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By the time I move her to the bed, she’s shivering. It’s a good sign—her body has the energy to work to warm itself. I cover her with the blankets and stoke up the fire to better heat the room. Only dim light comes through the window now, so I light the kerosene lamp and a few candles as well. Even little flames can help heat a small room.
I try to get her to drink a little water, but she’s not cooperating, and I don’t want the bed to end up wet. I pinch her arm gently and watch her skin snap back. She isn’t severely dehydrated, or her flesh would pucker. Water can wait. I hang her clothes and meager coat to dry out on the rack by the fire.
“Keep an eye on her, okay?” Solo only responds by whining, but he’s going to have to wait, too. I need to get the caribou back to the barn and stored where nothing can get to it.
I jog to the barn and grab the sled. Once I have it back to the cabin, I untie the caribou from the hood of the Jeep and strap it onto the sled. As I start to pull it back toward the barn, I wish I had found a husky pup instead of a cat. At least when they grow up, huskies could help with the work.
I store the caribou in the barn next to another one I’ve already cleaned and dressed, separating the best meat into usable portions and preparing the hide for whatever use I might have for it. I’ve built up a stockpile of furs over the years, and I usually end up with plenty of extra to sell or trade in the spring if I need a bit of cash to replenish supplies. I never sell the caribou hides though—the skins with the hollow fur are the best for winter weather protection, and that’s worth its weight in cash around here.
As I walk back from the barn, the wind picks up. I can feel the increased chill in the air and smell the impending storm before I even look up at the sky. Dark clouds loom from the west.
Back inside the cabin, the young woman hasn’t moved. Solo is absolutely screeching at this point, so my next task is to feed him. I watch the woman as Solo sucks on the bottle I bought for him in Yellowknife, trying to remember what she said her name is. I am pretty sure it starts with an S. Maybe Sarah? That doesn’t seem quite right. It is a little more unusual than that, and short for something else. I wanted her to leave me alone and hadn’t really been paying attention.
Solo drinks as much as he can fit into his tiny stomach. I swear he’s glaring at me for making him wait. When he’s finished, I rinse out the bottle while he decides to check out the woman in the bed. She’s still lying on her back, just as I left her. Solo starts out at the foot of the bed, sniffs at the lump under the blanket where her feet are, and then walks right up her legs, over her stomach, and stands on her chest. He stares at her face for a minute, carefully sniffing her nose.
He seems unimpressed.
“Women are trouble,” I tell him. “They’re best avoided. Sometimes you can’t help it though.”
Solo jumps down and entertains himself with a bit of bark he finds on the floor near the fireplace. I get caught up in watching him for a moment, trying to figure out how he could be so entertained just by pushing the bark around on the floor, but he seems happy enough to do it.
I should be so easily entertained.
As it is, I’m just tired. Between last night’s interrupted sleep, the hunt, and hauling this woman around, I’m about ready to lie down myself. It’s not late at all, but the sun is starting to set, and it will be dark quickly. I light the oil lamp and make some extra food when I cook dinner, assuming the woman will be hungry when she wakes up. Those donuts couldn’t have lasted too long.
While I eat, I crank my weather radio and tune into the forecast. As I suspected, there’s a storm on the way, and it’s looking like a big one. Several inches of snow are expected, followed by dropping temperatures. I glance at the unconscious woman, wondering just how long I am going to be stuck here with her.
She’s still out when I’m done eating, and I’m kind of at a loss about what to do next. For a while, I just stare at her, taking in her features. She’s pale white with light brown hair, which means she isn’t from anywhere around here. I remember the few words she spoke to me, and I know she’s from
the States and probably from the Midwest. Why would an American Midwest girl be this far into the Northwest Territories in the first place?
I remove my shirt and socks, then my jeans. Glancing at the woman in the bed, I leave my boxers on for her sake. She is bound to freak out when she wakes up in a strange place, and the last thing she would want to see is my dick waving around.
I stand in the middle of the room, looking back and forth between the chair and the bed and getting colder by the minute. I toss one more piece of wood on the fire just to buy myself some time. It would be most chivalrous of me to grab an extra blanket and sleep in the chair, but that would just kill my back, and I need to finish the caribou tomorrow before the storm hits. I also need to chop more wood, and doing that with an already aching back would suck.
Without knowing what else to do, and being totally unwilling to be gentlemanly enough to freeze my ass sleeping on the floor, I climb over the woman and slide into the blankets beside her.
Her body is still a little chilly, even under the blankets with the fire roaring. I move a little closer to her, pressing my body up against hers. I am encumbered with a vague memory of the last time I was in bed with Margot as a winter storm approached. It’s been awhile since I felt soft skin against mine, and I hope I don’t make a fool of myself.
Some things are more easily controlled than others.
I shiver a bit and pull the blanket up over my shoulder. I don’t know what to do with my arm. I try just laying it down my side, but it’s completely unnatural and uncomfortable. I’ll never be able to sleep with it in that position, so I slowly, carefully, slide my arm across her bare stomach and rest my fingers against the mattress on the other side of her.
“Please don’t wake up and punch me in the face,” I mutter as I close my eyes.
She doesn’t.
In fact, she’s still asleep when I open my eyes. I’m in almost the exact position I was in when I fell asleep—with one arm tossed over her. Her hand lies across my forearm and her head is tilted toward me. Her skin is warm now, our combined body temperature creating a pocket of heat under the thick blankets. The firelight is dim, but I can still make out her face. Her breathing is steady, which is a good sign. The light is too dim to know for sure, but I think she has color back in her face as well.
While I’m still staring into her face, her eyes open, and she grips my arm tightly with her fingers.
I brace myself, expecting her to freak out when she wakes up and finds herself in a strange place, lying in an unfamiliar bed with an unknown man lying beside her. She lies perfectly still for a long moment before slowly looking around the room. When her gaze finally reaches me, I’m surprised at the calm look in her eyes.
“Where am I?” she asks softly.
“My cabin.”
“How did I get here?”
