Page 14 of Tattooed Cowboy
The trail grows damp and close. Mist curls around us, cool fingers tracing my throat. When the drizzle starts, I pull his jacket tighter. Smoke and pine. The warmth of someone who shouldn’t matter but does.
Through the wet hush, I glimpse it—the cabin tucked into the valley below, small and plain, half-swallowed by aspens and fog. Its roof gleams slick with rain. A thin curl of smoke escapes the chimney, then falters.
My pulse stutters.
“Maveryk!” My voice disappears into the gray. Only the rain answers.
“Maveryk,” I try again, the name braided with relief and something darker.
I could leave his coat inside, escape without notice. Say,I see youwithout meeting his eyes. A goodbye letter I don’t have to write.
I dismount, tie Sunshine outside at the trough, and cross the clearing. The door hangs ajar, sighing on its hinges. The air inside tastes of iron and ozone.
A storm’s breath held captive.
The walls seem to breathe, cradling memories of their own. I’ve been here before, though so long ago it feels like a dream.
To one side, bunks line the wall. In the center, a long table. To the left, a rustic hearth looms, amber firelight flickering from the smoke-blackened rock.
He’s here. Close.
Maps and sketches sprawl across the table. I brush my fingers across them, then freeze at the sight of a small box wrapped in strange fabric, silver as starlight. My hand trembles as I pull the cloth aside, remove the lid. Metal and stone fuse together inside, humming faintly—a heart made of both earth and sky.
I should turn away, but curiosity has gravity—and I’m already falling. I stretch a shaking hand, touch it. A whisper sears my mind—my name on the cowboy’s lips.
Cold floods my hand. Fingers bloom with blue fire, bioluminescent like Maveryk’s tattoos.
I gasp, stumble back as visions pour through me: stars collapsing, fire raining down, judgment cold and swift. The air smells of metal and burnt honey.
My pulse staggers. The world reassembles one breath at a time.
“Maveryk.” His name breaks from my throat before I know I’ve said it.
He fills the doorway, rain steaming off his bare chest, tattoos alive, glowing like molten silver. “You shouldn’t be here,” he rasps, the hum of the range threading through his voice. His eyes drop to the coat, dwarfing my frame, his expression unreadable.
I open my mouth, a thousand excuses rising. Instead, I whisper, “I couldn’t stay away.”
“No.” His brows furrow, voice thickening with conviction. “You have to go. Now. Before we draw any more attention.”
“Attention?” I look around, puzzled. He and I are the only two people in this solitary valley.
“What happened in the barn—” he braces his hands on his hips, legs set apart like he’s holding the world still “—canneverhappen again. It was wrong.”
Outside, thunder murmurs low, as if even the storm disagrees.
His words cut, but his eyes—feral, turquoise, burning—cut deeper. Each searing glance only makes his tattoos pulse brighter, the faint hum off his skin rising until it fills the cabin.
My bracelet vibrates softly, answering. He steps forward, haunted, his hand closing around my wrist, thumb tracing the refracting silver.
“You have to go,” he orders gruffly.
He turns his hand slightly, and I register the raw, blackened flesh on his palm. I gasp, eyes bobbing from his wound to his face. “What did you do?”
He shrugs, tries to wrap his mouth around words. Bows his head instead.
I rise, heat thrumming through my core, light-headed, as I locate a First-Aid Kit down the hallway. I make him sit, fuss over his hand.
The smell of antiseptic burns my nostrils, but he never grimaces as I clean and then bandage the injury. The runes on his arms pulse and shimmer like quicksilver beneath my touch. I try not to notice, but I can’t deny the heat simmering behind his eyes.
