How to tend sick cattle.
How long a man could go without sleep and still stay steady on the trail.
Facts comforted him. If he understood the world, it couldn’t surprise him.
But people rarely fit neatly into rules or patterns, and he stopped trying to figure them out.
Safer to observe from a distance than risk getting hurt.
But staring at that painted version of himself, it was clear. The distance in his eyes. The stillness that wasn’t calm but emptiness. He thought keeping to himself made him strong. All it had done was make him lonely.
He turned the card over, running his thumb along the edge of his printed name. It looked official, like ownership papers. Maybe that’s what he had been all along. Claimed by the past, too careful to fit in anywhere else.
He turned the card over and read his name printed there.
Rhett Kelsey, 1878.
“Come on. You brought me here. Take me back.”
Nothing happened.
A laugh escaped him, dry and humorless. “Didn’t think so.”
He set the card on the table and stared at it, this impossible thing that turned his life upside down. All power locked in a picture, refusing to budge. Maybe it only worked for guys who knew exactly what they wanted.
He slid the card back into the coat pocket beside the wooden top Jamie liked to spin. The toy fit his hand, small and complete. Unlike everything else in this borrowed life.