Authors: Reece Butler
She breathed in the cold, clear mountain air. There wasn’t much to see but trees, snow, rocks and what the locals called ‘varmints’. On a clear day she could see miles, dark dots of Black Angus cattle sprinkling the snowy valley like pepper on mashed potatoes.
She’d thought about what Doc said, that both men were happier than he’d ever seen them and the locals would accept her for who she was and ignore the rest. Though she hated to think what the neighbors would say and do if they found out about their intermingled relationship, she wasn’t running away from Adam and Bryan.
No, she was running
to
something.
To freedom from men who might love you but would never admit it. From the expectations of a close-knit society that pulled her strings so tight she couldn’t fly.
Even Doc, though she already loved him like a grandpa, expected her to stay until Adam finally came to his senses. Why would she postpone the inevitable? If she stayed until the meadow bloomed she might never be able to tear herself away from the mountain’s beauty.
She couldn’t give up her soul, loving and living with men who only thought of her as a convenience.
Never again. Not even for the chance to live in this beauty.
Eyes straight ahead she took slow breaths, fighting her roiling stomach. She would not let upset nerves destroy her last ride. She hadn’t slept well for the last few nights. After their lovemaking the men had rolled over and gone to sleep, each of them touching her for comfort.
They said they needed her, but she loved them, and they didn’t return that love. Maybe after she left they’d learn that needing someone was a lot different from loving, and it wasn’t enough.
She yawned, shivering a bit in the chill. When she got to the cabin she’d light the stove, make a cup of chamomile tea and lie on the bed for a bit after she took care of her horse.
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Yes, a short nap would make all the difference in the world.
* * * *
Adam squeezed his legs, urging his gelding toward home. At least the horse knew his way home in the dark. The wind howled at his back, thick snow weighing everything down. The horse responded eagerly, both of them tired and wanting their dinner. They’d started the morning early with a dark line of clouds rushing in, a typical spring storm. Typical, but often deadly.
They’d hauled ass all day but they were ready for the last blast of winter. Both horses and men could use a break after the last week of good weather and hard work. He wanted to make up for that work with a few lazy days in bed. He shifted on the saddle, jeans a mite tight at the thought of what they could do with a few days off.
“Gonna be a good blow,” he called to Bryan, who stepped his horse closer to answer.
“Yep. You thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’?”
“Could be,” replied Adam. “Pirates and virgin?” Though the rest of the men were a hundred yards downwind, he spoke just loud enough for Bryan to hear over the wind.
“Sounds good. Candy’s been a mite uppity the last week or so. I think she needs to learn who’s boss around here.”
“Yeah, something’s bugging her,” said Adam.
“Maybe she’s bored with the weather. Don’t want her feet to get itchy. I like having her around.”
“Makes a man eager to come home. She’s a lot of fun, when she’s not arguing and beating us at those board games she loves.”
“So why don’t you ask her to marry you?” Bryan waited as Adam became suddenly interested in the snowflakes accumulating on his gloves. “You do love her, right?”
“Hell, I don’t know. What if I do, we get married and then she walks on us? I don’t want to end up like my bastard father.”
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“Jaysus, man. Candy is not your mother. She’s nothing
like
your mother, and no way are you like Grant!”
Bryan dropped his voice when a few of the men turned in the saddle thinking he’d yelled at them. He waved them on, waiting until they settled their coat collars back around their necks.
“Get over it and move on, you idiot. You love her and it’s obvious she loves you. What’s the problem?”
“Shut up, Bry. This is my decision and I’m not ready to make it.”
“Don’t throw away the best thing that’s happened to us since we started the Double R.”
“I said, shut up!”
Bryan’s horse danced sideways, picking up his agitation. “Easy, boy,” he said to the horse. He pulled on the reins and stopped to settle his horse, and himself. Maybe Adam’s father had hit the boy upside the head once too many times.
He rolled his neck, hissing as a rivulet of freezing melt-water trickled from his collar down his chest. He was fine with being second in Candy’s heart. Having Adam settled with a loving woman like Candy, a woman he could share, was more than he’d thought possible. He’d watched the two lovebirds dance around each other, each one afraid of speaking their heart. If Adam didn’t speak up soon Candy might walk. Maybe that was her problem, that she wouldn’t stay without Adam’s love, and he hadn’t said a damn thing to her.
