Her voice cracked. “What if I change again? What if I want something else, or screw everything up? What if I buy the studio and fail, or leave it behind because I’d rather dance than teach?”
He stepped closer. “Then we change together. Or fail together. I don’t care. As long as we’re together.”
Her heart thudded, fragile and full. She wanted to believe him. She wanted to believe in herself.
A low, hoarse sound came from the hallway. Damian.
Abe turned, already moving toward the bedroom. Daphne stayed frozen, his proposal folded into the night before like a note she hadn’t answered.
She waited, but he didn’t return.
The ache in her heart bloomed again. Slowly, she climbed the stairs and slipped back into the guest bed, curling beneath the quilt that smelled faintly of pine, firewood, and something that might have been safety.
The door creaked open.
Abe stood there, holding a blue wool fisherman’s sweater. His voice was soft. “Are you warm enough?”
She wasn’t but she nodded anyway, surprise catching in her throat.
He crossed the room, helped her into the sweater, and tucked the blanket around her shoulders. His knuckles brushed her temple, and she leaned into the touch before she could stop herself.
“I’ll be downstairs if you need me.” Then he left, the door closing softly behind him.
She lay in the dark, her heart aching. Wishing she’d reached for him. Wishing she’d said something.
Instead, she stayed silent, the question waiting between them, patient as the storm.
The barn was colderthan Abe remembered.
He dragged the tarp off the generator, muscles protesting from the night before. Every part of him ached—physically, mentally, emotionally. He’d slept maybe an hour total, most of it with one ear tuned to Damian’s breathing. The other, to the beautiful woman sleeping above him.
Now he knelt in the straw and dust, fiddling with the choke and pull cord, pretending that solving a mechanical problem might fix the mess in his head.
The generator sputtered but didn’t catch. He exhaled and leaned his forehead against the cold metal frame. The SAT phone lay in the hay beside him, screen dark. No bars. He’d tried pointing it at the horizon. No signal. Nothing but dead silence.
Like the whole world was slipping away.
Like Daphne was slipping away.
He pictured her face when he tucked her in, her blue eyes soft, her body leaning into his hand like she wanted him to stay. Except she hadn’t asked him to.
And he hadn’t asked to stay.
He yanked the cord again. Nothing but a cough and a whine. The fuel smelled off. Maybe it was watered down? Or it could be the carburetor. He’d check the tank next, but he already knew he was stalling.
What had he expected? That she’d say yes just because she didn’t say no?
She was spinning out. She’d danced last night not because she was ready, but because she was desperate to feel something again. He’d known how hard this season of Nutcracker ballets was for her. Yet he’d watched her fall and thought that was the right moment to propose?
Maybe he didn’t know her as well as he thought.
Or maybe he didn’t know how to love someone who hadn’t chosen to stay yet.
Or maybe he was an idiot… like his brothers so often reminded him.
He pulled his parka tighter as the barn creaked, the cold settling in deep. A few rusted tools hung crooked on the wall. A feed bin had collapsed under the weight of snow leaking through a hole in the roof.
Gage had renovated the cabin, but everything in the barn was weathered and falling apart. Wet, and rotted.
