“Dogwood. Chew on the soft end.”
He turns away, grabs a pot, and pulls out a tin of rice.
I put the stick in my mouth and chew and the bitter wood breaks up easily, morphing into rough bristles. I use the bristles on my teeth, rubbing every inch of enamel and using the pointed end to clean between my teeth. I never thought I’d enjoy something as simple as cleaning my teeth, but this is heaven.
“Thank you for this,” I say with the stick still hanging from the corner of my mouth. “If you teach me how to wash clothes—”
“I got it.”
I huff out a breath, toss my book aside, and stand slowly and carefully. “You should really put me to work.”
His shoulders tense as I get closer, and I notice he has stopped moving altogether.
I settle up to his side and tilt my head to see his face. “Do I make you uncomfortable?”
“Yes,” he breathes.
“Oh.” I take a step back. “Is it because I haven’t bathed in a week and smell like a dirty foot?”
The corner of his mouth beneath his beard twitches. “No.”
I sigh. “I can’t wait to take a hot shower. A bath would be a dream, but my crappy apartment only has a tiny shower. Hardly enough room to shave my legs. Another thing I can’t wait to do when I get back.”
“You can bathe.” He motions to a hook on the wall that holds strips of terrycloth. “Warm water, soap, keep your wounds dry.”
That must be how he manages to stay smelling like pine and earth. “I’ll try that.”
His muscles relax, and he goes back to scooping what looks like freeze-dried vegetables and spices into the pot with rice.
“Thank you for washing my clothes.” I bring the fabric of my shirt to my nose and smell the slight botanical scent, as if he cleaned them with tea leaves. “And thank you for including my underwear. I feel a little guilty for free balling it in your sweats.”
Am I purposefully trying to get a reaction from him?
Yes.
Does mentioning my underwear work like a charm?
Also yes.
Above the line of hair on his cheeks, the tanned skin flushes pink and softens the ruggedness of his face. He really is endearing in an unconventional kind of way.
“After you put the pot on, will you show me how to wash clothes? It’s the least I can do.”
In typical Grizzly form, he turns away from me and places the pot on the woodstove without response.
I’ve learned he’s more of a shower than a teller. He picks up another pot, this one much larger than the one holding our dinner, and fills it halfway with water. He places that on the woodstove and then pulls a mason jar filled with a foggy white substance from a shelf. Some kind of soap, I assume.
He sits at his small table in front of his lure supply box and opens the lid. I wait for him to pull something out and start working, but he doesn’t move.
“Did you make all those?”
“No.”
“Which ones did you make?” I cross closer to the table and watch his shoulders bunch up, just as they did when I stood close to him earlier. When he doesn’t answer me, I decide to settle in and wait. I circle around to his side and prop my hip on the table inches from his forearm. I don’t mean to intentionally push his boundaries, but if we plan to live harmoniously together for however much longer we’re here, then we have to stop tip-toeing around one another and form some kind of friendship.
I move to pluck up one of the furry lures and then remember how angry he gets when I touch his things. I hover my fingers over it. “May I?”
He tilts his head and the muscle in his cheek jumps. “Okay.”
“Did you make this one—ouch!” I drop the thing back into the box, and a dot of blood swells on my skin.
“They bite.”
I nearly tip over in shock when I look up to see the corner of Grizzly’s bearded mouth pulled up in a half smile. “I’ll be damned. You do have a sense of humor!”
He ducks his chin, that half smile working its way to the other side of his mouth.
I clutch my chest because the contrast of his intense deep-set eyes and full lips grinning is a kind of beauty that takes my breath away.
He clears his throat, and I wonder if he did it to keep that smile from manifesting into a laugh. “Hook.”
“Yeah, I figured.” I give his thigh a playful shove with my leg. “Smartass.”
His body freezes.
I hold my breath, and tension-filled seconds stretch between us. Did my touching him push him too far? Kind of hypocritical, seeing as he has no problem manhandling me when he needs to.
“I didn’t make that one.”
I blow out a steady breath. “Where did you learn to make these?”
“My grandfather.” He motions to the one that made me bleed. “That one is his.”
I pick it up again, this time avoiding the hook that hides inside. “What’s it made out of?”
“Are you going to ask me questions all night?”
“Does it bother you that much?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Besides it being annoying?”
I roll my eyes.
“I don’t understand why you insist on useless information.”
“I’m just trying to make conversation.”
“I don’t require conversation.”
“Maybe I do.”
He fiddles with a hook and pliers. “I tend to hurt people’s feelings unknowingly.”
I shrug, place a lure back, and pluck up another to inspect. “I guess that’s the flip side of being honest all the time.”
He grunts.
“If you ask me?”
“I didn’t,” he growls.
“No. But if you did? I’d take the honest hurt feelings over the lies any day.” I continue to check out the lures, all the different textures, colors, and shapes. Some look like bugs, while others look like art.
“Is that true?”
I lift a brow. “Now who’s asking the questions?” I place another lure back and meet his curious gaze. “Yes. It’s true.”
“Huh…” He tilts his chin and goes back to putting together a new lure, and I watch silently, granting him the peace and quiet he prefers.
The tiny strings and hooks, wrapped in fur and glue, are dwarfed by his big hands, and yet he works with such delicate precision. I remember how rough he was with me, tending to my injuries. I wouldn’t have thought that a man of his size and rigid demeanor capable of such tender attention. And brutal honesty. The man is an enigma.
And I get the feeling I’ve barely scratched the surface.
Eight
Alexander
“Where were you?”
With only one foot inside the cabin, I turn and glare at the tiny woman huddled up in front of the woodstove. Every time I leave, she asks where I’m going. Every time I come back, she asks where I’ve been. I imagine this is the very reason some men avoid relationships.
I close the door and hang my coat and gloves.
“Felt like you were gone for half the day,” she says to my back.
I was gone for a couple of hours.
I left to check the water pump and then hiked out to the lake to get a better view of the sky to get a feeling of whether or not we’d get a break in the snow soon. Dark clouds as far as I could see. I readjusted the tarp on my woodpile, cleared snow away from the outhouse, and cleared a path to and from the cabin. All of that information seems pointless to share.