Chapter 9
A foot of snow drops in the cold of the night, and it’s still falling when my alarm beeps softly, telling me it’s time to get up.
Guy hasn’t been here long enough to realize the lane into the property will be unpassable, and showing up late for work on the second day of a new job isn’t the best look. I dress as quietly as I can, tiptoeing down the darkened stairs and avoiding the boards where I know they creak. The living room is chilly this early in the morning, and the man-size lump on the couch has both blankets piled up on top of him. If he’s been getting cold at night, he hasn’t mentioned it.
Something tells me that cold or not, Guy will never mention it.
He’s just so different from my ex. Micah worked hard, but he never had a problem telling me or anyone else what he was thinking. If he’d spent a cold night on the couch, Micah would have been grumbling and blustery about it to anyone within earshot. I wonder if Guy isn’t a complainer or if things have been so hard, he doesn’t even register an uncomfortable night on the couch. Either way, I need to make sure to add extra wood to the fireplace woodstove, because Emma and I might be toasty warm upstairs, but clearly Guy isn’t.
The real cold hits me as I step into the mudroom, my sock-covered feet protesting the icy concrete. I pull on a pair of coveralls, thick fleece-lined work gloves, and my warmest hat before stuffing my feet into my work boots. Then I glance at the thermometer hanging outside the window and grimace at six degrees Fahrenheit. A single-digit morning is never a great way to start the day, and I add a heavy winter jacket on top of my coveralls.
In this getup, I always feel like a kid in too-thick winter clothing, straight out of A Christmas Story . I head to an old, repurposed, and somewhat dilapidated wooden cattle shed tucked behind the cattle pen; it’s now my tool shed. My great-grandparents built this with their own hands, and restoring the shed to its former glory is on my never-ending list of things I’d love to get done someday.
“Someday but not today,” I murmur as I fiddle with my dad’s old tractor. “Come on, baby. Be nice to me this morning.” I sweet-talk it until Monster rumbles to life. The thing is so beat up, Micah didn’t want the tractor added to the list of assets. Or maybe even a painful divorce wasn’t enough to make him take my dad’s pride and joy away from me. The metal seat is cold enough to feel through the clothing I’m wearing, so I stick an old blanket beneath me before I drive it out of the shed.
As I pass by the house, I see a light in the kitchen, and I frown because Guy shouldn’t be up yet. Waking up Micah always made him crabby… No. I’m not going to keep thinking about my ex. I’m not going to assume Guy’s going to react the same ways as Micah did. And if he does, well, then his butt can clear the road of snow next time.
I hate that I’m fighting with fictional versions of two husbands in my head. Not only is this unhealthy and will leave me stressed and anxious, it isn’t even fair.
“Focus on what’s in front of you,” I tell myself for the hundredth time this month, a mantra that helps…until it’s late at night and there’s nothing else in front of me to focus on except a book I don’t want to read and a tub in need of scrubbing.
Clearing the entire lane of snow isn’t necessary as long as there’s room for one vehicle to get in and out. But I’m already here, so I scrape the drive to the main road and back, then make a sweep past the barn and the garage. I feed the horses and use Monster to dump a new round bale of hay into the cattle pen. All the water trough and water bucket heaters are working, and I leave Lulu, the donkeys, and Legs inside their stalls. With wind like today, the windchill must be in the negatives, so they get to spend the day snug in the barn where it’s warmer.
The cattle don’t have the same kind of barn the horses do, but they’re sheltered under their lean-tos. Cattle are tough, and as long as they’re fed, dry, and out of the wind, they can handle the cold better than the rest of us can. Despite my clothing, I’m chilled through, and the cabin feels wonderfully warm when I finish my chores and go inside.
Guy’s built up the fire, bless the man.
There’s a bowl of oatmeal with fresh berries waiting for me on the kitchen island, covered with a paper towel so it doesn’t get cold. Guy’s waiting for me too, dressed for work and finishing his own breakfast.
“Thanks for making it warmer in here,” I tell him as I head to the sink to wash my hands. The warm water stings my icy fingers, so I turn the temperature colder.
“Sure. I figured you’d be an ice cube about now. You didn’t have to do that, by the way.”
“Unless you wanted to take the ATV into town, it’s a little necessary.” I shrug, turning off the water. “It’s just a part of rural living. We don’t get as much snow as you Montana boys, but it adds up.”
