4. Forrest
FOUR
Forrest
I wasn’t sure exactly why Willa Daley felt safe with me, but I was damn sure going to prove her right.
The cottage wasn’t much to look at; I knew that before Willa did, but I still felt it when I opened the front door—the low ceiling, the window that stuck in its frame, the smell of old wood floors and the ghost of every summer it had sat here catching heat with nobody in it.
There was a clean set of linens on the bed in the spare bedroom, always unused, sans a little bit of Nickel’s dog hair from when she decided it was her bed.
I kept the place clean, at least. Always had.
“It’s small,” I said, like she couldn’t see that.
She gave me a soft, hesitant smile. “It’s perfect.”
“Really?”
She shrugged. “I grew up with twelve siblings and we had about thirty people packed into that house. So…yeah. It’s perfect.”
Good lord.
What the hell was going on over there?
“Where’s the spare room?” she asked, and I could see the change—that my silence had been enough to tilt her into self-consciousness.
I pointed down the hall. She went.
Nickel followed her, tail swaying, head down.
I stood in the kitchen and let them go, because following a woman you’d met two hours ago and who’d clearly been through some shit seemed like exactly the thing that would spook her. She didn’t seem like she spooked easy, yeah…but I wasn’t going to test it.
As far as I was concerned, I was going to be the safest person she’d ever been around.
I’d just met her…and I wanted to protect her.
She came back in a minute, that soft and hesitant smile back.
“It’s good,” she said. “It’s really good.”
I nodded. “There’s a deadbolt on the bedroom door. Interior side, from back before Peg and Adam put an actual latch and knob on it. Just..want you to know that you shouldn’t feel pressed to come out or anything. You’re safe here.
Her tongue darted out to slide across her lips, and I hated myself for the fact that I noticed she was beautiful. When I’d first seen her, she looked like such a wild thing…but now she looked like a person, I could see it.
Yeah.
Beautiful.
“Thank you,” she said. “Now…I don’t really have anything. Are there—”
“Haven’s bringing over some of her and Millie’s spare clothes,” I said. “They might be a little big on you, but it’ll do. Figured I’d introduce you to the goats in the meantime.”
Her eyes brightened. “Goats…I thought I’d heard them over this direction every so often. You have a lot of them?”
I grinned. “Peg does. I’m just their temporary shepherd.”
Then her smile got bigger. “Okay,” she said. “Lead the way, shepherd.”
We went out the back door and the Hill Country opened up in every direction—cedar trees, live oaks, and limestone, the grasses gone brown in the August heat, the air smelling like dust and resin. The creek wasn’t visible from here but you could hear it, feel the cool air it gave off.
Willa stopped on the porch step, looking not at the landscape, but at the goats.
There were seven of them in the near pasture, small and busy and painted in various shades of white, brown and black.
They all stopped what they’d been doing to look at her.
Dolly—Aunt Peg’s favorite, the de facto leader of their strange little flock—put both hooves on a stump to make herself look taller.
“Willa, meet the goats,” I said.
Her hands flew up to cover her mouth. “They’re tiny.”
“It’s the only reason we’ve got ‘em,” I chuckled. “Peg’s pets—she claims they’re good for trimming the lawn, but I think she really just likes watching their antics.”
“Are they friendly?”
I shrugged. “If they like you.”
Willa carefully walked over to one of the closest goats and extended her hand in a fist. The goat sniffed it daintily and then allowed her the privilege of petting it.
“I love them,” Willa whispered.
“Don’t let ‘em fool you.” I leaned on the post. “Dolly’ll eat your shoelaces if you’re not paying attention.”
Willa laughed. “Guess it’s a good thing I didn’t bring my own shoes.”
“So you’re willing to sacrifice my boots to the goat goddess?”
Dolly picked that moment to ram her head gently into Willa’s shin. Willa stumbled a step, looked down at the goat, and laughed again.
“Dolly.” I pointed. “I warned you.”
“She’s just saying hi.”
“She’s not. She’s establishing dominance.” I pushed off the fence. “Don’t let her win.”
Willa stared down at the goat.
Dolly stared back…then bleated and walked off.
Willa looked over her shoulder at me with her eyebrows up. “I think I just established dominance,” she said.
She went back to petting the goats, still smiling, and that was when I heard the screen door bang at the main house and the sound of Haven’s voice carrying down the hill.
“Forrest—oh good! You’re out here.”
She came around the corner of the yard at a quick clip, her blonde braid over one shoulder and her baby, Ethan, on her hip. He had Wyatt’s dirty blond hair and the makings of a strong jaw already, gnawing on a toy.
“I see the goats took to you,” Haven said with a grin. “The ultimate test.”
She held out a duffel bag to Willa, then, wrangling Ethan with her other arm.
