Chapter Seven
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GWYNN JERKED upright, sucking in air, her heart pounding while the screams echoed inside her head. She blinked in the darkened room. Moonlight arced in a funny path across the ceiling above her.
“A dream.” Her shoulders sagged, and she rubbed her temples. “Just a dream.” Then why did the moonlight come from an odd angle?
“Because you’re sleeping in a guest room, silly,” she answered herself. Two thousand miles from her carefully crafted life. She peered at the alarm clock beside the bed. Four-thirty. Six-thirty Boston time. Time to get up, if she were there. Time to stay in bed since she was here.
Gwynn curled onto her side and shut her eyes, but the screams from her nightmare hounded her. Panic-laced death screams that had ripped through the evening air amid a hazy backdrop and faceless people in a dream she hadn’t had in years.
She grimaced and tossed back the covers. Fine. She’d clear her thoughts with an early morning jog.
Rifling through her luggage, she collected her running clothes. Ten minutes later, wearing a hat, mittens, and carrying a flashlight, she ventured out into the dark, frosty morning.
She nearly turned around again after a few hundred feet.
Gwynn’s body might have been awake, geared for her daily run, but she’d forgotten the side effects of high-altitude exercise. Her lungs shrieked inside her chest, and her legs moved like blocks of granite as she traversed the snow-encrusted sidewalks. And she’d only gone half a mile!
Yielding to a slow jog, she forced her attention from her body’s agony to the surrounding neighborhood. Moonlight trickled down rooftops and pooled along front yards. Some houses had been lovingly tended over the years; others wilted on their foundations. A few original log cabins rotted away, relics from Prospect’s booming days during the gold rush in the 1860s.
Though ranching families had moved in to replace the miners moving on, the town’s population had been declining long before she’d escaped. Big cities drew away the younger generations for education, and few returned to their roots. If the trend kept up, Prospect could become a future ghost town.
Yet, if one had a past like hers, Gwynn didn’t begrudge their leaving.
With her flashlight beam lighting the way, she followed the sidewalk that looped through Bentley Park.
Wrong choice. Memories clawed at their confines as she passed a water fountain, the statue of Prospect’s founder, the gazebo where—
What was that?
Movement tickled in her peripheral vision, and she whipped her beam over frost-coated swings, a slide, and a jungle gym. The hair at the back of her neck prickled. Had she seen animal … or man?
A dog barked in the distance, and she licked her lips. Was someone watching her?
She carried the beam beyond the playground to a copse of evergreens, and it caught on a massive form. Her hand trembled. Thick, majestic antlers branched out atop the intelligent face of … a reindeer. It blinked, chuffed, and lowered its head, its gaze fixed on her.
The blood rushed in her ears. She got the feeling it was sizing her up.
Another bark ripped through the silence, this time closer and followed by a whistle. The reindeer snorted then spun and dashed off as two giant paws landed on Gwynn’s chest. She shrieked, sprawling backward onto the ground. Adrenaline geared up for flight mode until something rough and wet slimed her chin.
Her shriek turned into a laugh, and the tension drained from her shoulders as she gave the Golden Retriever a hearty scratch behind the ears. “You scared the color right out of me.” She sat up, angling her face to ward off the dog’s excited kisses. “Where’s your master, hmm?”
“Sawyer, heel!” Hurried footsteps crunched through old snow, and a beam of light settled over her and the dog. “I’m so sor— Gwynn ?”
The light shone in her face, and she lifted a hand to block it, her mirth fading to caution at the familiar voice. “Good morning, Cash.” What kind of reaction would she receive from him today?
“What are you doing out here?” he asked.
She took in his Adidas shoes, running pants, and an old, ratted sweatshirt. A ribbed beanie hugged his head, his hair curling around its brim. “I think the same thing as you.”
“You mean I’m not the only insane person to go running before five in the morning?” Cash held out a gloved hand and helped Gwynn to her feet.
“Oh, you are.” She brushed the snow and dirt from her backside. “According to my body clock, it’s almost seven.”
Cash motioned to the retriever. “Sorry if Sawyer freaked you out. I rarely leash him because he sticks by my side, but this morning, he took off.”
“He must’ve caught the reindeer’s scent, came to investigate, and then I distracted him.” She scrubbed the fur along the dog’s back.
“You saw a reindeer?”
