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She smirked. “Got it.”
He touched the brim of his hat while dipping his head and then turned and walked away. Keena’s heart fl
uttered. She was already in too deep with him, yet the thought of what he would suggest later filled her with hope she didn’t want to feel.
* * * *
Keena couldn’t sleep no matter how hard she tried. She’d showered and slipped into a nightie hours ago, but all she did then was pace. The hours passed at a snail’s pace, and for the millionth time, she checked the clock. Twelve fifteen. He was late. She went over to the door, opened it, and peeked out into the darkness. No sounds other than the normal night ones reached her. She sighed.
She closed the door and sat down at the chessboard to play a game with herself. One a.m. rolled around, and he still wasn’t there. She turned off all the lights and stomped into her room. “If he thinks I am going to sit up all night waiting on his ass, he has another think coming.”
Not until she was about to slip into bed did she hear something at the front door. She hesitated and then strolled at her leisure back into the sitting room. She clicked a lamp on, but no one came in. For the second time, she went to the door to open it. A note was tacked on the outside.
Keena,
Ryan running late. Please meet him at his cabin.
“At his cabin?” She frowned. She knew which cabin Ryan used when he wasn’t staying at his house. After Jade had mentioned it, she had asked Ryan where he lived, and he had told her it was a couple miles down the road, wherever that was. But he stayed in one of the cabins sometimes when work kept him here late. Yet, Ryan had never requested her to come to his cabin, and who did he get to leave her a note? She shrugged. Probably one of the hands who hadn’t gone home for the night, she figured. He must have thought she was already sleeping. Everyone but Ryan seemed to recognize a need to sleep sometimes.
She threw on a pair of jeans and a shirt and then pulled on her boots. By the time she had grabbed a flashlight and headed outside, thunder echoed in the sky, and to the west, lightning flashed. A storm was rolling in. She grinned, thinking of being curled up before a roaring fireplace in Ryan’s arms. Annoyed at how fast the man rose to her mind at all times, she tested her emotions by trying to bring up Steven in her mind. His image rose with no problem, and she did experience a tug of regret, maybe even an ache, but nothing close to what she had felt when she arrived here. The knowledge both encouraged and alarmed her. She could not have replaced her feelings for Steven with feelings for Ryan so soon.
Ryan’s cabin came into view, and she was gratified to find a light on. Without waiting to knock, she let herself in and put her flashlight on a side table. The sound of a shower running reached her, and she smiled, thinking she’d join him in there. Their sessions in the shower had been mind-numbing.
Keena passed into the bedroom and stopped cold. The bed was unmade, and clothes were strewn about the floor, both male and female items. When something shifted on the bed, she retuned her shocked attention to it to discover someone lay in it. A sigh escaped the person, and they rolled over. A thin arm shot up from the overstuffed comforter, pushing it back, and there lay a sleeping—very naked—Jade!
Somewhere above the roaring of blood rushing through her ears, Keena heard the water shut off in the shower, but all she could do was stand there watching Jade lie there, looking so peaceful, so satisfied. Ryan’s distinctive male scent permeated the air. Even his boxers lay in plain sight, with Jade’s thong panties slung about a lamp like they had been mad to get at each other.
Then what had Ryan planned? To shower off the evidence and come to her? She took shuffling steps backward, shaking her head. He had no obligations to her. They hadn’t said, “I love you,” or made commitments to one another. I don’t care. I don’t care!
Pain ripped through her insides. Her mind clouded to the point that she didn’t know what to do. All she knew was she had to get away from this scene, from the horror of having an instant replay of the devastation she’d suffered just weeks ago. She tore the door open and ran full tilt outside. She stumbled down the two steps to ground level and fell but pulled herself up in a flash.
Rain pelted her face, but it wouldn’t last, she remembered. The rains here were short. Her mind raced. She’d forgotten her flashlight, and she couldn’t see where she was going. It didn’t matter. She just needed to get away and never see him again. Liar! You stupid liar. They are all liars.
Tears mingled with the rain. Tree branches slapped at her face. She was going the wrong way, had ventured too far, but she didn’t stop. A small whimper nearby must have been her own, and the ragged breathing. Nothing mattered, just making the hurt dull. She ran faster, harder and ignored the stitch in her side.
Her toe caught on a root, and she crashed to the ground. Her braids hung in heavy, wet ropes across her face. Mud squished between her fingers, and her feet slipped as she tried to stand. She sobbed, shaking as much from her emotional pain as from the chilly, wet weather. At last a little more alert to how stupid she was to come out here, Keena used a tree to help herself to stand and pressed her back to it while trying to get her bearings.
She peered around her, but nothing looked familiar, just trees and more trees, seen only when lightning flashed. All at once, the rain stopped, but the silence tightened her chest, making her feel like the dark was closing in. She struggled to calm down, to think. Straight ahead must be where she had come from. If she retraced her steps, she’d find her way back to the ranch.
Taking tentative steps, she moved ahead, her arms outstretched to keep from smacking into something. Soon the clouds cleared from the moon, and she could see better. When she came upon a small lake, hope rose. A trail couldn’t be far. But this body of water seemed smaller than the one she had come across when she ventured out with the riding group. After circling it twice, she knew it wasn’t the same one. No trail led away from the water, and come to think of it, she hadn’t passed water when she’d run out here.
Panic began to set in. Someone would have to find her soon, right? No, not if that bastard was still with Jade. Everyone else was asleep by now, and no one would wake up until four at the earliest. Even then, she was known to stay in bed until eleven if Ryan had kept her up half the night. Tears choked her again at that thought.
A growl nearby caught her attention. She froze in place, eyes aching from her straining to see where the sound came from. Then a dark shadow shifted in the trees several feet away. Keena swallowed.
“Ryan?” she called out.
The growl came again, and this time, she knew without a doubt what it was—a bear. She pressed a hand to her mouth to keep from screaming as it advanced, and pressed against the tree behind her until the bark bit into her back. The gigantic black beast loped closer. Keena couldn’t help herself. She screamed.
The bear reared up on its hind legs and roared. Keena’s head began to spin, and just when she thought she would die in the night alone, something zipped between her and her attacker. She squinted to see him closer, the man who would try to fight this animal bare-handed.
“Oh no, Ryan, get away. It will kill you,” she shouted, but he didn’t listen.
The bear swiped thick, long claws at Ryan, which sent him flying backward, but no matter how hard it knocked him down, Ryan rose up and fought again. Keena searched the area for a stick, anything that would help him, but all that littered the ground were small branches that the storm had knocked free from the trees. She was useless.
Ryan went down several more times, and Keena sobbed for him. When she watched the bear bring a paw down across Ryan’s head, sending him to the mud, she knew he could never live through a blow like that. She dropped to the ground, all strength and will gone. The distinctive scent of blood choked the air.
When Ryan didn’t move, the bear seemed to think it had won the fight and looked like it would move to her, but when it was alongside Ryan, he reached out and wrapped his arms around the bear’s neck. The two struggled, with the bear shaking his massive head back and forth to dislodge Ryan. Ryan squeezed the bear’s neck harder, cutting off his breath. At last, the beast gave in and slumped to the ground. When Ryan let go and took a step back away from it, the bear stumbled to its feet and turned to lumber away. After the bear disappeared, Ryan fell to his knees and collapsed facedown.
