Page 23 of Breaking His Exile

And outside in the clearing, a horse screamed.

Evander was out the door with his rifle before Rainey could get to her feet. She followed, her ribs pulling with every step, and emerged into the cool air just in time to see him sprinting across the clearing toward the lean-to she’d noticed last night.

The horse was black as shadow. Her eyes rolled white, and her whole body shook with panic as she pressed herself against the back of the lean-to. A long, deep scrape ran down her left side, bright red through the dark hide, and she pawed at the ground, tearing furrows in the dirt.

At the tree line, maybe twenty yards from the lean-to, a mountain lion crouched.

It was huge. Golden-brown, motionless, its tail switching slowly from side to side as it watched the panicked horse.

Evander didn’t shout or run at it. He lifted the rifle from his shoulder, sighted down the barrel, and fired.

The shot cracked across the clearing like a whip.

The shot hit a tree near the mountain lion and the animal flinched, but didn’t retreat. It rose to its full height, muscles bunching under its coat, and bared its teeth in a hiss audible even from where Rainey stood frozen on the porch.

“Get back inside,” Evander said, and his voice was ice.

She didn’t move.

He took a step toward the lion. Then another. The rifle stayed at his shoulder, the barrel trained on the animal, and he fired again.

The shot landed in the dirt inches from the cat.

The man just told her he’d been a sniper. Why the hell wasn’t he hitting it?

For a long moment, the lion held its ground. Then it turned, languid, almost contemptuous, and vanished into the trees.

Evander kept the rifle up for a long beat. Then he lowered it, slung it back over his shoulder, and crossed to the lean-to.

The horse was still trembling, still wild-eyed, but she’d stopped pressing herself into the back wall. Her breath came in great heaving gusts that made her whole body shudder, and the scrape on her side dripped blood onto the dirt below.

“Sable.” His voice changed. The ice was gone, replaced by something softer, lower. “Easy now. Easy.”

He approached without rushing, his hands open at his sides, his movements deliberate in a way that reminded Rainey of nothing so much as a man walking through a minefield. The horse watched him come, her ears pinned. She took one skittering step away, then another, and stopped with her hindquarters pressed to the wall again, but Evander kept coming.

“The cat’s gone,” he said, still in that low voice. “You’re safe. Nobody’s going to hurt you.”

Rainey stood frozen at the edge of the porch, watching. Tilly had come to stand beside her, her body pressed against Rainey’s leg, and the dog’s hackles had lowered, but she still trembled with alertness, her eyes fixed on the tree line.

Evander reached the horse. He didn’t grab for her halter, didn’t try to hold her. He just stood beside her, one hand rising slowly, and let her smell his knuckles. Then he touched her neck, light, just the tips of his fingers, and the horse flinched.

“Easy.” He stroked her neck in long, even passes, and Rainey watched the shaking begin to subside, degree by degree, until Sable no longer looked ready to bolt. “Let me see.”

He crouched, and the horse let him, though her muscles stayed bunched. He ran a hand down her side, stopping short of the scrape, studying the wound without touching it. The blood had already started to clot, bright crimson against the dark hide.

“It’s shallow,” he said, more to himself than to Rainey. “She caught herself on the lean-to when she spooked.”

Rainey found her voice. “She’s yours?”

He didn’t look up. “Yes.”

The horse’s panic had faded to a fine tremble, and the wildness in her eyes had dimmed to wariness. “You always keep a horse that spooks at shadows?”

“I keep a horse that needs keeping.” He straightened, his palm still resting on Sable’s neck, and he looked at Rainey for the first time since he’d fired the gun. “She came off a reservation roundup eight years ago. Untouched. Unbroken. She’d been passed over three times because nobody wanted a horse that wouldn’t trust them.”

Rainey felt something shift in her chest. She couldn’t name it. Didn’t try. “So you took her.”

“I needed a backcountry horse. She needed someone who wouldn’t fence her in.” He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.