Chapter Twenty-Four
Flint had spent the better part of three days trying to convince himself he needed to leave.
The argument made perfect sense whenever Daisy wasn't around. Amos's men were searching harder with each passing day; Nathan's concern was becoming harder to dismiss, and every instinct Flint possessed warned him that remaining under this roof put all of them in danger.
Then Daisy would set a cup of coffee beside him and return to whatever task occupied her attention before he found a reason to keep her talking.
She remained perfectly polite.
That was the problem.
Whenever he asked a question, she answered.
Whenever Nathan made one of his ridiculous observations, she laughed right along with him.
She still thanked Flint when he carried boxes, chopped wood, or reached a shelf she couldn't. Yet the easy warmth that had settled between them during recent weeks seemed harder to find.
Most mornings, she drifted back to her workshop soon after breakfast, leaving Flint staring at a closed door and wondering whether he'd finally succeeded in creating the distance he'd been chasing.
The conversation on the porch lingered between them.
Daisy hadn't raised her voice. She hadn't accused him of regretting the kiss.
She'd simply listened while he wrapped fear in practical excuses and called it realism.
Since then, a quiet caution had crept into their conversations, and Flint hated hearing it because he knew exactly who had put it there.
A few weeks ago, he would've convinced himself this was the sensible outcome.
The closer he grew to Daisy, the greater the danger became. Creating space should've made things easier.
Instead, every measured reply felt wrong. Every conversation cut short left him irritated with himself. Every glimpse of her disappearing into the workshop carried an ache he couldn't seem to shake.
Distance sounded far more noble when he imagined himself making the sacrifice.
Living with it proved considerably less satisfying.
He sat alone at the kitchen table long before sunrise, nursing a cup of coffee that had gone cold enough to offend any decent citizen of Wyoming.
The house rested in comfortable silence around him.
Nathan had already ridden out to visit a patient, and Daisy remained upstairs, leaving Flint alone with thoughts that had developed a nasty habit of circling the same problem without offering a solution.
A faint glow had begun creeping across the horizon by the window, washing the ranch land in pale gold and soft blue. Flint watched it for a while and told himself he should be planning his departure.
Instead, he found himself listening for Daisy. Thirty-one years old, hunted by criminals, carrying enough scars to fill a medical textbook, and he'd reduced himself to waiting for a woman to walk downstairs.
Pathetic.
The first floorboard creaked overhead.
Flint straightened before he could stop himself.
Another board answered a few seconds later, followed by the familiar rhythm of careful footsteps moving through the hall.
When Daisy appeared in the doorway, her hair still loose from sleep and her expression softened by the early hour, every sensible thought abandoned him completely.
"Good morning," Daisy said as she entered the kitchen.
Flint looked up from his coffee.
The greeting sounded perfectly ordinary. Hearing her voice still carried enough weight to unsettle him. "Morning."
She crossed the room with easy confidence, her fingertips gliding across the counter's edge before she reached the coffee pot. The movement came from years of habit rather than caution, and Flint found himself watching her longer than he intended.
A few weeks ago, he would've told her she looked beautiful. These days, he spent most conversations searching for ways to avoid saying what he actually wanted.
"You've been awake a while."
Flint listened to the familiar sounds of her preparing coffee, the scrape of ceramic against wood, the quiet clink of a spoon, and found himself wishing things felt as simple as they had before the argument.
They didn't.
The conversation on the porch lingered between them, woven through every exchange and every silence. Daisy hadn't raised her voice that night.
She'd simply stopped pretending his excuses made sense.
Daisy carried her coffee toward the table and settled into a chair. The chair farther down, away from him. The choice appeared innocent enough. Flint knew better.
He wrapped both hands around his mug. "I've made plenty of questionable decisions lately."
Daisy lowered her cup carefully onto the table. "That's one way to describe them."
The answer carried enough dryness to remind him that hurt and forgiveness weren't the same thing.
Flint let out a slow breath. “True.”
"Thinking again?" she asked as she poured herself a cup.
Flint rubbed a hand across his jaw. "You've started saying that with far too much confidence."
"I've had weeks to study the behavior."