“This Montana boy would have done it for you,” Guy says sweetly. “Anything you need around here, Sienna, just let me know. This whole husband-for-hire gig has been the easiest job I’ve taken.”
“Yes, but the benefits are crap,” I joke as I dry off my hands and add lotion to them.
“Not from where I’m standing,” he murmurs as he gets up.
Did he just flirt with me? Probably not. He’s probably just being appreciative of having a place other than the extended stay in town. My stomach growls, and I gratefully take my bowl of oatmeal. “Mmm, this smells good. I’m starting to get spoiled with all the cooking.”
“Says the woman who’s been out since four plowing the drive.”
Guy gazes down at me, and those eyes are far too blue for this early in the morning. I’m not supposed to be lost in my fake-but-not-fake husband’s eyes before dawn, or at any time really, and we’re standing too close. I start to move right as he tries to give me space by stepping the same way. We bump arms, which shouldn’t be a big deal, except those are really nice arms.
I exhale a small laugh. “I forgot I like dancing.”
“Me too.”
Sticking my face in a bowl of oatmeal is easier than meeting his warm gaze. A few bites in, I see him start to pack his lunch, so I get up and pull out a loaf of bread, moving the box of off-brand protein bars out of his reach.
“Nope, I can’t do it. These look awful.”
“They’re not that bad.” Guy flashes me a grin. “I bought them, so I need to eat them.”
“If you want to feast on them when I’m out with Jess, go for it. But people know me in this town, and I have a reputation to maintain.”
“Jess?” His tone is accepting, but I know a silent question when I don’t hear one.
“Jess is my best friend. They and I have been thick as thieves since grade school. They want to meet you and Emma.”
Guy smiles. “Sure, if they’re important to you, I’d love to meet them.”
The fact that he uses Jess’s preferred pronouns is definitely important to me, and I find myself wanting to hug him. Instead, I pack his lunch, repeatedly stealing out the protein bar Guy keeps teasingly putting back in. Then I look around because someone has been missing from our morning. “Where’s Emma? Doesn’t she want breakfast?”
“She’s still in bed for a little longer. Em’s having a slow morning,” he tells me. “I think she’s tired from being out in the cold yesterday.”
“Oh no.” I freeze. I’d had so much fun with her yesterday, we’d all decided for her to try staying with me again today. Did I mess up letting her play in the barn for so long?
Guy must have read my mind because he puts a hand on my shoulder, squeezing it. “You’re doing great, Sienna, she just gets tired. It’s part of this. Some days are better than others.”
“We can stay in today,” I tell him. “Keep it low-key.”
“Emma’s a tough cookie, and there have been a lot of times we were on jobsites when she was having a tired day. Just keep her warm and make a bed in the truck if you need to go work outside. She’ll be good for you.”
I nod, thinking about what we can do together since we’ll be inside all day. Then I hand him his lunch, stealing the protein bar out one more time. “Over my dead body, mister. You’re not eating chalk when Emma and I have leftover veggie burgers.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he says, eyes dancing with humor. “Thanks, Sienna.”
“Yep. Umm… Have a good day?”
“You too.”
I can tell we’re both in a “maybe hug” zone because he’s lingering outside my personal space, and I keep edging into his.
“Don’t judge me,” I finally say, caving and wrapping my arms around his waist.
Guy’s low, warm laugh is the best part of an already nice morning. Even better are the arms he gently wraps around my upper back, snugging me in close. “Safe space,” he promises. “I’m a judgment-free zone.”
“I keep forgetting how tall you are,” I tell his rib cage. “Okay, go. Be all construction-y.”
He grins at me and heads out the door. For a bitterly cold day, the man certainly has a spring in his step.
The feeling isn’t mutual, because when I go into Emma’s room to wake her at the time Guy wanted, I have to coax her into getting up and dressed. Emma is definitely having a tired day. Despite Guy’s assurances, I’m not sure today counts as being “good” for me. She absolutely refuses to eat breakfast, and she pitches a complete fit when I can’t give her more water. She doesn’t want ice chips or a mouth swab. All suggestions of fun things we can do are met with a shrill no, and when she wants to play outside, she doesn’t take being told it’s too cold very well. More than once, Barley and I glance at each other, wondering where the sweet child of yesterday has disappeared to.
