We left the lobby in silence, our boots crunching on the crusted snow. The wind had picked up again and whippedstrands of her wet hair across her face. She hugged her arms tight to her chest as we walked. Her jacket was zipped all the way up, but she still shivered with each breath. She hated needing help. I could tell by how tightly she held herself together, like she’d rather splinter herself in half than lean on someone else. I knew the feeling well.
“You know this is wildly inappropriate,” she muttered.
“So is hypothermia.”
“This isn’t funny.”
“I didn’t say it was.”
“People will talk.”
I huffed out a breath that steamed in the cold. “People always talk.”
“That’s easy for you to say. You’ve already proved yourself.”
The words hit harder than she probably meant. Sure, I’d proved myself once — overseas, in a uniform. Out here? I wasn’t sure who the hell I was anymore. I slowed my stride just enough so she could keep up without rushing. “You think sleeping under the same roof for one night’s going to ruin your reputation?”
“I think it could,” she said, her voice strained. “Because I don’t have one yet. I’m still building it.”
Something twisted low in my gut. She was terrified of losing what she hadn’t even built yet, and I couldn’t blame her. But I hated that she thought being near me might be the thing that broke it.
The path wound through the pines, the moonlight silvering the snow-laden branches. Our shadows stretched long and dark over the drifts.
“Have you always worked this hard?” I asked.
Her brows drew together. “What?”
“Out at Iron Spur. You were always around, but… quiet. Organized. Like you were running the place from the background.”
“I had to be.” She kept her eyes straight ahead. “Stetson was gone, Slade was running the cattle side with Dad. Somebody had to keep the books and make sure we didn’t lose the ranch.”
Steel laced through her voice. More than I remembered. It hit me then that the girl on the porch had grown into this—someone who didn’t wait for permission, who carried her entire future in her two bare hands and dared the world to take it from her.
“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised,” I said.
She glanced at me, quick and sharp. “Surprised about what?”
“That you turned out to be a general in heels.”
A faint, unwilling laugh broke from her before she caught it. “I’m not wearing heels.”
“Yet.”
She shook her head and kept walking, but her shoulders weren’t quite as tight.
My suite was warm and still when we stepped inside. The fire had died down to a low glow, and the air was tinged with wood smoke and pine. Sidney stopped just inside the door. Water dripped from her hair onto the entryway rug. Her gaze swept across the space and took it all in… the wide-plank floors, the leather chairs, the glass wall overlooking the frozen lake like black marble under the moon.
“Of course this is your room,” she muttered.
“I splurged,” I said as I set her duffle on the armchair and crouched in front of the hearth to stir the embers back to life. Flames licked up slow and lazy, painting the room in gold. “The bed’s all yours.”
“No,” she said, her tone final.
“Yes.”
She crossed her arms. “I’m not kicking you out of your own bed.”
“You’re not kicking me out. I insist.”