Daisy carried her coffee to the table and launched into a detailed explanation of a new candle order she intended to finish before the end of the week. Flint listened longer than he intended, which seemed to happen frequently around her.
The morning passed quickly. Nathan returned briefly, ate lunch, and complained about a patient who ignored every piece of medical advice he'd been given, then disappeared again before Daisy could convince him to stay.
By afternoon, Daisy had retreated to the workshop.
Flint lasted less than half an hour before following her.
"Good," she said when she heard him enter. "You're here."
A heartbeat later, a wooden box landed squarely against his stomach.
Flint caught it automatically. "What am I holding?"
"A box."
He stared at her.
Daisy tilted her head slightly. "I can feel your disappointment from here."
"You answered a question without providing any useful information."
“So, could you please help me stack these boxes? That’s what I really need.”
Flint looked at her longer than he should have.
Daisy's smile faded into a softer expression, and although her eyes never focused on him, he had the unsettling feeling she sensed exactly where his thoughts had wandered. "Flint?"
He shifted the box against his hip and cleared his throat. "Yeah. Right. The box."
The corners of her mouth curved upward. "I was beginning to wonder if you'd forgotten how to carry one."
"I was conducting a thorough inspection."
"Of a pine crate?"
"Might've been dangerous."
"Good thing I handed it to an expert."
The amusement in her voice made him shake his head.
Years ago, he'd been the one teasing her. Somewhere along the way, she'd become entirely too skilled at turning his own jokes against him.
Daisy reached across the worktable and ran her fingertips along a row of candle tins she'd arranged earlier. "Set it beside the shelf. The one near the wall."
Flint glanced around the workshop. "You're aware every shelf in here is near a wall."
Daisy continued sorting supplies across the worktable, entirely untroubled by the objection. "Then perhaps you'll have to use your judgment."
"That's a dangerous amount of responsibility."
A smile tugged at her mouth. "You survived cattle drives."
"Barely."
"You survived Amos Grady."
Flint shifted the crate against his hip. "Still questionable."
Her smile widened. "Yet a room full of candle supplies leaves you helpless."
"That's because the candle supplies answer to a much stricter boss."
Daisy laughed again, and Flint found himself smiling before he realized he'd surrendered.
He carried the crate where she wanted it and spent the next hour helping organize supplies, measure wax, and move inventory from one side of the workshop to the other.
Daisy directed the entire operation through memory and touch, navigating the familiar space with a confidence that still amazed him.
She knew where every tool rested, which drawer held extra wicks, and which stack of tins needed refilling without ever laying eyes on any of it.
Watching her work made it difficult to remember she couldn't see.
Watching her made it impossible to think of her as helpless.
The workshop carried the warm scent of beeswax and dried herbs. Lavender lingered beneath it all, woven through the air so thoroughly that he associated the fragrance with Daisy herself.
Weeks ago, he wouldn't have noticed.
Now he could identify half the oils stored on the shelves.
He knew which soaps sold fastest at the market, which scents she preferred making during winter, and which candle batches she quietly disliked even when customers bought every last one.
The knowledge had arrived gradually, tucked inside ordinary conversations and shared afternoons.
He should have paid less attention.
Instead, he remembered everything.
He knew which candle scents she preferred making during winter and which orders she quietly dreaded filling. He knew how many spoonfuls of sugar she took in her coffee and exactly how her face softened when she laughed at one of Nathan's complaints.
The knowledge had arrived gradually, tucked inside ordinary conversations and shared afternoons.
That was the trouble.
A man preparing to leave shouldn't know those things.
Every small detail tied him more firmly to the life unfolding around him. Every habit he memorized, every routine he shared, every quiet evening spent beside her made the future he planned feel less like a sacrifice and more like a loss.
Lately, even the thought of leaving carried a bitterness he couldn't escape.
Because walking away from Daisy had once been an abstract decision.
Now it had her voice attached to it.
***
Rain arrived shortly before supper, beginning as a soft drumming against the windows before settling into a steady downpour that swallowed half the town beneath sheets of water and showed every intention of remaining through the night.
Nathan had ridden out that morning to visit a patient and should've returned long ago.
Daisy spent the evening trying to convince herself she wasn't worried.