Every time Barley walks up to her, she marches away, until I tell him to go lie down on his orthopedic cushion in the corner. Then I join Emma on the bottom stair step, where she’s glaring down at her toys and knocking them together with a little extra force. “Emma? You don’t seem very happy today. Do you want to talk about it?”
“No.”
That’s fair. When I’m having a crap day, I rarely want to talk about it either.
“Is there something you would like to do? We could watch a Christmas movie.”
“No. When’s Daddy coming home?”
“He just left for work, sweetie. He’s not going to be back until this evening.”
At which point I learn this is the wrong thing to say. She doesn’t start to cry; Emma full on bawls . No matter how I try to soothe her, it doesn’t work, and Barley—who never breaks a command when he’s asked to do something—breaks one now. He scoots over on the floor on his belly, whining and trying to get her to let him snuggle her. But Emma doesn’t want either of us, that’s clear.
I send a text to Guy, asking if he’s free for a call, because I don’t want to alarm him thinking it’s an emergency by calling unexpectedly. I don’t even have to wait for a reply text, because within two minutes, his name pops up on my phone on a video call.
“Everything okay?” Guy’s face takes up the bulk of the screen, but I can see the jobsite and the other workers behind him. Whatever he’s been doing this morning, he’s already covered in sawdust, and he’s wearing the hard hat usually tucked in his truck’s back seat. Guy’s cheeks and nose are ruddy from the cold.
“I think Emma needs to see your face,” I hedge, feeling guilty because he’s clearly busy, and I know how construction sites are run. If you’re wearing a hard hat or there’s heavy equipment moving, OSHA rules are clear. No phones. He’s liable to get chewed out by the foreman for talking on the phone on-site instead of stepping away.
“She’s having a tough day,” I add, “but we’ll keep it quick.”
“I’ll drag up on this job right now if I have to,” Guy tells me in a firm voice. He pulls off his hard hat and moves so his back is against the white boxy office trailer I’d just seen in the background. “Emma comes first.”
“She really wants to play outside, but it’s so cold.” I let Guy know the issue before handing over the phone to Emma.
“Yeah, it’s too cold. Hey there, baby girl.” Guy’s face brightens as he sees her. “Are you having fun with Sienna?”
“ No . I want to be with you.”
“Emma, we’re going to have a real talk right now, okay? You can be at work with me, which will mean staying in the truck the rest of the day, or you can spend the day with Sienna, where Barley is and all your toys and movies are. It’ll be a lot more fun, and if you choose to be with me, there’s no changing your mind.”
Emma hits her toys together again but with less force. “What if you came back here instead?” she tries.
“I wish I could, but I’ve got to work. That’s what parents do.”
She starts crying and doesn’t answer him, despite Guy making a comforting noise over the phone.
“Sienna, can I talk to you privately for a minute?”
“Of course.” I head up the stairs and take the phone into my bedroom, then into the bathroom, where Emma can’t hear. A sudden smile flashes across his face. “What?”
“Nothing. I just never took you as the type to have an inappropriately graphic rubber ducky shower curtain.”
“That’s the beauty of being divorced. You’re not subjected to the whims of someone else.” I try to stay serious, then I find myself grinning too. “Okay, I’d had way too much wine that night and it seemed funny. Once it arrived in the mail, it would have signified failure to send it back.”
“Onward and upward?”
“Always.”
“Sienna, you’ve been absolutely amazing from the first moment I met you. But Emma’s a lot some days. You don’t have to shoulder this. She used to be better at handling disappointments, but the sicker she gets, the harder it is on her.” The expression on his face tightens. “I can come home. The foreman here is a nice guy, and I think he’ll understand.”
I hesitate, weighing what Emma needs but also what he and I need. The animals have been fed, and technically, I’m good until tonight’s feeding. Unless something unexpected happens, I can catch up this weekend on any work I miss today.
“Is there a way she can get what she wants but not be an Emma popsicle?” I ask.
“Unless you can suddenly make outside not have a windchill of negative ten, I think we’re stuck.”
Well, now that he mentions it…
“I have an idea. If worse comes to worst, I’ll drive her into the site so she can see you, but let me see if I can make the windchill disappear for a while.”
“You’re a Christmas miracle, Sienna.” Guy flashes me a sexy smile, and he’s obviously joking, but for a moment, he holds my eyes a little longer than necessary. “You call me if you need anything, okay? You two come first.”
