Josie had seen broken bones before.
Her youngest brother had fallen from a hayloft when he was nine and fractured his arm. Her mother had still been alive then and had shown Josie how to splint it with two boards wrapped in strips from an old petticoat.
Hayes’s injury was worse.
Much worse.
His right leg bent at an angle a leg had no business making.
His skin had turned gray beneath his beard.
Josie forced herself not to panic.
“Can you feel your foot?”
Hayes clenched his jaw.
“Yes.”
“Move your toes.”
He did.
Relief washed through her.
She looked toward the cabin thirty feet away.
Hayes outweighed her by nearly a hundred pounds.
Dragging him carelessly could make the injury worse.
The temperature was already below freezing.
Leaving him outside could kill him.
Josie stood.
“Stay here.”
Hayes gave her a look.
“I was planning a walk.”
She almost laughed.
Instead she ran.
Inside, she grabbed blankets, rope, two straight boards, and the small hand sled Hayes used to haul meat from the trap line.
When she returned, snow had begun collecting in his beard.
“I’m going to straighten it.”
Hayes’s expression hardened.
“You know how?”
“Enough.”
“That doesn’t inspire confidence.”
“You can freeze politely instead.”
His mouth twitched.
“Go ahead.”
Josie cut away the trouser leg.
No bone had broken through the skin.
Good.
She positioned the boards.
“This is going to hurt.”
“It already hurts.”
“No. I mean really hurt.”
Hayes looked at her.
“Josie.”
“Yes?”
“Do it.”
She did.
His shout echoed across the valley.
For half a second Josie was sixteen again, kneeling beside her mother while fever took her, knowing there was no doctor coming.
Then the memory vanished.
Hayes needed her.
She tied the splints tightly enough to stabilize the leg, wrapped him in blankets, and maneuvered him onto the sled.
It took nearly an hour to move thirty feet.
By the time she got him inside, her arms shook.
Hayes was barely conscious.
For the next three days, Josie slept in a chair beside his bunk.
His fever rose the second night.
That frightened her more than the fracture.
She changed cold cloths across his forehead and forced willow-bark tea between his lips.
He cursed the taste.
“That’s how I know you’re getting better,” she told him.
“Because I complain?”
“Because you’re annoying.”
He opened one eye.
“You weren’t this talkative when I brought you here.”
“I was evaluating you.”
“And?”
“Still evaluating.”
His eye closed again.
But he smiled.
The fracture slowly stabilized.
The fever broke.
Hayes hated helplessness.
Josie discovered this quickly.
On the sixth morning she found him attempting to stand with one hand braced against the table.
“What are you doing?”
“Getting coffee.”
“You’re breaking your leg again.”
“Coffee’s worth considerable risk.”
“Sit.”
Hayes looked over his shoulder.
Josie pointed at the bunk.
“Now.”
“You’ve become very commanding.”
“You made the mistake of surviving.”
He sat.
Josie handed him coffee.
“Thank you.”
The words were quiet.
Something about them made her uncomfortable.
She busied herself with breakfast.
Over the following weeks, their roles reversed.
Hayes could not collect wood, check the traps, bring water, or care for the horse.
Josie did all of it.
At first Hayes tried to instruct her from inside.
“Creek bank gets slick near the bend.”
“I know.”
“Take the shorter axe.”
“I know.”
“Don’t go west of the ridge if weather—”
“Hayes.”
“What?”
“I know.”
He grumbled.
She left smiling.
Yet the work was dangerous.
One afternoon Josie failed to return before dark.
Hayes sat beside the window, leg immobilized, watching snow swallow the last light.
He told himself she was capable.
He told himself storms slowed everyone.
He told himself she had probably found a trap needing repair.
Then darkness came fully.
His chest tightened.
Hayes reached for the crutch Josie had fashioned.
He stood.
Pain shot through his leg.
He did not care.
He had reached the door when Josie pushed it open.
Snow covered her from head to toe.
“What are you doing up?”
“Where were you?”
She blinked.
“One trap had frozen.”
“You should’ve left it.”
“It had a rabbit.”
“I don’t care about the rabbit.”
Josie stopped.
Hayes realized he was angry.
Not because she had done anything wrong.
Because he had been afraid.
He had not felt fear like that since his younger brother died fifteen years earlier.
Hayes lowered his voice.
“You were gone too long.”
Josie stared at him.
“I’m sorry.”
“No.”
“What?”
“Don’t apologize. Just... if something delays you, fire one shot.”
Her eyes softened.
“So you know I’m alive.”
“Yes.”
The answer came too quickly to hide.
Something changed between them.
Josie stepped inside and closed the door.
“I’ll fire twice.”
“Why twice?”
“One means trouble.”
Hayes considered it.
“Smart.”
“I occasionally surprise people.”
“You surprise me daily.”
Neither of them spoke for several seconds.
Josie removed her gloves.
Hayes returned to his bunk.
But the air in the cabin felt different.
January arrived with brutal cold.
The temperature dropped so low that moisture froze against the inside of the windows.
They conserved firewood.
At night Josie read aloud from the three books Hayes owned: a Bible, an old collection of Shakespeare, and a damaged adventure novel missing its final thirty pages.
The missing ending infuriated Josie.
“You’ve owned this for how long?”
