Chapter 40
LOUISE
After placing the flowers he'd picked from his greenhouse by the gravestones, Ryder and I rode Liberty and Prudence back to the house in silence. When we arrived, we quietly went our separate ways. I tried to offer him my bed—his bed—but he refused.
I was too worried to sleep.
I drew a hot bath and sank into the copper tub. Afterward, I stretched on the rug in the bedroom, cycling through half-remembered yoga poses I’d seen on a relaxation program once. Searching for calm that wouldn’t come.
Around midnight, I tiptoed to the kitchen and made myself a cup of chamomile tea. Cradling it in both hands, I wandered the house in search of him.
I found him in the library.
Only a single dim light glowed, casting long shadows across the room. Ryder sat in the leather chair, motionless, staring out the frost-laced windows into the dark. His expression was vacant, eyes heavy-lidded and ringed with exhaustion.
I hesitated at the threshold.
Part of me wanted to retreat, to let him have the solitude he seemed to crave. But another part—a quieter, more certain part—wondered if maybe he didn’t want comfort... but needed it.
Barefoot, I padded across the room. He looked up as I approached, and in that brief glance, I saw the wreckage behind his eyes. Grief. Pain.
I gently handed him my tea. Then, without a word, I plucked a book from the top of the nearby stack—a classic Ryder pick, some action-packed thriller with a couple sprinting out of a cave on the cover. He took it, watching me with unreadable eyes.
“May I read with you?” I asked softly.
“Yes,” he said.
I grabbed a romance novel with a shirtless man on the front and curled beside him on the couch, tucking my legs under myself. Ryder stood, pulled the folded plaid blanket off the back of his chair, and draped it around my shoulders.
“Thank you,” I murmured.
His eyes met mine. “Thank you.”
He settled in next to me, opened his book, and with the snow falling outside, we read together for an hour in a comfortable silence. A companionable silence.
I fell asleep after the first few chapters.
I pretended not to wake when Ryder gently lifted me from the chair and carried me down the hall.
I pretended not to wake as he laid me in his master bed and pulled the covers to my chin.
I pretended not to wake as he stroked my head.
When the warmth of his skin left mine, I opened my eyes as he quietly slipped from the room.
Ryder slept on the floor again in the same room as the night before. Right next to mine. Sometime after two in the morning, I covered him with a blanket.