Under the Northern Lights(57)

I was on high alert as I moved up the trail. While I walked, I noticed more tracks, smaller ones, belonging to animals that didn’t terrify me. Ignoring them, I swept the trail for signs of creatures higher up on the food chain.

When I finally spotted Michael, I breathed a sigh of relief. He swung around, gun raised when he heard me approaching. Apparently, he was on high alert too; he must have noticed the paw prints. Seeing a gun being pointed at my chest made me involuntarily raise my hands. “It’s just me,” I quickly told him.

He lowered the weapon, but his eyes never stopped scanning the defrosting landscape. “I didn’t know you were coming out today,” he told me, a small smile breaking his hard demeanor; he was happy to see me.

I resisted the urge to tell him I’d rushed out here because I’d missed him and instead gave him a nonchalant shrug. “I changed my mind. I take it you saw the grizzly tracks?”

At the mention of the tracks, a look of pride and admiration crossed Michael’s face. It was quickly replaced with concern. “Yeah, I spotted a couple of sets. They’re out early this year, which means they’re probably hungry. We need to be extra careful.”

Fear shot up my spine, and I stepped closer to Michael. I knew how I got when I was superhungry; I could only imagine how cranky a hungry bear would be. “Should we go back?” I asked him, watching the trees now too.

Michael pursed his lips as he thought, and for a moment, I was so distracted by him I forgot all about the bear. He’d let me cut his hair and his beard a few times now, keeping it short and neat and oh-so-sexy. I hadn’t cut it again while he’d been bathing, though—that had been too tempting for both of us; dreams of that night often woke me up panting and clutching at my blankets. Since that night, I always cut his hair while he was fully dressed and sitting at the kitchen table. While I looked forward to every time he let me take a pair of scissors to him, I couldn’t deny that I preferred the nude version . . .

“Yeah, we should go in. All the traps were empty anyway.” He indicated the bare basket on his back, and putting my inappropriate fantasy away, I frowned. Michael needed the money he earned from furs, and while he had a decent stack of them back at the cabin, I wouldn’t say it was enough to cover the commodities I’d used or the damage the wolf had done. Michael was going to be hurting next winter, and that didn’t sit well with me.

We turned to head back the way we’d come. Michael still had his gun out, was still surveying the land, searching for trouble. A forlorn sigh escaped me. I wanted to be somewhere with him that wasn’t quite so dangerous all the time. I wanted to hold his hand and go for a walk with him in a park, where nature was still abundant but the predators were kept in check. I wanted . . . a normal life with him.

Michael looked over at hearing my weary exhale. Maybe mistaking why I’d made the sound, he gave me an encouraging smile. “It will be okay, Mallory.” He patted the butt of his superpowered rifle. “This thing can take out anything we might come across.”

That hadn’t been my problem, but I smiled anyway. Michael didn’t buy it. “What’s wrong?”

Feeling weary to the bone, I kicked at a pile of slush by my feet. “The bears . . . the melting snow . . . the empty traps . . . spring is on its way, and that means we’ll be going our separate ways soon.”

Michael’s face fell, and he looked away from me to check the tree line again. “Yeah, I know. The part I ordered could come any day now . . . and then I’ll be able to fix the plane, get you on your way.” He looked back at me, confusion on his face. “But that was the plan all along . . . to get you home.”

“I know,” I said, lowering my gaze to the soggy ground. “I just wish we were heading out together. I feel so close to you . . . I don’t want to stop getting to know you right when I feel like I’m finally starting to.”

Michael stopped in his tracks and put a gloved hand on my arm, stopping me as well. “I know how you feel, Mallory. I wish . . . this wasn’t the end. I wish . . .” He sighed, then shook his head and kept walking. “We knew where this was going when we started, which is why I didn’t want to start this.” He didn’t sound angry, just sad. I understood—I felt the same way.

“I know,” I repeated as I followed him. “I just never thought . . . when we started this, I never imagined how much you’d mean to me.”

My voice had faded to a near whisper, but Michael heard me. He stopped again, waiting for me. When I caught up to him, he cupped my cheek. His glove was cool against my skin, but the warmth behind the gesture was undeniable. He leaned into me, and I eagerly lifted my lips in anticipation.

Right when his lips were just about to touch mine, I accidentally poured out my heart’s wish. “Come back with me.”

He froze, then pulled back to look at me. Pain was in his eyes. “Mallory, you know I can’t.”

Disappointment hit me so hard I nearly stepped back from the recoil. “I know you won’t. I know you’ve given up on people, and for some reason that includes me too. But if you gave it a chance, I think you’d love Cedar Creek. It’s quaint, isolated—my parents know every single person who comes into their diner. Crime is virtually nonexistent. It’s just about the greatest—”

Michael held up his hand, stopping me from selling him on my hometown. “If it is how you say, then it’s only that way because it hasn’t truly been discovered yet. More people will come, and it will turn into a city . . . just like every other city. You can’t change human nature, Mallory. Eventually, your little town will be ruined, and you’ll be left with the good ole days. I’m sorry.” He looked genuinely apologetic, like he’d looked into a crystal ball and seen his prediction as fact, and he was heartbroken for me.