I was mid-meal, my spoon deep in a bowl of oatmeal, when the door creaked open and Major walked in.
GLORIOUS
Polished, and entirelytoohandsome, Major locked his eyes on me. And my knees felt like crepes. Without the dust of the road on him, without the wind-whipped roughness, he was dangerous. He tipped his hat, and my throat worked to get the oatmeal down.
“Everywhere you are, there is Major,” Lessie said pointedly.
I’d still not found my voice, but Major’s eyes hadn’t left the spoon in my mouth. He hadn’t even looked up at Lessie. When I pulled the spoon out and placed it on the counter, his eyes did not follow it.
“Care to take a walk, Miss Caroline?”
“On the main street?” I asked.
He nodded.
“Lessie, I’ll take Freddie Karol and let you work in peace for a spell,” I said.
She had agreed too fast. And Lessie’s eyes moved over me.
It was indecorous, entirely unbecoming of a woman of poise, and I knew it. Knew it the moment I had bundled little Freddie Karol too haphazardly, my hands unsteady, my movements rushed, until Lessie had to gently pull her baby near, securing the wrap herself, and said, “Daylight still gonna be there when you get outside.”
I nodded and let her secure the baby on my back.
The walk was warm. Stifling.
I kept my chin high, my posture perfect, but my pulse was another thing entirely, wild and out of rhythm.
Beside me, Major walked with that maddening, unhurried grace of his, his presence stretching into the space between us, filling it with something too big to ignore.
“I thought I’d tell you something,” he said, voice smooth. “Something that might help make your decision.”
All around the little plaza, the good citizens of Carsondale were trying their very best not to stare while absolutely, unequivocally staring. The shopkeepers. The men tipping their hats like they had somewhere better to be. The wives pretending to be fascinated by cookie tins. All of them side-eyeing Major and me like we were a two-horse parade. No malice in it, not really. Just the lean of curiosity, of knowing something was happening, even if they didn’t know what shape it would take yet.
Major didn’t seem to notice. Or rather, he did, and simply didn’t care.
“I’m settin’ roots,” he said, in that low, sturdy way of his that always seemed to start from the boots up. “I been reading law,” he added. “Under the county judge. Figure I’ll take the Colorado bar in a year’s time, practice right here.”
I blinked. “So… bounty hunter to barrister?” I laughed, and the sound came out lighter than intended, girlish, like something from someone with a ribbon in her hair. Even Freddie gurgled behind me.
Major smiled at the boy. “Gotta keep things interesting. Besides—”
And here he paused. The whole air around us shifted. He took a step closer, and the heat rushed up my neck.
“I need you to see I’m serious,” he said. “That I’m stayin’. That I’m not just followin’ you around like some stray dog who got too attached.”
My gloves were damp. My brain knew I should say somethingrefined. But instead, my stomach dropped into the soles of my shoes.
“Major, your brother—”
He cut me off, already gearing up for rejection. “I know you came here to marry him,” he said quickly. “But if there’s even the smallest part of you—any part—that might give me a chance…”
I opened my mouth. “Your brother chose Bertha.”
That stopped him.
“What?”
“Your brother,” I said, “chose the French chef.”