Too bad the man never left the ranch long enough to get over his past.
Bryan nudged his horse. It strode forward, knowing of the warm mash waiting at the barn. He soon caught up to Adam and the two men rode side by side, each in their own thoughts.
A few months ago they’d be coming home cold and exhausted just like now. But they’d walk into an empty house with a cold stove.
Thanks to Candy, today they’d get hot food, welcoming kisses and…
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“About this pirate thing,” said Bryan. “Don’t we have a wide sword perfect for smacking her bottom? We can give her a day without riding to soften up, do the scene tomorrow night.”
“Wait a whole twenty-four hours?”
Bryan laughed at Adam’s horrified expression. A few men glanced back and shook their heads. Johnny told Bryan the men though they were eccentric, but they worked hard and paid well. Since Candy arrived, the men boasted their cook made the best desserts in a few hundred miles.
“Jeeze,” continued Bryan. “Can’t you go a whole day without her? The anticipation will make the final event much better.”
“Yeah, I guess we can all use a good night’s sleep. Candy’s been acting even stranger since the last time Doc came to dinner. Maybe she’s tired.” He automatically adjusted as his horse curved down the path. “After a day of playing nice, we’ll surprise her. Teach her what plundering pirates do to reluctant virgins.”
“Deal. But you have to get her into the playroom.” Bryan kicked his heels and joined the line of men.
An hour later Bryan pushed the kitchen door behind him to keep out the rising wind.
“Hey, Candy, we’re home,” he called. He shrugged off his coat as Adam entered the mudroom behind him.
Adam shut the door and stopped, coat half undone. “Where’s Candy?”
“Upstairs, I guess.”
“She always calls out.” He pushed open the door to the kitchen and sniffed. He looked at the stove, bare except for the red kettle. He lifted it and touched the burner. “Cold as a brass monkey’s balls.”
Since Adam still had his boots on, Bryan headed up the stairs.
Two minutes later he pounded back down.
“Every damn thing we bought her is folded on the bed beside her suitcase. I don’t like it.”
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Adam pointed to the full key board by the back door. “She didn’t take one of the trucks.”
“She wouldn’t have gone out riding with this storm coming, would she?”
They looked at each other and strode to the door, jamming feet into boots. Adam wrenched it open to a face full of snow.
“Christ, she’s not stupid enough to go out in that?”
“It wasn’t this bad this morning. She doesn’t know the weather patterns.”
They were half way to the barn when one of the hands ran up to them.
“I went to feed Bess but she’s gone,” he yelled over the wind.
Bryan rubbed his hands over his face. The possibility of Candy stuck half way up the mountain in the dark, without shelter, supplies or the survival skills every local kid knew by age ten, shot a dagger into his heart. He grabbed Adam’s arm but the man shook him off, heading for the barn.
“Dammit, Adam,” Bryan grabbed the front of Adam’s shirt and yelled into his face. “You can’t go tonight. Even down here you can’t see more than a foot in front of your face. It’ll be worse in the mountains.”
Adam swung, clipping Bryan in the jaw and knocking him down.
Bryan dragged Adam with him, cursing through the blood from a split lip.
Adam fought for a moment before letting go. “Get off me.”
“You gonna to listen?”
“No more than I ever do.”
The hired hand ran to the barn with the news. Adam took Bryan’s outstretched hand and hauled himself to his feet. They’d only have a few minutes of privacy before all hell broke loose. Candy was the best thing that had happened to any of them, hired hands and owners.
Everyone would want to help.
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“What the hell was she thinking?” Adam wiped the melting snow out of his eyes.
“If she left early enough, she might have made it to the line camp.
She’d be safe there.”
“She’d better be safe or I’ll blister her bottom the next time I see her.”
They turned toward kitchen, men pelting out of the barn and bunkhouse.
“Aw, shit,” muttered Adam. “Who’s gonna tell Doc?”
