Page 18 of Rescued By the Mountain Man Cowboy
"Once. In college. We learned how to yell really loud."
"Useful."
"Apparently not."
"Here's what we're gonna do." I stand and clear the bowls. Her eyes follow me. "Tomorrow morning. Oh-six-thirty. You and me, front porch. Wear something you can move in."
"What?"
"I'm gonna teach you a few things."
"Luke, I don't..."
"You don't have to fight off a man twice your size. You have to know enough to buy yourself ten seconds to run. That's it. Ten seconds of grip breaks and one good strike to the right place. I can teach you that in a week."
She's staring at me like I've grown a second head.
"Why?"
The water runs over the bowls. I don't look at her when I answer.
"Because you're sitting at my table telling me you freeze when a man puts a hand on you. And I'm not having that."
Silence.
I scrub the bowls. Rack them. Shut the water off.
When I turn around, she's still in the chair. Eyes on me. Something different on her face now.
"Oh-six-thirty," she repeats.
"Yep."
"That's six-thirty in the morning."
"Ma'am."
"Luke Davis."
"Anna Kim."
She stands. Brings her glass to the sink. Sets it down next to me. She's close enough that I can see the little gold hoops in her ears and the place where her pulse is still going faster than it should be.
"Thank you. For dinner. And the saltines."
"Go to bed, Anna."
She goes.
I stand at the sink for a long minute after her door clicks shut. The wind's picked up outside. The owl calls again, farther this time.
I scrub a plate that's already clean.
I'mon the porch at oh-six-fifteen with two mugs of coffee and a foam mat I dug out of the barn. Sun's just starting to come up over the ridge. Pink bleeding into gold. Birds are going at it in the cedars.
I sleep badly most nights. Woke at four, stared at the spare room ceiling until the dark started thinning out, got up. That's my usual. The new part is knowing whose breathing was in the other room. Knowing she cried for a while before she slept. The walls are thin.
The new part is that I heard her, and I stayed on my side of the door anyway, because she didn't scream this time.
