My eyes narrow. “Don’t have anything to prove to anyone.”
She laughs, shakes her head, and takes another sip of coffee.
“What?”
“I knew you’d say that. You’ve definitely got the strong, silent type bit down.”
“No one to talk to … usually,” I counter.
“Is that why you seem like you’re hating every moment of conversing?”
“No,” I protest too quickly. “Talking to you’s good. Rest of the world? Not so much.”
She cocks her head, understanding softening her gaze. “So, how’d you end up out here all alone, Denver?”
“Wanted to be.”
“For any particular reason?” she asks.
A shiver runs down my spine. Cold metal, darkness, harsh lights—white, blue, red. A steady voice, “Sir, tell me your name.”
I shrug. “Needed to live my life on my terms.”
Recognition flares behind her eyes. Her smile intensifies. “Like me, then. That’s why I’m here.”
I nod, shift my weight, slide the eggs onto a plate, then add greens to fry with garlic, salt, pepper, and chopped bacon. “Explain.”
She swallows hard, looks at the ceiling. “My best friend, Maya, died suddenly. One minute here, the next gone.”
“How?”
“Motorcycle accident. She and her boyfriend were both killed.”
I nod, listening.
“Maya and I always dreamed of leaving the city behind, moving somewhere remote, pristine, where we could get back to nature—what really matters. It was always five years down the road. Never today until she had no more days.” Her voice cracks at the end, and she looks away.
“Sometimes, surviving’s the hardest part,” I say.
She nods, smiling at me.
Silence settles, only the crackling of the fire, the sound of Bear’s tail thudding on the wood floor as he draws closer, nuzzles her hand like a sympathetic brother.
“Car accident for me,” I say before I can catch myself. I rub the place over my chest where my heart is.
“What happened?”
“Out on a work call with my partner, Steve. He drove. Massive heart attack on a back road. Windy, two-laner. Killed him instantly. Truck plowed off an embankment into a gorge.” My face sours. “Messy.”
“I’m so sorry,” she says quietly.
I nod. Don’t want to get into the details. The rehabilitation and scars, the PTSD, which still haunts me. My injuries from before in the service. A broken man. Useless to the world.
“Is that the reason for your limp?” she asks, facing the awkward head-on. Makes me like her even more.
“Prosthetic leg from the knee down.” The air buzzes between us. Too intimate. But I can’t help myself. “Slept together, but you didn’t notice?” I tease.
She smiles, not easily embarrassed. “Kind of had a wall of fur between us.”
