“Miss Hayward,” Silas said, his tone not unkind but dead practical, “I drove two days through a blizzard because there ain’t another soul between Cheyenne and Red Willow willing to come to this ranch. The boy screams at night. The father don’t speak much at all. The last woman cried for a week and left on a supply wagon.”
He flicked the reins.
“This ain’t a position folks fight over. Good luck.”
The wagon rolled away. Thirty seconds later, snow swallowed it like it had never existed.
Ruth stood in the yard of a stranger’s ranch, ice soaking through her boots, torn dress flapping against her thigh, cold so deep it felt like the world had looked directly at her and decided she hadn’t suffered enough yet.
Then the front door opened.
A man filled the frame.
Tall. Lean. Hollowed out in the way men get when they stop sleeping properly. Arms crossed, jaw locked, eyes the color of creek ice and just as warm.
