Page 59 of Broken Trails
Is she married?
The thought settles low in my stomach, heavy and unwelcome. Is that why she keeps me at arm’s length? Why she shuts down every time I get close?
Because she’s not actually… available?
Is that why she flinched? Why she pulled back like my touch burned? Because someone else already made her feel unsafe?
And if she is married, then why the hell is she here? Alone. No ring. No mention of a husband. Why come back to Wattle Creek at all?
She’s impossible to read. Nothing gets past her unless she slips, and even then, it’s gone before you can hold onto it. But that panic attack? That was real. That was raw. You can’t fake that kind of spiral. And now this? This only leaves me with more questions than answers.
Xavier says something beside me. I catch part of it—something about Callie’s mud-caked jeans—but it’s background noise.
Bradley tilts his head, studying me like he’s trying to figure out what’s going on under my skin. “You good?”
I nod, though the truth is, I don’t have a clue what the hell I’m doing. Don’t know how I ended up here, standing in the middle of a farmyard, slowly catching feelings for a woman I barely know. A woman who might be older. Might be married. Might be hiding more than I’m ready to take on.
I stay put for a while, letting the crackling fire fill the silence in my head. People laugh. Somewhere, a speaker’s pumping out a new Morgan Wallen track. Eventually, I start moving, weaving through the crowd, nodding at a few familiar faces, catching stray fragments of conversation I don’t bother to hold onto. Grace and Dominic Mitchell are propped near the old watertank, wine glasses in hand. They wave me over, ask how the shop’s been going.
“Busy as always,” I tell them, giving a polite grin before moving on.
Joe’s perched on a long seat, one that was built from an old railway sleeper, with Mum beside him . I snag a beer from the Esky on my way over, drop onto an empty crate next to them, and pop the cap off against the wood.
“Evenin’, son.” Joe’s gravelly voice cuts through the crackle of the fire.
“Hey, Joe.” I nod toward him, lifting my bottle.
Mum leans forward, her eyes narrowing the way they always do when she’s trying to read me. “You look tired, love. Been pushing too hard again?”
I shake my head, taking a long pull of beer. “Just a long day, that’s all. Nothing I can’t handle.” Joe peers over at me, the brim of his worn trucker cap casting a shadow over his eyes, holding back the long strands of greying hair that curl just past his collar. “Finish up alright at the shop? How’d ya go with the Rav?”
I stretch my legs out in front of me. “Stubborn bloody thing. Fuel pump needed replacing, not the starter. Took us a bit to figure that out. Jono wanted to just ‘give it a whack’ and call it a day.”
Joe chuckles. “Ah, that sounds like Jono. And Harrison?”
“Grumpy as hell, as usual. But Imogen came past with lunch, so he softened up quick.”
“Did she cook again?”
“She did. She’s actually getting better at it, too.”
Mum tips her head, a smile tugging at her lips. “Her baking’s lovely. Those muffins she brought the other week? Gone in ten minutes.”
Joe nods enthusiastically at that.
My eyes flick back to the fire. To her. Still curled in that chair, still distant. I don’t mean to keep looking. But my eyes have a mind of their own, drawn back to her like a habit I haven’t broken yet.
Joe follows my gaze, then nudges his chin forward. “That the woman who came by a few months back?”
I glance at Mum, but she’s already turned away, engrossed in a lively conversation with Dominic and Grace. “Uh… yeah.”
“Huh.” He lifts his mug. “So she did stick around.”
“I guess so.” My hand tightens slightly around the neck of my bottle. “For who knows how much longer.” I tip the rest of the beer back, draining it. It’s too cold, but it gives my hands something to do.
“What?” I ask Joe when I notice him staring.
“In all my twelve years of knowing you, boy,” he says slowly, “not once have I seen you shy away from chatting up a woman.”