“I brought you some clothes, some toiletries, a few creature comforts. Obviously I don’t know your shoe size, but I figured I’d bring some options over.”
“Thank you so much,” Willa said, her eyes darting to Ethan as she took the bag. “How old is he?”
“Ethan?” Haven snorted. “Sometimes I think he’s eighty, with how serious he can be. But really…seven months. Maybe he’s just remembeirng a past life.”
Willa laughed at that. “Seven months,” she repeated. “He’s beautiful.”
“You wanna hold him?” Haven asked.
Willa blinked. “I…yes. Please.”
Haven was already holding him out.
Willa took him like she'd done it a thousand times. One hand under his bottom, the other at his back, him settled against her chest before he'd had time to register the transfer. Ethan looked up at her, decided something, and grabbed a fistful of her braid.
"He does that," Haven said. "Sorry."
"I don't mind." Willa didn't try to detach him. She just tipped her chin down toward the top of his head and let him have it, her thumb moving in a slow absent circle on his back.
I watched her face.
She didn't know I was watching. That was the thing—she'd stopped performing, the way she'd been performing all morning, that careful steadiness she put on when she thought someone was assessing her. With Ethan she'd just gone somewhere else entirely. Easy and present in a way she hadn't been yet.
She wanted this.
It wasn't a small want, either. It was the kind that had been living in someone for a long time.
Ethan offered her his toy. She touched it to her lips and handed it back and he grinned at her with his two bottom teeth and she made a sound low in her throat, not quite a word.
"He likes you," Haven said. "He made Gage work for it for a solid month."
"He's got good judgment," Willa said.
Haven laughed. "Don't tell Gage that."
Ethan had given up on the toy and was now patting Willa's cheek with an open palm. She let him. Her eyes had gone a little bright.
I looked at the fence line.
There was something private in what I'd just seen and it didn't belong to me. Whatever was behind that want—and there was something behind it, I'd have bet the property on it—she hadn't offered it and I wasn't going to reach for it.
"You're good with him," I said. Neutral. Just a fact.
She looked up. Remembered I was there.
"I like kids," she said. Simple. Then something moved across her face and she looked back down at Ethan and the simpleness of it got complicated, just for a second, before she smoothed it out.
Haven was watching her too…and I knew she had the same questions I did.
We didn’t know what went on at that compound, but we knew it wasn’t good, wasn’t right. We knew the women didn’t get to leave the property…that they married too young, and not on the books.
I wondered if she’d left kids behind.
If she’d had to leave them for her own safety, her own sanity.
“You let me know if you ever want to babysit,” Haven said. “Forrest takes it on from time to time. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind the help.”
Haven reached for him then, and Willa handed him over without making it a thing. But her hands stayed curved for a second after he was gone. She pressed them flat against her thighs and turned back to the fence.
Dolly headbutted her knee immediately.
Haven bit back a smile. "She never does that for me."
"You have to let her win once," Willa said. "Then she respects you."
"You've known her for twenty minutes."
Willa shrugged, scratching between Dolly's ears. Dolly leaned into it with her eyes half-closed.
Haven looked at me over Willa's shoulder. Something in her face asked a question I didn't have an answer to yet. I shook my head slightly and she let it go.
"I should get this one down for his nap," she said, settling Ethan higher on her hip. "But I'm right up the hill if you need anything. Anything at all." She said it to Willa, direct and plain. "Day or night."
“Thank you,” Willa said, a tremor in her voice.
Haven nodded once. Headed back up the slope.
We watched her go. Ethan looked back over her shoulder at Willa until the yard took them.
The afternoon had settled into that specific Hill Country stillness—the heat pressing down, the cedar holding its breath, the creek a low murmur somewhere past the tree line. The goats had mostly dispersed except for Dolly, who was still stationed at Willa's elbow.
"She's not going to leave you alone," I said.
"Good." Willa looked down at her. "I could use the company."
I nodded. Didn't say anything to that.
After a minute she turned and looked out east, past the pasture fence, toward the ridge. Her face went still. Not afraid—just thinking. Running something through that filter again.
"They're not coming today," I said.
"You don't know that."
"No," I said. "But Stetson's on the fence line and Gage knows, and nobody on this property is going to let anyone take you anywhere you don't want to go." I kept my voice even. "That's not a maybe."
She was quiet for a long moment.
"You don't even know me," she said.
"Doesn't matter."
She looked at me then. Really looked, the way she had from the blind this morning—running those calculations I didn't have access to, looking for the thing behind the thing.
Whatever she found, she didn't say.
She looked back at the ridge.
"Okay," she said quietly.
Dolly pushed her nose against Willa's hand and she opened her fingers and let the goat walk into them, and the three of us stood there in the afternoon heat while the light went long and gold across the pasture and the cedar held its breath.
I wasn't going anywhere.
She'd figure that out.