Page 93 of Heart & Hope

Olive stalks through my door and slips past the PA who no longer takes direct orders from me, apparently.

The ship is going down, no matter how fast I bail out the water. It could well be the Titanic.

And I’m Jack fucking Dawson.

Chapter Twenty-Three

REED

The snowdrift has well and truly set in. The only thing keeping me warm right now is the memory of Ruby wrapped around my waist and me buried deep inside her as I tail a small herd of furry cattle across the ridge. Mack is at the head, and I keep an eye out for mountain lions and wolves.

We came close to losing a run-in with a pack of wolves last night. Despite the rifle strapped to my back, I have no desire to fend off a pack attack with gunfire and then have to gallop after a stampeding herd.

When we finally reach the halfway point for the muster, and the rough, timbered forest opens up, I can breathe easy. Trotting around the cattle, I find Mack checking his mare over. The two men that ride with us have started the camp, and I lend a hand, thrilled to hand Magnet over to my brother. As much as I love my horse, I am happy to be out of the saddle.

“Where’s your hot little blonde, Rawlins? Not ridin’ along like Addy?” Curly says. His dark hair pokes out from under his hat, his old, leathery hands stacking firewood to make our campfire.

“Back in the city” is all I give him.

He shakes his head. “Good luck trying to tie that one down. I hear she’s somethin’ of a spitfire.”

“How the hell did you hear that?”

“At Louisa’s party. Harry was talking about her.”

I can’t help the smile that stretches my cold, tight face. The dry air up here has my skin paper-thin, clinging to my bones. The chafing is so bad it keeps me from sleeping well most nights. I can’t wait to get home.

“Ruby tells things like they are. Like everyone should,” I finally respond.

“Yeah,that’swhy you like her. I’ve seen the body on that one,” Stan pipes up as he walks over, carrying the rolled up tents.

I snatch one from his arms and throw him a dirty look. “Watch your mouth, old man, or I’ll feed you to the wolves.”

Curly laughs, and Mack slaps my shoulder. “That oughta keep them off our tail.”

I grunt, sinking onto a fallen log by the campfire. The trees around us sport branches weighed down by snow, and the cold air slides its icy tendrils into every tiny gap between my clothes and skin it can find. I shiver, rubbing my hands over the now roaring flames.

We eat in silence until Mack yawns.

“Well, I’m gonna call it a night. Reed, you right to take first watch? We can’t let those doggies spook the herd.”

Always the sergeant.

“Sure, not like I’ll be gettin’ sleep anyway.”

“Too many thoughts flying around your head about that blonde?” Stan has another crack at me.

“Fuck off, Stan,” I growl.

Something about him talking about Ruby riles me up. Maybe it’s the exhausting days, or the fact that I haven’t seen her for so long. Or maybe it’s the fact that I have finally found her and we have created something incredible, and her life—the oneshe wants with her whole heart and has worked a decade for—doesn’t include me.

And being out here in the middle of nowhere reaffirms how magnificently different our two worlds are. How far apart they really span.

I wander to the pile of tack and lift the blanket that’s draped over to protect the saddles from the elements and pluck the rifle from the stack. Settling back down by the fire, I let my gaze meander over the trees, searching in the dark spaces between the trunks for movement.

After nothing for an hour, my mind skips to Ruby. I stare up at the stars. The milky blanket hangs over the glistening, white-covered canopy, and I imagine she is looking up at the same sky as me.

“Any movement?” Mack’s words jolt me back to the present. The cold, Ruby-less present.

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