Chapter Twenty-Eight
Daisy woke before dawn with her cheek pressed against the sofa cushion and a blanket tangled around her legs.
She remained still for a while, suspended between sleep and wakefulness while the house settled around her.
Wind brushed softly against the siding, and the mantel clock continued its steady counting of the hours.
Somewhere within the walls, old timber answered the cool morning air with a familiar creak.
Everything sounded ordinary.
And that’s what troubled her.
Her hand drifted across the cushion beside her before she fully realized she was searching for him.
The fabric had already gone cool.
A faint trace of Flint lingered behind, carried in the scent of leather, woodsmoke, and soap that seemed permanently woven into his clothes. The discovery should have reassured her. Instead, it left her listening harder.
He had probably stepped outside.
The explanation arrived immediately and with suspicious enthusiasm.
After what had happened in the workshop, it wouldn’t have been strange if Flint had spent part of the night checking the barn, walking the property, or satisfying himself that every door remained locked.
Nathan would've called it unnecessary. Flint would've ignored him. The argument practically wrote itself.
A reluctant smile threatened briefly before fading. The house should have carried some sign of him.
Daisy pushed herself upright and listened carefully. The clock continued ticking. The wind moved through the trees. A loose board complained somewhere near the kitchen.
Yet Flint remained absent from the familiar pattern of sounds she had come to know over the past weeks.
"Flint?"
No answer followed.
Unease began to form low in her stomach.
She swung her feet onto the floor and stood slowly, gathering the blanket around her shoulders against the morning chill. The room felt larger than it had the night before, as though the absence beside her had altered the shape of the space itself.
He was outside. He had to be.
The certainty weakened every time she repeated it.
Daisy crossed the sitting room and paused beside the sofa. Her hand moved across the cushions where they had sat together only hours earlier.
Flint had done that.
Daisy turned toward the kitchen. The stove was cold. No coffee had been started. Nathan’s medical bag rested where he had left it near the chair, which meant he hadn’t yet gone out to patients. That should have reassured her.
That realization unsettled her far more than the empty kitchen.
If Nathan was still asleep, then Flint hadn't gone anywhere with him. Whatever business had taken him from the house had been his alone, and the thought carried an edge of unease she couldn't quite explain away.
Daisy stood quietly for a few seconds, listening for any sound that might contradict the growing suspicion taking shape in her mind.
The house remained stubbornly silent.
At last, she turned toward the room Flint had been using.
Each step seemed to deepen the hollow feeling that had followed her since waking. She told herself she was being foolish. Flint could have gone to the barn. He could have saddled a horse for exercise. He could have decided dawn was the ideal time to tackle some chore Nathan had neglected.
The door stood partially open when she arrived.
Daisy paused at the threshold and drew a careful breath.
The room still smelled like Flint. Leather, soap, and gun oil lingered in the air, familiar enough to make her heart ache. Yet beneath that familiarity lay an absence she felt immediately, the same way she noticed when Nathan moved a chair or left a cabinet standing open.
Her hand found the small table beside the bed.
Nothing rested on it.
A faint unease stirred deeper inside her as she moved farther into the room and reached toward the chair near the wall. Flint's coat had hung there every evening since Nathan finally allowed him enough freedom to dress himself without supervision.
Her fingers closed around nothing.
Her hand hovered in the empty air for a moment before she forced herself to move.
She reached toward the wall where Flint's gun belt had hung every evening. For weeks, she'd heard the familiar scrape of leather against wood as he settled in for the night.
Her hand found the empty peg.
The realization settled with quiet certainty.
Flint never went anywhere without that revolver. He hadn't stepped outside to clear his head or inspect the barn. He had gathered the few possessions he cared about, strapped on his gun, and ridden away while the rest of the house slept.
Daisy sank onto the edge of the bed.
Pain struck first, sharp enough to steal her breath. Anger followed just as quickly.
He had promised her honesty.
She had told him why she'd left all those years ago. She had admitted that fear had driven her to decide his future without giving him the chance to choose for himself. She had confessed every regret she'd carried since the fever stole her sight.
He had listened. He had understood.
Afterward, he had kissed her.
