Page 25 of Hearts at War

“Anyone there? I see your light on,” she called out, pairing it with another series of knocks.

Dammit. The light from the bedside lamp. I wished I’d shut it off already. Attracting visitors wasn’t a goal of mine, regardless of who she was.

“Hello?” she called out again.

She didn’t sound distressed. No begging hint made me think she was in dire need of a rescue. No cries, whimpers, or sobs.

“I need help,” she said.

I narrowed my eyes. This wasn’t Main Street. My cabin wasn’t in a public area for just any old pedestrian to walk up to. I was out here at the Grand River Ranch, inaccessible without a decent drive and long walk.

Curious now, and worried about what could have brought a woman out this way, I released my clutch on the blanket and slowly walked up to the door. I hadn’t kicked out of the lightweight shoes I used as slippers yet. Nor had I taken off my hoodie that I’d put on to stay cozily warm after my nuclear-hot shower. I was covered enough to open the door, and I did.

A young woman stood there, staring at me like she’d been waiting on me for an hour.

Pinks and purples showed in a disarray of her thin, starchy-looking hair. The light from the lamp behind me reflected off the metal rings in her nose, lip, brows, and more. Black garments hung off her body, but the dark colors of her attire didn’t completely hide how thin and gaunt she looked. Maybe she was always that pale and skinny, but facing her with the light drizzle still misting outside, she damn near looked like an apparition.

“Hey!” She perked up, brightening at the sight of me. “You’re home.”

I raised my brows, keeping my body right where it was, to block her entrance into the cabin. Holding on to the door was my best shot at another barricade, my arm stiff and rigid. “Do...we know each other?”

“No.” She smiled and shrugged. “But hello there, neighbor.”

Neighbor?

“You live out here?” I asked. She was the last person I’d expect to see living on the ranch. And that wasn’t just because she looked like the opposite of a ranch hand. Honestly, I was surprised anyone could claim to be living out here. I had yet to see anyone else coming or going from the cabins I passed on the way back to the road, and I’d happily assumed I was the sole tenant this way.

“Yep.” She answered too quickly to dupe me. “My cabin’s back thataway,” she said, pointing in the opposite direction of the bumpy road.

“Uh-huh.” I was instantly suspicious. It was hard not to be, with how alone I felt back here close to the woods, but I had David to thank for this quick-to-grow skepticism of what others told me.

And everything this teen told me seemed like a lie. If she was a neighbor, why hadn’t I seen her before? I’d been here for over two weeks now.

“But I lost my key,” she said, cringing in a self-deprecating way that was probably supposed to make me relax. “Silly me.”

“Sorry to hear that,” I said, monotone and staying skeptical.

“Yeah. It sucks.” She wrapped her arms around her thin frame and shivered. “It’s freaking cold out here.”

Uh, no. No way. I pulled my door closed that much more. If she was trying to get in here and mooch off my hospitality, she wouldn’t get far. I was raised by two mooches, always on the lookout. My mom and dad had always done this kind of stuff, taking advantage of others’ goodwill. A good Samaritan was their ideal target, and inversely, it trained me to always have my guard up with people looking for “help” or a handout. I hated to be this cautious, but with the childhood I had, it was impossible for me to expect any different.

“It’s getting cold out here,” she said, as if her overly exaggerated full-body shiver had gone unnoticed. It hadn’t. And it was chilly out there, especially with the rain stopping and that icy mist hovering close to the saturated ground.

“I was hoping you’d help me get into my cabin.”

Huh. So, she wasn’t trying to ask to stay in here? She just wanted help to get in somewhere else? “Your cabin?” I asked, still hung up on that detail. One, she looked too young to be a rancher and actual employee tenant. Two, where had she been for me not to notice her sooner?

“Yeah.” She smiled. “My cabin. Can you come with me and help me get to the spare key?”

Red flags popped up all over. I wasn’t buying this.

“How can I know that you actually live around here?”

“Well, I just told you,” she stated, like I was slow.

“And I’m supposed to just take a stranger’s word? Like that?” I snapped my fingers. “You knocked on the wrong door to find a gullible idiot.”

She smirked. “I can prove it with my papers in the cabin, but if I can’t get in there...” She shrugged, turning the movement into a bigger and longer shiver, chattering her teeth, too.