20 #2
“Fuck you, Davis.” A muscle jerks in his jaw. The punch of his finger in my chest rocks me back on my boots. “I’d never ask that. I’m asking you to find this guy. Fix it.”
I take a step closer to him. Our gazes clash. “I always fix it.” My hand balls into a fist, trying to tamp down the growing shadows. The guilt. “And you goddamn know it.”
His nostrils flare. “Then do it.”
Richter’s loud boom sideswipes the rest of our conversation. “Charlie, a statement.”
“Find him,” I order Richter, swinging his way. “Fast.”
As Richter steps up to Charlie, I walk over to the side of Dead Fred’s Curve and stare down over the rocky side of the canyon. The deep crevasse, the terrifying drop. Nausea wells in my stomach.
Ruby and Charlie—they never would have made it.
I stiffen when a hand slides over my shoulder. “This is my fault,” Dakota says in a low voice. She leans in, her body warm and firm against mine. “It’s him. I know it is.”
Feeling the Arctic chill in the air, I tug on my gloves. My breath puffs white in front of my face as Keena’s sharp whines cut through the February night.
Need to walk. Need to get that fucked up image of Charlie’s truck hanging off the lip of Dead Fred’s Curve out of my mind. The cops don’t know who did it. No witnesses, no sign of the vehicle. I can’t shake the feeling that whoever did this poses a threat to my family. To Dakota.
I want to punch a hole in the side of the lodge. Break stone, break my hand, just to feel something other than the shadows building inside.
That same poisonous combination I carried home with me from the Marines is trying to rise up. Rage. Failure. Helplessness.
I step off the porch, eyeing Ruby and Charlie’s cabin. It’s lit up with light.
Sleep isn’t coming easy for any of us.
The paw on the side of my leg redirects my attention. A pleading whine comes from the dog beside me.
“Listen to me,” I tell Keena, who’s now in a full-on spin. “We’re outside to walk. There’s no biting, there’s no playing. There’s focus. There’s no damn time to roll around. You got me?”
Ears pricked to attention, Keena whines once more.
I look up as the back door slides open and Dakota steps out onto the porch, wrapped in her parka. “Late night stroll?”
“Taking Keena for a walk.”
She lifts her brow. “At midnight?”
“Never miss.”
“Mmm. So, this is the real reason you don’t sleep.” She steps toward me. “Can I come?”
I shake my head, not wanting her outside. “It’s freezing. Go inside, Dakota.”
She lifts a defiant chin, hands on her belly. “Exercise is good for the baby.”
“You don’t listen,” I grumble.
She smiles, knowing she’s won the battle. “Never have.”
Fuck. This woman could play every card in the book and I still couldn’t say no to her.
“Fifteen minutes,” I say with a sigh. I put my trapper hat on her head, my gloves on her hands, and when I’m satisfied that she’s snugly bundled, we step into the yard.
“Hold on to my arm,” I tell her. “I don’t want you slipping.”
She links her arm through mine and my cock jerks like a bobber on a string.
Keena lets out a hearty bark and bolts into the dark.
I sigh, scrubbing a hand down my face. “She makes her own rules.”
Dakota bumps her shoulder into mine. “Sounds like someone I know.”
Far off, a wolf cries. The sound is distinct from a coyote.
“Is that her?” Dakota asks, curiosity staining her voice. “The wolf?”
I stare into the blackness. “She’s close. But she’s smart and knows how to stay away from the traps.”
“Good for her,” Dakota murmurs.
“Yeah. Good for her.”
A growl from the woods has Dakota gasping. My senses snap into high alert, and I clinch my bicep to keep her closer. Check the gun on my hip. Keena’s growl slowly dies off into soft snuffling, telling me there’s no threat.
“The woods scream,” she whispers.
I chuckle. “Listen to the woods. They’re not your enemy,” I say, planting a hand firmly on the small of her back and moving her in the direction of the sound.
I point to my right. “They paint a map of where you are. Meadow Mountain and Eden is to the west. The hiking trail near the cabin leads back to the ranch.” I pivot her again, this time to the left.
Dakota’s eyes scan the darkness. “The highway is to the East. You hear the traffic now? Far off?”
She nods. “Yes.”
“Trust the land,” I say fiercely. “The ranch takes care of us, and I’ll take care of you.”
She bounces her hip against mine. “And I’ll take care of you.”
Something cracks in my chest. Sharp and undeserving. “You don’t have to make sure I’m okay, Koty.”
“Why not?” She turns and cups my face in her hands. “You do it for me. Let me in, Davis.”
“You’re already in,” I admit.
