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I hadn't even given going out after Brooks myself a second thought because I'd known my horse was surefooted enough to handle the trail. And Brooks wasn't just some cowboy who’d inadvertently gotten himself lost and would hunker down until the storm passed. He had no experience and he likely hadn't taken any emergency supplies with him.
While the temperature wouldn't necessarily get into the freezing digits overnight, it would still be cold enough that with the rain, anyone caught outside without any kind of protection could be susceptible to hypothermia. Not to mention all the other dangers that the Wyoming wilderness had in store for those who weren't prepared for it.
Curtis had already been making his way to the barn with the intent of coming with me when I’d convinced him that I’d be able to navigate the trails faster on my own. Thankfully, the older man hadn't argued with me. He’d just begged me to bring his nephew home.
The few hours it had taken me to find Brooks had been absolute torture. I’d tried to convince myself that was only because I hadn't wanted to tell Curtis his nephew wasn’t coming home, but I’d had to call bullshit on myself.
Especially once I’d found Brooks and hadn't been able to wake him up at first. I’d slapped him hard enough that he’d probably have a bruise come morning, but it had finally pulled him from his daze enough to actually talk to me. I hadn’t really cared what he’d been talking about as I’d gotten him wrapped in a survival blanket, so long as I’d kept him talking. I’d kept up with the questions about pie as I’d untacked my horse, tethered him, and set up a tent to offer Brooks and myself some protection from the worsening weather. Once inside the tent, I’d gotten a portable light and heat source going and then I’d gotten Brooks undressed so the survival blanket could do its work and reflect his body heat back onto him. But he'd been so cold and wet, I'd known it might not work on its own. I hadn't hesitated to slip my own clothes off and get beneath the blanket with Brooks so my body heat could help speed up the process of warming him up. I'd managed to radio down to the ranch to let Curtis know I’d found Brooks and that we were both okay, but once again, I'd had to use my powers of persuasion to keep Curtis from sending more people up after us.
There’d been a few dicey moments when I’d been worried about the tent staying put or a swaying tree limb falling on us or my horse as the storm had raged outside, but the thunder was finally moving off into the distance and I didn't hear any more coming from the direction the line of storms had been originating in. The rain was still falling heavily, but I was hopeful that we’d gotten through the worst of it. Brooks had started to shake violently in my arms after about twenty minutes of holding him, but that had been a relief because it meant that his body had started to warm up to the point that it was responding to the cold, rather than succumbing to it.
I had my arms wrapped around Brooks and one of his legs was wedged between both of mine, so we were pretty much pressed together from head to toe. I’d left my underwear on, figuring that we could both use that little bit of a barrier between us, especially if Brooks happened to wake up while he was still wrapped around me like a vine. Now that his body seemed to be getting back to its normal internal temperature, mine had decided it was time to take notice of all the soft skin and hard muscles that were lined up with its own. Brooks's nose was pressed up against my neck and he was breathing peacefully, more proof that he was doing better. I told myself I'd hold him just for a few more minutes, then I’d let him go because the survival blanket would use his own body heat to continue to warm him up.
My own adrenaline rush was still there, though it wasn't as intense anymore. But admittedly, I was still shaken to the core at what a close call it'd been. I hadn't seen or spoken to Brooks since the night he’d come to my room, but the idea of how badly all this could've turned out made me feel helpless and out of control.
It was a feeling I’d felt all too often behind bars and that I'd vowed never to feel again.
So the fact that this one man—this one man who hated me above all others and for whom I had mutual feelings of anger and distrust—would cause me to feel the same things was disturbing, to say the least.