His words linger as I head back down the stairs, where Emma has her head resting on top of Barley’s, her little arms around his neck. He probably just misspoke when he included me, but Emma absolutely comes first for Guy and for me too. Until this little girl gets her kidney, she’s priority number one.
I take her hand and smile down at her. “Come on, sugar. You and I are going ice-skating.”
***
Sometimes I wake up crying.
Even after good days, when I get to indoor ice-skate in circles with a giggling child in my arms, listening to her tell me about all her favorite things. And good nights, when I spend the evening with help finishing my chores—a blessing if there ever was one for an overworked rancher—and I learn a low-salt diet can be delicious in the hands of a man who likes to cook. When I don’t feel like just an extra body in the room when we read Emma a bedtime Christmas story but maybe a real friend to them. Even though I go to bed wondering exactly what kind of muscly things are happening in my kitchen and fall asleep with a little smile on my face…it doesn’t change the fact that sometimes I just wake up sobbing.
This happens to me more than I’d like to admit, and even in the silence and the darkness of my empty bedroom, it’s humiliating. Sometimes it’s because of Micah, sometimes my dad. Even though it’s been years, sometimes the tears on my face are because of my mom. I usually don’t remember my dreams, so I never know exactly what triggers the grief, I just wake up in it, utterly overwhelmed.
“Sienna?”
A soft tap at my door makes me sit up, rapidly scrubbing at the tears on my face. Guy’s voice is husky with sleep, unsurprising since it’s three in the morning.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m good. I just had a bad dream. Sorry I woke you.”
“You didn’t. I was checking on Emma,” Guy says quietly through the door. He hesitates and then asks again, “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah, gimme a sec.”
One more swipe at my eyes and I get up, glancing down at my pajamas to make sure I’m actually wearing them tonight. Guy’s leaning against the doorframe when I open the door, and for once, he doesn’t step backward to give me more room. Instead, he gazes down at me, brow furrowed. His eyes sweep my face and then drop down to the wet spots on my tank top where I dried off my face.
“Bad dream, huh?” he says softly. “I get those too.”
“You have to be up for work in two hours,” I remind him. I tilt my head because I suddenly have a feeling. “You weren’t just checking on Emma, were you?”
“We’re married, Sienna. I’m not going to walk past the room if you’re crying.”
“Didn’t you know?” I tell him wryly. “I’m a Naples. We don’t cry.”
Guy nods acquiescence, then he offers me his hand. When I take it, he hooks his index finger around my pinkie and gives it a little tug.
“For what it’s worth, Maples do cry,” he says quietly. “We don’t make a habit of judging each other for it, and we accept it for what it is. Life is rough sometimes.”
“The typical Naples will hop on a horse and work themselves to exhaustion instead of processing any pesky things like emotions.” My joke sounds hollow to my own ears. I clear my throat, eyes flickering across the hall to Emma’s room. “And we definitely don’t complain about it to people with a lot worse on their plates.”
“Believe it or not, Sienna, our hard days don’t have to be mutually exclusive.”
I blink, then suddenly I laugh. “If someone had told Micah that, I might still be married.”
He looks like he wants to hug me, and I want the hug. If I stopped lying to myself, the wet spots on my shirt and I might admit I need the hug. Still, I can’t do it. There are only a couple inches between us, but I can’t cross the distance and let this man comfort me.
“Emma’s okay?”
“She’s dead to the world, using your dog as a teddy bear.” Guy chuckles despite the tiredness on his face. He squeezes my fingers before dropping his hand and stepping back. “I suppose I better try to do the same.”
Losing the sheer presence of him makes the air around me feel empty, as if my personal bubble is regretting returning to its normal state of emptiness.
“Hey, Guy? Thanks.”
“Anytime. Oh, you should know, Barley woke me up to come check on you. He likes you more than you think.” He starts toward the stairs, then Guy pauses at the top, turning and suddenly giving me a knee-melting smile. “We all do. Good night, Sienna.”
As he heads back down to the crappy couch I’ve got him sleeping on, I decide I’m going to figure out how to be tougher, or at least quieter. Guy needs more than just sufficient food to get through what he and Emma are dealing with. He needs sleep. He needs a break . And he definitely shouldn’t have to take care of me. That was never in the ad’s job description.
Still, as I curl back up in my big, empty bed, I can’t help but think that in another place and time, in a world that didn’t rest so heavily on his broad shoulders, maybe accepting a moment of comfort wouldn’t be such a bad thing.