“Oh,” she whispers, her eyes momentarily going dreamy. “That makes me happy.”
“Good,” I tell her. “I like you happy.”
Keena bounds back to my side, and we resume walking. A charged silence stretches between us, until I say, “You know, the only time I let someone help me was when I first met you.” The cover of darkness is doing something idiotic to my brain, my mouth.
A chuckle shakes out of me. “I loved those cupcakes too damn much.”
“Today scared you.”
I nod. “It did.” The truth has bile rising in my throat.
She’s quiet for a long second. “I know you don’t want to hear it, but… I should go. He’ll destroy what you care about. He’s promised me that.”
“You’re not running.”
A sound of frustration. “You can’t protect a stranger over your family, Davis. I won’t let you.”
“You’re not a stranger.”
“Then what am I?” she asks.
“You’re a…friend.”
Her hitch of breath is like a knife to the heart.
Fuck, but I’m an asshole.
Heartless is easier. It lets me hide what she means to me.
“I’m not your hero,” I tell her and she casts me a sideways glance in the dark. “You’ve always been able to save yourself.” I pull her closer. “But I am your anchor. Because I will always be there when you need something to ground you.”
“I like that.” She squeezes my arm. “An anchor.”
As we walk, her arm in mine, my body hums. A reminder of how we’d talk to each other, how we’d touch each other. Effortlessly. Everything with Dakota is effortless.
Snow crunches beneath our feet as we make our way around the lodge. Dakota’s gaze lingers on the woods, the rambunctious approach of Keena, before she looks up at the full moon in the sky.
“My mom always told me dreams are like the moon. Because they are high and bright and brilliant. And sometimes, no matter how hard you try to touch a dream, to bring it down to you, you can’t.
Sometimes they’re stuck. And that’s why we needed to rope them.
So we could get those dreams come hell or high water. ”
Dakota bites her lip. Glances at me. “I used to think she was so wise…but now, I think it was probably my mom that was screaming.”
I stare up at the moon, wanting nothing more than to pull it out of the sky for her. “You’ll get your dreams back, Koty.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.” She holds her belly, her expression pensive, but not filled with the sadness I’ve come to expect.
“I think that’s part of the reason I’m so scared about being back here.
I had all these big dreams. And I want them.
But I’m unsure how to fit them here in my hometown. They feel scrambled.”
A shadow of doubt passes in her eyes. “All I wanted to do was make my father proud. And I don’t even know if I’ve done that.” Her voice catches, and I know it’s a long-buried fear she’s finally releasing.
“Do you remember what you told me the night before you left for San Antonio? You said the future is wide open. And it still is.”
Her lips part in surprise. “You remembered.”
“I remember everything about you.”
She tilts her head, and the cap slips down, making her look like some big-eyed doll. “How do you remember me?”
I chuckle at the memories. “When I remember you, I don’t see you as the woman I picked up that night at the motel.
I see you at the Roughrider Parade, hurling candy into the crowd.
I see you dropping off the best damn banana cake for Charlie, and then sweeping the front porch, even though no one asked you to.
I see you as the girl leaping into Lake Cascade in a little string bikini and screaming your fucking head off because it was too damn cold, but smiling the entire time. ”
Dakota flashes me a smile. “So, what you’re saying is I need to jump scantily clad into more lakes?”
A groan tears out of my throat. “You’re still trouble.”
Keena lurches into view, saving me and my cock from the memory of Dakota that summer. I swear as my stupid dog leaps into a pile of snow and mud. Over and over Keena rolls, her face blissed-out beyond belief.
Looks like that midnight walk is going to turn into a midnight bath.
“She gets the zoomies,” I explain to Dakota.
Her lips quirk. “The zoomies?” I clear my throatand she palms my chest. “Under all that steel, you’re just a big marshmallow.”
“Don’t tell anyone.”
“Secret’s safe with me.” A shiver rolls through her slender frame.
“Been longer than fifteen minutes,” I tell her.
“Can’t go back now. Keena’s on a roll.” She looks over to where my idiot dog is literally rolling in the snow. “Keep me warm?”
Fuck.
But instead of walking her back to the house, I wrap my arm around her shoulders and tuck her into me. Her body melts against mine. My heart pumps out a hard rhythm, matched only by the throbbing of my cock.
“Is talking in the dark under the moon our thing now?” Her voice comes out slightly breathless.
I kiss the top of her head, inhaling her honeyed scent. “I like under the moon.”
“Me too.” She beams and every bit of self-control I have disappears. This isn’t an itch. Dakota’s a need. “Same time tomorrow?”
I should say no. But I can’t.
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”