“Yeah. You should’ve seen him when Kavik joined us a few months ago.”
She tilted her head slightly. “Kavik?”
“X’s husky mix. Bramble was terrified of him.”
“Ah. Because he looks like a wolf?”
“Yeah.” This kind of conversation, he could handle. The dogs were a safe topic. The kittens were safe. “Kavik howls. A lot. Like, all the time. For no reason. Bramble was absolutely terrified,but he stood guard over the paddocks for a week, keeping watch over the horses, goats, and our alpaca. Trembling, but refusing to back down. Kavik just kept singing his lungs out, and Bramble just kept standing guard.”
Maggie smiled, her eyes crinkling at the corners. “Poor guy. But brave.”
“They’re friends now,” he added. “Sort of. Bramble still flinches when Kavik starts up, but he doesn’t run to guard the livestock.”
“Do you think he misses having a job?”
He paused, and Maggie also stopped moving, raising a brow in question as she glanced over her shoulder at him.
Was Bramble missing his job? Feeling useless without a clear purpose? He’d never considered it before, but now he did.
“Maybe,” he admitted after a drawn-out moment. But the thought of sending Bramble out into the night to guard livestock made a cold sweat break out along his spine, and he hurried to add, “But he’s getting too old to guard sheep.”
Wolfhounds had short lives compared to other dogs, and at six, Bramble was entering his senior years. Thankfully, he showed no signs of slowing down, but Anson didn’t want to think about the day it happened. Boone had lost his heart dog, Bishop, to old age last spring, and he still hadn’t recovered.
Losing Bramble? Without a doubt, that would destroy him.
If Maggie noticed his darkening mood, she didn’t mention it. “Well, now he has kittens to herd.” She laughed as Bramble glanced back at them and huffed, clearly telling them to hurry. “And, apparently, us.”
Us.
Such a simple word, packed with so much meaning.
They reached the forge door, and Anson held it open for her. The familiar scents of coal and metal and oil wrapped aroundhim as they stepped inside. Home. The only place he truly felt at ease.
Bramble had already taken up his post beside the kitten box, his massive head resting on the edge, amber eyes watching the tiny creatures with fierce protectiveness.
“Oh,” Maggie breathed, stopping short just inside the door. “Anson.”
He watched as she scanned his space—the forge itself, banked but still radiating heat, the anvil, the racks of tools arranged in order by type and size. Then her gaze fell on the kitten house, where the morning sunlight from the high windows illuminated it.
He shifted his weight, suddenly conscious of the sawdust on his jeans, the wood shavings in his beard. “Made them something better than towels.”
She moved toward the workbench, reaching out to touch the polished wood. Her fingers trailed over the dovetail joints, the perfectly fitted lid, the tiny staircase leading to the upper level.
“Anson, this is...” She looked up at him, her eyes bright with something that might have been tears. “This is beautiful. When did you—how did you have time?”
He shrugged, uncomfortable with her focus, with the naked emotion on her face. “Started last night. Finished this morning.”
She opened the lid carefully, revealing the three kittens nestled in their woolen bed. The orange one—Spark—mewed at the disturbance, tiny paws kneading the air.
“You built them a two-story house,” she said, wonderment in her voice. “With actual stairs.”
“For when they’re bigger. Kittens like height. Safety.”
She closed the lid gently and turned to face him fully. “You’re good at taking care of things.”
The simple statement, delivered without expectation or demand, loosened something in his chest. “Things are easier,”he admitted. “They don’t expect...” He gestured vaguely, searching for the right word.
“The right words?” she finished.