He had held her as though the years between them no longer mattered, then slipped away before dawn and repeated the very mistake she'd spent years mourning.
Flint hadn't left because he'd stopped caring. He'd left because he cared too much.
He had seen the bruises on her arm. He had heard Amos's threat. He had looked at it all and decided the answer was to remove himself before danger reached her again.
As though love meant leaving the person you loved with no voice in the matter.
Her fingers curled into the blanket.
Did he think she was too weak to stand beside him?
She knew better. Flint admired her strength. He'd shown it every time he let her do things for herself, every careful offer that stopped short of pity.
Yet when it mattered most, when trust demanded partnership instead of protection, he had still left her behind.
A floorboard creaked near the doorway.
“Daisy, are you there?”
Nathan’s voice carried a roughness that told her he had been awake longer than she realized.
She turned her face toward him. “Did you know he was going to do this?”
He didn’t answer quickly enough. The silence hurt almost as much as Flint’s empty room.
“I heard the back door before dawn.”
Her heart sank. “And you let him go?”
Nathan exhaled. “I didn’t know he was leaving until I came downstairs and found the door unbolted.”
“But you suspected.”
“I suspected he was capable of doing something foolish,” Nathan said. “Unfortunately, that covers a great deal of territory where Flint Callahan is concerned.”
His attempt at dry humor fell flat.
Daisy rose so abruptly that the chair scraped across the floor. "You should have woken me."
"Yes," Nathan said after a pause. "I should have."
The answer robbed her of the argument she had been preparing.
She folded her arms instinctively, then winced when the movement pulled at the bruises darkening her forearm.
"Flint took his horse," he said quietly. "His gun belt is gone. So is the saddlebag."
Daisy looked away. "I know."
When Nathan spoke again, the irritation that usually colored his voice whenever Flint entered the conversation had faded considerably. "Oh, Daisy."
She turned toward the window because she couldn't bear to look in his direction. Anger she could handle. Pity had always been far more dangerous. "I didn't think he'd do this."
The quiet stretched long enough for Daisy to brace for the lecture she had expected from the beginning.
Nathan had spent weeks warning her about Flint.
He had questioned his judgment, distrusted his past, and looked upon every development in their relationship with the enthusiasm of a man discovering termites in his foundation.
Any second now, he would remind her of all that.
Instead, he said, "He was wrong to leave without saying goodbye."
Daisy blinked. The response surprised her enough that she turned back toward him. "What?"
"You heard me,” he shot back, exhaustion lacing his tone.
She struggled against the emotional tide ebbing at the edges of her heart. "You think he was wrong?"
"Yes."
Daisy swallowed. For reasons she couldn't quite explain, hearing Nathan say it made the hurt worse.
He crossed the room slowly and rested a hand on the back of the chair nearest her.
"He was wrong to decide this alone," he continued. "He was wrong to leave before dawn and convince himself that disappearing would spare you pain. And he was certainly wrong if he imagined you'd wake up grateful for the experience."
"That would've been optimistic."
"It would've been idiotic."
The word caught somewhere inside her.
Before she could stop herself, the tears she'd been holding back burned in her eyes. She pressed a hand over her mouth, but it did nothing to keep her composure from slipping.
Nathan crossed the room without another word.
His arms settled around her the same way they had ever since she was little, steady and familiar, asking nothing of her except that she let herself lean on him.
For a long moment, she did.
"I really thought..." Her voice broke. She swallowed hard and tried again. "I really thought we had another chance this time."
Nathan's hold tightened. "So did I," he admitted quietly.
She pulled back just enough to look at him. "After everything... after all those years..." Her voice trembled. "He kissed me, Nathan. He listened to everything I'd been too afraid to tell him. I thought we were finally done running from each other." She lowered her head. "I thought he was staying."
Nathan rested a hand against the back of her head, the way he had after the fever, when there had been no words big enough to carry her grief. "I'm so sorry, Daisy."
Daisy sank into the chair behind her. "Then why do you keep sounding as though you're defending him?"
Nathan released a long breath. "Because understanding a man and agreeing with him are two entirely different things."
Nathan pulled out the chair opposite hers and sat down with the weary resignation of a man who suspected the conversation ahead would be uncomfortable for everyone involved.