Chapter Nineteen
When the train fromCrest Stone to Cañon City steamed by in the distance, Wade refused to look at it. Hazel was on there, somewhere. He could imagine her watching out the window, wondering where she’d gone wrong.
He squeezed his eyes shut, forced the thought away, and kept working.
He ignored questions from Kristiansen and the men about Hazel. After a sad supper of tinned beans and day-old bread Hazel had made the previous morning, he sat down at the small table in the kitchen, alone, and stared at a full glass of whiskey he’d poured and hadn’t touched.
The bottle was old, tucked away when he first arrived here after the house was built and meant to be shared with friends and neighbors. But all he could think about now as he looked at the amber liquid was Hazel’s quip that she assumed cowboys drank only whiskey and coffee.
Memories of her lurked in every corner of this house. How was that possible? She’d been here only a little over a month. And yet evidence of her presence was everywhere from the neat arrangement in the pantry to the bread he’d just eaten.
Wade dropped his head into his hands. He’d done the right thing, hadn’t he? He’d saved her life. And he’d saved his own.
Love was only a certain way into despair. His father had shown him that.
And yet he remembered the story Hazel had told about her own father. He’d grieved—and he’d continued living. It was impossible to imagine. So impossible that Wade couldn’t contemplate it for too long, not at the time she’d told the story.
But now . . . it wasn’t the difference in the men’s reactions to grief that set his mind spinning, but something else entirely.
They’d both had what Wade had started to think he had with Hazel.
Love.
And they’d had it for years. Long enough to build a life together, to raise a family, to enjoy several years in one another’s company. It was a wonderful, glowing sort of a thing to think about, and his soul soared at the very idea.
But it all had to end, and whoever was left . . . was left alone.
Wade turned the glass slowly around on the table, not really looking at it. It was a gamble, really. One either prepared for the inevitability of dying alone by eschewing love, or flew in the face of death by daring to love.
Which was better? Protecting one’s heart or taking the risk?
He stopped turning the glass. He’d never been a coward. He’d never shied away from danger or hard decisions.
And yet he’d run from Hazel like the yellowest man who’d ever lived.
He’d given into fear, hurt her deeply, and sent her away, even when she’d begged him to take the chance. She’d been right.
And he’d been gravely wrong.
Shouting from somewhere outside made him jump from his chair. Somehow the sun had set, casting the kitchen into darkness.
Heart pounding, he stumbled into the parlor and felt for the gunbelt he’d tossed onto the settee. There was more shouting, and he buckled the belt as he threw open the door—to a pistol aimed directly at his face.
Wade slowly raised his hands, and the man with the gun stepped aside to let another man move forward.