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“Doc wasn’t surprised that she’s gone,” said Bryan. He slammed down the ancient wall-mounted phone with a crash. “Said she mentioned a ‘last ride’ when he spoke to her the other day.”
“Maybe she made it to the line camp,” said Adam.
“She liked it there,” said Johnny. When his bosses glared, the camp cook blanched in the spotlight. “We talked about it over the grocery list is all!”
Adam stopped pacing across the kitchen and turned to the old man, “What else did she say?”
“Are ye gonna fire me for talkin’ with Miz Candy?”
“Dammit, man, I’m not my father!”
“Ignore the roar, Johnny,” said Bryan. “Adam’s a mite upset. But you might know something to help us figure out where she might be.”
“She liked to go up there and make a cup of tea. Look out over the valley and pretend,” said Johnny.
“Pretend what?” Adam had his voice under control, but the corded muscles, visible where he’d turned back his cuffs, proved he was anything but calm.
“That she could live here forever. Said she had to leave ‘cause she loved it too much.” He gave a ‘women!’ shrug. “That never made much sense to me.”
* * * *
“Ow, ow, ow.” Candy flapped her tongue in the cold air. She should have waited a bit longer before trying the soup. She felt a bit
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like Robinson Crusoe, only with snow instead of sand, mountains instead of ocean and pines instead of palm trees.
She did
not
need rescue. Tomorrow she’d head down the mountain, likely meet Adam and Bryan on the way up, eager to make sure she got back safe.
Safe as houses.
Only, there weren’t any here, just a shack that barely kept the snow out and did little for the wind.
At least she was inside with a hot stove. Bess wasn’t so lucky, though the horse didn’t seem too unhappy once Candy got her into the lean-to behind the shack and covered her back with a blanket. She put out a few handfuls of grain and made sure the first melted snow went to the animal. After all, Bess managed to get her to the only place they might survive the night.
At least she had enough wood. She’d helped Joe haul branches and put them near the door to add to the chopped logs. She’d felt useful doing it, thinking that some little part of her would remain behind. She looked up at the rafters where she’d carved her initials, adding them to so many others. She’d leave a few letters but take the heartache with her.
As a child back East, she’d imagined being a pioneer wife, struggling to keep her husband and children alive in something as small and cold as this shack. Many women had done it, but many others died. Looking back at pioneer times it sounded so heroic. She now knew that living it would be a nightmare.
While living on a ranch like the Double R was too much work for most people, she liked it just fine.
If only Adam loved her. Her eyes prickled and she jammed them shut, holding a deep breath until she could let it go slowly.
No. Once she got back to the ranch house and gathered her things, she was gone. A week, even a few more days and she’d never be able to tear herself away, but staying would lead to shame, bitterness and, eventually, cold nothingness. She’d had enough shame
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and humiliation as a child when she hadn’t a choice. She’d been stupid to marry Dan to escape her parents.
Unless Adam loved her enough to tell his friends and neighbors to take a hike, she’d face the same situation again. While she knew he cared for her more than Dan ever did, he hadn’t said a thing above love.
When he came home and found the place empty, her luggage packed, it might shake him up enough to admit it. Either way, by morning she’d know.
She finished her soup and cleaned up. Thanks to the wind’s howl, and her aching heart, she’d not sleep tonight.
She curled up in the bed facing the stove and drifted, adding wood to the stove now and then. She allowed herself one last pity party, letting the tears fall. The wind died near morning and she sank into a deep sleep.
* * * *
Bryan, following Adam breaking trail in snowshoes, lifted his head at the faint whiff of smoke. They’d left the horses farther down the mountain, the steep slope and deep snow making it too dangerous for them. The rest of the men waited there as well.
He whistled, and at Bess’s whinny, surged forward.
“She’s there, Bry.”
The two men approached the door, mercifully free of a deep drift.
Adam slipped off his snowshoes and pushed the door open. Bryan, waiting to pass on the signal, watched Adam exhale, his breath showing white in the cold room. The single bed in the corner held a lump. A snoring lump. The sweetest sound Bryan ever heard. Adam shuddered, murmuring a prayer. He wiped his eyes and returned to the door.