“Twelve years.”
“And you never found out what happened?”
“No.”
“How do you live with that?”
“Mostly by chopping wood.”
She stared at him.
“You’re impossible.”
“You’ve mentioned that.”
Sometimes Hayes told stories.
He had grown up in Missouri.
His father had been a blacksmith.
His mother had died when Hayes was nineteen.
His younger brother Daniel followed him west.
Daniel never returned from a hunting trip.
A spring thaw revealed his body months later.
Hayes had not lived comfortably around people afterward.
“Was that why you came up here?” Josie asked.
They sat on opposite sides of the stove.
“Partly.”
“What was the other part?”
Hayes looked toward the fire.
“People ask too many questions.”
Josie smiled faintly.
“I’ve noticed.”
He glanced at her.
“And mountains don’t?”
“Mountains ask plenty.”
“What do they ask?”
“Whether you’re prepared. Whether you’re stupid. Whether you respect them.”
Hayes considered that.
“Fair point.”
She hesitated.
“Did you ever marry?”
“No.”
“Almost?”
Hayes gave her a suspicious look.
“That sounds like a question.”
“It is.”
“You getting comfortable?”
“Maybe.”
He looked into his cup.
“There was a woman once.”
Josie waited.
Hayes continued.
“Her name was Anne. She wanted a house in town. Children. Church on Sundays. Neighbors.”
“And you wanted mountains.”
“I thought I did.”
“What happened?”
“She married somebody else.”
“Were you heartbroken?”
Hayes considered lying.
“Yes.”
Josie nodded.
“Good.”
He frowned.
“Good?”
“It means you’re human.”
“I’d hoped that had been established.”
“Not completely.”
He laughed.
Later that evening Josie climbed into the loft and lay awake.
She did not like thinking about Anne.
The realization unsettled her.
Hayes had never touched Josie except when necessary.
He had given her food, shelter, a weapon, privacy, and choices.
Every kindness somehow made him more dangerous in a way she had not expected.
Not dangerous because he might hurt her.
Dangerous because she was beginning to care whether he did not.
February brought a new problem.
Their flour supply dropped faster than expected.
Hayes examined the shelves.
“We’ll make it.”
“Barely.”
“Spring could come early.”
“Or late.”
Josie counted again.
Beans. Cornmeal. Salt pork. Dried apples. Potatoes.
Enough calories if rationed carefully.
Not enough variety.
“I can add what we trap.”
Hayes shook his head.
“Too much snow.”
“I’ve been checking the line.”
“Close traps only.”
“We need meat.”
“We need you alive more.”
Josie bristled.
“I’m not helpless.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
“You think because I’m a woman—”
“I think because I’ve lived here twelve winters and watched storms kill men who knew these mountains better than you.”
That stopped her.
Hayes softened.
“You’ve proven enough.”
Her anger faded.
“What?”
“You don’t need to keep proving you deserve to be here.”
Josie looked away.
“I’m not.”
“Yes, you are.”
“You don’t know what I’m doing.”
“I know you wake before me, work until after dark, eat less than I do, and apologize every time you use something from the pantry.”
Josie said nothing.
Hayes shifted painfully on the bunk.
“You owe me nothing.”
“You spent forty dollars.”
“I spent forty dollars because Pike had rope around your wrists.”
“That still means—”
“No.”
His voice was firm.
“The money bought Pike’s agreement to get out of the way. It didn’t buy you.”
Josie looked at him.
Hayes continued.
“When that trail opens, you can leave.”
A strange ache appeared beneath her ribs.
“That’s what you want?”
Hayes’s expression changed.
“What I want isn’t the point.”
“What do you want?”
He looked away.
For the first time since she had met him, Hayes Mercer seemed afraid of an answer.
Before he could speak, a sound came from outside.
A horse.
Not their horse.
Both froze.
Then came another sound.
Men’s voices.
Josie went pale.
Nobody should have been able to reach the cabin in February.
Hayes grabbed his rifle.
“Upstairs.”
“No.”
“Josie.”
“I’m not hiding.”
The pounding came at the door.
“Mercer!”
Hayes knew that voice.
He looked at Josie.
Her fear told him she knew it too.
Pike.
“Open up!”
Hayes tried to stand.
Pain nearly dropped him.
Josie caught his arm.
Outside, Pike shouted again.
“I know you got her in there!”
Josie’s face drained of color.
“How?”
Hayes checked the rifle.
“Doesn’t matter.”
“What does he want?”
Pike answered through the door.
“You cheated me, Mercer! Her daddy says forty dollars wasn’t enough!”
The cabin became silent.
Hayes’s eyes hardened.
He moved toward the door.
Josie grabbed his sleeve.
“You can barely stand.”
“Don’t need to stand long.”
“There could be more than one.”
“There are.”
“How many?”
Hayes listened.
“Three.”
Josie’s hand shook.
Then she remembered the revolver upstairs.
The one Hayes had given her.
She looked at him.
For months, Hayes had protected her by giving her space.
Now the men who had once treated her like property had crossed a frozen mountain to reclaim her.
And for the first time in her life, Josie did not intend to disappear inside herself.
“Hayes.”
He turned.
Her voice was steady.
“Give me thirty seconds.”
Then Josie climbed the ladder toward the gun.