“Mm-hmm. A huge one. With an uncanny, calculating look.” Gwynn motioned in the direction the reindeer fled. “Most impressive rack you ever saw, though.”
“Montana doesn’t have reindeer. You must have seen an elk.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “I know the difference between an elk and a reindeer, even if I do live in the city. And that was definitely a reindeer.”
Which begged the question: what was it doing around here?
A breeze picked up, and branches creaked above their heads.
Worrying her lip, Gwynn retreated a few paces and rubbed her arms in the frosty air. “Um, I should get going. It’s too cold to stand still for long, and I don’t want to derail you from your run. Bye, Sawyer.” She turned and began a slow jog in the direction of Aunt Maude’s house.
Seconds later, Sawyer dashed past her, followed by Cash, who altered his stride to match hers. “Is that your way of getting rid of me? Or may I join you?”
Gwynn shrugged. “It’s still predominantly a free country, but you needn’t feel obligated.”
“It would ease my mind. Prospect’s wild days might be far behind us, but we do have shady characters, and I’d feel better if—”
“Cash.” Holding up a hand, she stopped in the middle of the walkway. “You gave the impression yesterday that I make you uncomfortable, so if you’re tolerating my company because you suffer from a gentlemanly guilt trip, well … quit it.”
A wan smile flitted across Cash’s mouth. “It’s no guilt trip. But you’re right—I shouldn’t have bolted so fast after dropping you off. It was rude of me, and I’m sorry. You just—” He swiped off his beanie and ran a glove over his hair. Sawyer wandered back to nose his thigh. “You remind me of a girl I grew up with, and it threw me for a spin.”
She feigned ignorance but dropped her gaze, stabbing the toe of her sneaker in a small patch of snow. “So, uh, will there be other people who wig out over my face? Should I wear a mask while visiting?” Now there was an idea. It would certainly solve any awkward chance encounters.
“A few will do a double take.” Cash replaced his beanie then rubbed the back of his neck. “The thing is, Hadley Jacobs died almost ten years ago, and it’s still a sore subject for people because we never learned the exact details concerning her death.”
“Ah.” Gwynn stared at the yellow halo from the lone streetlamp marking the edge of Bentley Park. Lord, why did you bring me out here? “Were you two close? That must have been hard for you.”
“We’d actually had a falling out a few weeks before she …” Cash swallowed and gave Sawyer a scratch behind his ears. “It’s complicated. But we didn’t get the chance to make amends.”
This needs closure . Uncle Russ’s words from last night described the current vibe rolling off Cash’s shoulders. Gwynn’s chest tightened. Good gravy, he didn’t continue to long for Hadley, did he? She’d made decisions specifically so that wouldn’t happen.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
What a hollow ring those two words often had.
“Thank you. Sometimes it’s a battle to leave it in the past, but God’s been faithful to help me heal.” He glanced at her. “I’m not pining for her, in case you’re wondering. She was a teenage crush.”
“Oh. I …” Gwynn rubbed her arms again. Surely, she couldn’t be that transparent.
Cash ducked his head with a self-conscious laugh. “Or maybe you weren’t wondering.” He peeked at her through lowered lids. “Maybe I wanted to make sure you knew.”
Her cheeks heated, the warmth seeping into her heart despite the fact he was not part of her plan.
Cash cleared his throat and gestured down the path. “Shall we continue?”
“I’m actually heading back to the Davisons’ place.”
“Then allow me to escort you there. Please?”
The sincerity and concern in his tone trounced her willpower, and she released a smile. “Okay, fine. But only because I suspect your inner gentleman wouldn’t let you live it down if I refused.”
“You’d wound his pride, that’s for sure.”
“Yeah, well, with this kind of chivalry, you’re going to ruin me from dating any other guy.” She slapped a mitten over her mouth. Shoot, she’d done it again. “That came out wrong. I’m not implying you and I are dating. Obviously. I mean, for all intents and purposes, we barely know each other. Not that if we knew each other better, we’d be dating, of course—” Gwynn pulled the brim of her hat over her eyes. “Say something so I stop talking.”
“Why? This is fun.”
“Shut up.”
Cash chuckled. “You want to sprint back to the Davisons’ with me? Sprinting at high altitudes should leave a Bostonian wheezing and speechless in no time.”
She shared his grin. “Let’s do it.”