Page 41 of Trade
I don’t understand his use ofsubscription, but I get the gist. “Those men passing by aren’t rogues, though, right? They aren’t a danger to us?”
Somehow, his brown eyes soften and catch fire at the same time. “I’d never let anyone take you from me, Glory.”
“Because you traded for me, fair and square.” I’ve never heard petulance in my voice before. I’ve never allowed it.
“Yes,” he says, no shame, no regret.
It should be demeaning, right? I am a citizen vested with all the rights and privileges outlined in the Articles of Incorporation, and he’s treating me asgoods, bought and paid for.
But that’s not how he looks at me, and that isn’t how I feel as he watches me, so carefully, gaze darting from my wet cheeks to the knife in my hand like he’s desperate for a sign that I’m calming. Like my upset isn’t an annoyance or a problem to him, but a hurt he wants healed.
I haven’t felt this way in years—that I can fall apart because someone will try to pick up the pieces. The feeling went away when Dad died, and I didn’t even notice it was gone.
Now I’m crying even harder and the crease between Dalton’s eyes is a slash.
“Do you want me to take you back to the mountain, Glory?” he asks softly, and I know—from the cast of his jaw and the grit in his voice—that it is the last thing he wants to say.
I shake my head, sniffling. “I don’t want to ever go back.”
I’ve never seen a man so happy and so confused at the same time. “Okay. Do you want to walk a few more miles before we camp?”
“Sure.”
Dalton slowly crosses the distance between us and eases the knife from my hand. He slides it back in its sheath and clips it to my pocket. Then he kisses the knuckles of the hand that’s still clenched in a fist. “Brave Glory,” he murmurs.
“Not really,” I snort. I hid in the bushes and then had a meltdown when I was safe.
“Quit arguing with me,” he says, smiling, throwing my words back at me as he hikes his backpack onto his shoulders.
Then he takes my hand and we walk on. Until it gets too dark to see where we’re going and we break for camp, he stays by my side, holding my hand.
I’m still shaken. Still scared.
But I don’t feel alone.
* * *
The next two days are uneventful. We hike. My feet ache. Our roles begin, not to reverse, but to change. Dalton has already told me the name of all the plants that he knows, so I tell him the names I know.
“Oh, see that? That’s golden ragwort.”
“That’s partridgeberry.”
“That’s a loblolly pine.”
“You’re making this shit up, aren’t you, Glory?”
“No, I’m not.”
“Loblolly? Ragwort?”
“Seriously. That’s what they’re called.”
“How do you know?”
“My dad taught me.”
“He was shitting you.”
