She jumped at the sound of her name.
“I am content to make a pallet on the floor. Ye’ll have the bed to yerself.”
“The floor? Are you sure?”
“I slept fine on the groond in the stables,” he lied. “I shall do the same here. And if ye prefer me on the far side of the room, I understand.”
“Okay. Yeah. Great.” She grimaced. “Because, you know, I’m still married.”
He snorted. “Pure tosh. He’s given ye up, so none of this…” He gestured to her body, head to toe, “None of ye belongs to him. But that doesnae mean I’d take aught that wasnae mine.”
She swallowed hard, and the height of her brows told him he’d done little to relieve her worries.
“I’ve made a mush of it, but ken that ye have nothin’ tae fear from me, Maddy lass. Yer Yeti-man is an honorable one, I vowit.” He turned his hot face away from her, snatched up the damp longshirt and plaid and took them to the tool wall to hang them to dry. His blush alone likely did half the job.
YerYeti-man? Was he mad?
She took pity on him and said nothing more. When he finally returned to face her, she was on her hands and knees mopping up the melted snow he’d tracked inside. He kicked off his house boots and set them by the door, then waited to see what else she planned for them.
“I cleared the path to the privy,” he said.
She scrambled to her feet, collected her jacket, and pointed to the bed once again before flying to the door. “Get comfortable while I’m gone!”
He stared at the bedstead and wondered what the devil she expected when she returned.
Kee-un MacInnis hadn’t been kidding.He hadn’t just cleared a path, he’d cleared a wide one. He’d also removed three feet of snow that had blocked the door and broken off the solid frame of ice that had sealed the outhouse shut.
Without the wind blowing, and a lazy snow replacing the blizzard, the temperature was warmer now, with the sun going down, than it had been around noon. After I took care of business, I headed back to the house, but a set of wide footprints, made by snowshoes, piqued my interest. They headed off to the left, away from the row of houses.
Cian hadn’t only been fetching things from the barn, shoveling snow, and chopping wood…
We already had enough produce and meat for the day, and for the next morning. And I’d already seen everything hebrought inside on the little sled. He hadn’t said anything about having animals to take care of. And after I’d followed the footprints for a hundred feet, I saw no signs of another barn, or building of any kind.
He said no one had crossed his threshold. He hadn’t said no one else lived nearby, had he?
A hundred yards further, the road curved off to the right, and the footprints turned sharply and cut straight into the woods that filled the rest of the valley and spread up the mountain. I vaguely wondered what kind of animals were watching me pass, but my curiosity outweighed my paranoia at that point.
The trail was fairly straight. He’d come this way before, taken these same steps, even though the towering pines all looked alike. Considering how easily someone could get lost there, I was reminded of a funhouse. Turn in any direction, and you wouldn’t know where you were.
But I didn’t have to worry. I had tracks to lead me and a clear trail to follow back. I wasn’t dropping breadcrumbs that the birds would eat. And there was no wind there to cover up my deep footprints.
The snow wasn’t as deep there, in the woods, as if half of what should have fallen was still stuck high in those upper branches, waiting for a breeze to shake it all loose so it could finish its fall.
The trees thinned out ahead, leaving a clearing, and Kee-un’s footprints headed straight into the center, leaving decorative stitches across white cloth. The little mystery was about to be solved!
The snow in the clearing was deep, tapering around the edges near the trees where the wind had uncovered a solid row of small rocks made into a perfect ring. All uniform, about the same diameter as an extra-large pizza, and each topped with its own mound of snow.
A string of snow-white pearls. And in the center of the mound that filled the clearing, stood a tall flat rock, chiseled and shaped into a rough arch.
Since Cian’s tracks led straight to it, I followed, and as I got closer to the arch, I realized what it all meant.
Cian dartedabout the house for half an hour, trying to guess what would best please the woman. Surely, she hadn’t meant for him to be waiting on the bed. But she hadn’t pointed to the chair, had she?
Nay, she hadnae.
The word comfortable soon became an enigma, and he paced and paced, eager for her to return and better explain herself. But she did not.
Had he frightened her away completely?
