CHAPTER TWO
BODE
I stared at the slip of a woman who looked like she’d been through hell to get up my mountain. After the first sentence I spat at her, words failed me. Not uncommon; I wasn’t used to talking, period. Part of the reason I came out here in the first place was that I didn’t like the company of others.
Which still begged the question, what was she doing on my front lawn.
If my lawn was full of dust, granite, and she was dressed in clothes that looked like she’d been caught in a cloudburst then slept in them for the past few days between Red Hart to here, however long that took her.
Hell, considering the tiny backpack she carried, they probably were the same clothes she started out in.
Not a stupid strategy, as long as that was what she expected.
The way she stared back at me, thirty percent exasperation and seventy percent curiosity from the safety of my arms as she came around after half tumbling to the ground from what looked like either pure exhaustion, sunstroke, or a mix of both, maybe it was.
But when she dropped in front of me, her thin legs beneath bottle green cargos covered in patches of grit, I tossed aside the barriers I’d erected as a last-ditch effort to keep the world out, and launched forward in a display of the training banged into me so long ago.
Because once, I’d worn a uniform and served. But that was a different life, back when there’d been someone worth coming home to. Someone worth returning from deployment for, before that same someone took every inch of my trust and shattered it.
And here we were.
A different girl I didn’t know curled in my arms, staring up at me like I was a fascination she couldn’t decipher.
Right back atcha, sprite.
“You are not what I expected, Bode Hunter.” She said my first name in a stilted way, pronouncing it Bow-d, without the extended ‘eee’ sound at the end.
Whatever. I’d forgive her for mangling my name in a second, if I could stare into those deep brown eyes that matched her dark chocolate hair a while longer.
Then the penny dropped.
“What the fuck.”
I placed my not-random hiker who knew my name gently back on her feet, hoping she would stay upright on her own. Still cursing and muttering on a fast rasping throat, I grabbed for my rifle, glad the damn thing hadn’t discharged when I threw it before, and backed the hell up.
This was no random incursion, and no random girl.
“You’re not what I expected for an artist,” she offered, a soft smile gentling her already pretty face.
I raked trembling fingers through my hair.
“Christ, no one’s supposed to come out here.
” I coughed on the excess chatter, already choking on the thought of small talk.
I didn't want anyone in my yard, let alone this stunning woman. She looked like she needed medical attention then a firm hand to turn her tidy behind about and get her off my mountain. “Get inside and have some water. Then you’re going back where you came from.”
“Mmm.” She made a quiet sound that might have been agreement or discontent.
Either way, that hum went straight to my cock.
Shaking my head, I led her out of the heat and under the porch. “Leave your things there.” I pointed to the utilitarian bench that dipped at one end that I used each morning and evening to get my boots on. “Come in and clean up. Then you’re gone again. Understand?”
She didn’t make a sound.
I swung about to check she hadn’t passed out on me again, and found her right behind me. Her shoes were off in the place where mine usually sat, but her bag was clutched tight in her arms. At least it was off her back.
“Where it goes, I go.” She stared up at me defiantly. A dare behind her eyes challenged me to defy her.
I didn’t have the energy to play combat games right now. “Sure, sprite. Make yourself at home.” To my surprise, the corner of my mouth quirked upward as I motioned her in front of me through the open door.
She murmured her thanks and that same instant arousal spike hit me a second time.
She’s gotta go.
But damn if I didn’t like the fact that someone—even a tiny woman encrusted with half the mountain's dirt with a big attitude problem—could make me smile.
I cleared my throat as she found my wooden table at one end of my living space and set her things on the floor beside it. “You know my name, but I don’t know why–”
“I came out here to talk to you.” She ignored my intent and rummaged through her things, head down, ass in the air.
I got an eyeful of curves as she faced the wrong direction, or maybe the right one, digging through her pack. A few expired rations pouches I recognized were laid out in haphazard piles.
Crouching nearby, but not too close, I collected her rubbish. “You got these from Travis down at the ranch.”
She nodded, or at least, her hair did as she continued rummaging without raising her head. “Yep. He sorted me out when I came through Red Hart a few days back. Him and trader Kyle. Freaking love Kyle. He’s been amazing."
Another name’s name on her lips sent a jolt through my chest. I crumpled her rubbish into my fist and removed it to the bin system at the back of my kitchen.
“Thank you,” she called. “That leaves me more space for the return trip.”
“Which will be soon,” I muttered under my breath.
“I’ll top you up before you go.” I wasn’t that cruel, but I also wasn’t used to talking.
My breath and voice officially expired on that last word.
I pulled out a chair from my table for her, and one on the corner for me.
When she didn’t notice, I reached across and grabbed a hip, squeezing. “Sit.”
Mistake.
Touching her was the worst thing I could do. Despite her skin and bones appearance, my fingers sank into her flesh to that just right point. The point where I could pull her back into me, and—
Fuck.
I let her go as she gasped at the contact. “Sit,” I growled. The single sound ripped my throat.
My voice was done, along with my sense of peace. Whoever she thought she’d come out here to see had died a long time ago.
Bode Hunter wasn’t the same man who walked into these hills and built a house near on a decade ago.
That man with the broken heart, he used to care.
I lost that sense of humanity a long time ago.
Travis and Kyle should have warned her about me.
Shit, maybe they had. Maybe she’d been too gung ho about whatever she’d gotten into her head that brought her up here and nothing they said would have stopped her.
“Thank you.” Her quiet answer blew my mind.
While I was ranting inside my head, she was off being all sweet and gentle. Christ, I wasn’t fit company for a woman like her. Maybe I never had been.
“You shouldn't be here. Not with someone like me.” The words came out so faded and thin, I wasn't sure she’d heard them. Not until she straightened up and scattered a handful of stones across the table. Stones that I recognized because I’d spent the last years carving them.
Her eyes flashed with triumph as she tossed her hair in an undeniable ta-daa gesture.
No, not stones. At least not the sort you pick up from the ground. No, these came out of a river. At least, they did around here. Red Hart’s river. Because these were Yogo sapphires, and they originated from the mountain right behind Red Hart Ranch.
I stared at the carved gemstones, recognizing my own art. “Fucking Kyle.”
She grinned at me, those damn pretty eyes sparkling with the sort of mischief I wanted to hate but couldn’t. “He’s good, isn’t he?” she agreed.
She. Because while she knew my name, I didn’t know hers.
“Alright, sprite. Tell me why you’re here. And start with your name.” I coughed into my hand, pushing my chair back, needing the distance from her.
She nodded. “I’m gonna get myself that water first,” she told me. “And wash up. Alright?”
I blinked and nodded, waving her in the direction of the other rooms in my cabin. It wasn't like she could get lost.
She wandered away from the table, running her fingertips along my shelves, padding barefoot through my house.
Releasing a slow breath, I leaned back and watched her. Maybe it wasn’t so bad having a girl back in my house. Maybe I could deal with someone else in my space, even if she challenged everything about me in the few seconds she’d been here.
Maybe I'd let her stay a little longer and find out what she wanted. Work out why Kyle sent her in my direction.
My sprite disappeared along the darkened hallway that ran through the middle of the house like a vein through the mountain before I realized she’d left without giving me what I’d asked for.
I still didn’t know her damn name.