Selena Kitt - Beauty

“Jolee!” He followed her, bursting through the door she’d just slammed behind her. “Talk to me!”

“You left me alone!” She sat on the bed with her accusation, looking up at him with such a dejected look he was instantly sorry. He wanted to scoop her up and make her feel safe again.

Silas looked around the room, noting the difference instantly. Curtains-she had hand-sewn them, patch-worked from his old t-shirt material.

“Tell me what happened,” he said flatly, going over to the window and pulling the curtain aside, somehow already knowing what he was going to see.

“I think someone was looking in the windows.” Her voice trembled and Silas saw the footprints in the snow, coming in from the woods and retreating again.

“Did anyone see you?”

“I don’t think so.” She sniffed. “I only went out to milk Anna in the morning and it was still dark.”

He considered this information. Whoever it was had been wearing boots, big ones.

Definitely a man. He’d have to go out and investigate, see if there were any shell casings, arrows, signs he hoped he’d find.

“It was probably just a curious hunter.” Silas let the curtains drop, turning back to Jolee.

“My land backs up to state land about five miles to the north.”

“What if it wasn’t?” Her hands twisted in her lap and she looked up at him helplessly.

“What if he found us?”

“He didn’t.” Silas sat on the bed, feeling it sag under his weight, and put a comforting arm around her thin shoulders-she was actually quivering with fear. He told her the truth, in spite of her anxiety. “Carlos is no peeping Tom. If he’d found you, you would know it.”

“Maybe.” Jolee turned toward him, letting him comfort her, tucking her head under his chin. He could smell the sweetness of her shampoo and he let the heady scent envelop him.

“So did you see anything? Hear anything?” he asked, stroking her hair. She’d stopped having so many bad dreams and while he was glad, he missed holding and comforting her like this in the darkness.

“I heard something.” She pressed herself closer at the memory. “Last night, late. I thought it might be you coming home.”

The longing in her voice made him want to smile. “What did you hear?”

“I was sleeping.” She shrugged. “I heard something outside my window, but by the time I got up to go look, there was nothing. Then this morning, I saw the tracks.” He nodded, hoping it was just a lost hunter, out too late, looking for somewhere to crash for the night. He’d been careful, backing his truck up into the make-shift garage out back so the license plate wasn’t visible even if Jolee had gone in for something and forgot to shut the barn door. If one of Carlos’s guys had stumbled on this place-and it was purposefully well-hidden dimly lighted-there was no reason for them to believe it was connected to him or to Jolee.

Unless one of them had seen her.

“You’re safe.” He said the words and hoped she believed them. Even if there was danger lurking, he had every intention of protecting her.

Of course, he’d intended to protect Isabelle too.

“I’m glad you’re home.” She sounded both relieved and truly happy. “I did miss you, you big lug.” She went to pound her fist against his chest to emphasize the point and he caught it, stifling a laugh.

“So did you fix me dinner, woman?” he teased. She looked up and stuck her tongue out at him. That did make him laugh. “I smelled something good a mile away.”

“Venison chili.” She stood, picking up a skein of yarn and her knitting needles. “I used some of your canned tomatoes. I hope you don’t mind.”

“They’re for eating.” He followed her out, shutting the door behind him before heading toward the good smells in the kitchen. “What are you working on now?” Jolee put her mass of flesh-colored yarn and needles on the counter, peering under a pot lid and stirring. The already delicious scent of food increased tenfold and Silas’s stomach rumbled. He’d been living on jerky for two days.

“Another mask.” She held it up. “I made my own pattern. Since you won’t show me yours, I’m going to give you a face.”

“Talented girl.” He studied it-she only had a third of it completed, but he could see the image beginning to take shape in the stitches. “Keep it up and I’m going to need to buy you some sheep just to keep you in yarn.”

“You should learn.” She pushed the yarn toward him and let him finger it while she spooned bowls of piping hot chili. “It’s a good skill to know out here. That way you can even make clothes for yourself when I’m…”

She didn’t finish the sentence and Silas looked at her, his heart beating too fast, as she handed him a spoon. Of course she didn’t have to finish the sentence. He finished it easily enough in his head. When I’m gone.

Gone.

He didn’t want to think about that. He’d lost too much in his life and didn’t want consider losing her too. They didn’t talk about what might happen in the future, or what had happened to either of them in the past, and it was better that way. Thoughts of the past brought pain and looking into the future was too uncertain. Staying right here in the moment was the only thing that mattered.

Jolee was a surprise to him every day and he couldn’t have expressed what a joy it was to wake up to the sound of her singing in the new shower every morning, how much he looked forward to stoking the fire in the woodstove at night so she could warm her feet while he whittled and she knitted and they played the “would you rather?” game.

Would you rather live in the country or the city? His answer was obvious.

Would you rather eat a bug or step on a nail? She made faces at him and refused to choose.

Jolee had introduced him to the game and he played with relish, seriously considering even the most ridiculous options, always giving her an honest answer. Of course, there were questions neither of them asked-they had a tacit understanding. But now a question came to mind that he didn’t want to ponder.

Would you rather lose Jolee or Isabelle?

He couldn’t choose. Isabelle was gone, and although he still searched for her, nothing was going to bring her back. But Jolee was here-safe and smiling at him from across the table, chattering on about how Anna had missed his big, warm hands and objected to her small, cold ones-and he wouldn’t let anything happen to her. He would make sure of that.

He wasn’t even going to let himself consider the alternatives.

* * * *

She tried to scream, but nothing came out. Opening her eyes, she saw only blackness.

The darkness was suffocating, air like lead weight in her lungs-she could barely pull a breath.

She listened hard for something that would center her, give her a sense of location, and it took moments that felt like hours to discern the soft, hitching sound of Silas snoring down the hall.

The bed beneath her tensed limbs grew slowly familiar, as did the whistling of the wind through the pines outside her window and the sudden, startled call of an owl. It had just been a dream. She was safe. She was home. Rolling over and pulling the covers with her, Jolee willed her heart to slow, her breathing to return to some semblance of normal. It had been months since she called out for Silas in the middle of the night because of a bad dream, but she still wished for him upon waking, even if she didn’t say anything.

There was something so comforting about the man, just his presence in a room made her feel more calm. Of course, that wasn’t all it made her feel. Closing her eyes, she tried to drift off again, but the weight of the silence, the darkness, and her own loneliness were too great. The bed was too small, the sheets too rough. Nothing felt right.