He should leave right now. He didn’t like the companionable silence between them, or sharing the magic night sky, because this was about connecting and he didn’t want to connect with her. He wanted her to stay a distant acquaintance, someone he recognized from the service station. He wanted to go back up his mountain and sit in solitude on his own porch, not beside her on her wooden front steps.
But . . . nipples.
It was hard for him to walk away, with hard being the operative word.
Which made her even more dangerous to his self-imposed semi-exile from the human race, because every time he came in contact with her he became more interested in finding out who she was, what made her tick. She was so quiet and self-contained that even years into the future she could still supply surprises, and he wasn’t a “future” type of guy. He was a here-and-now, don’t-let-anyone-close-enough-to-give-a-fuck-about type of guy. He shouldn’t be wondering if she had a temper, how far someone would have to push her for the hot to surface, if he could make her scream in bed or if she tried to be as quiet as possible—
Shit. Just when his dick was settling down, he had to default to thinking about sex.
She said, “If you run short of food, we’ll share ours. We wouldn’t have what we have if it hadn’t been for you.”
He surprised himself by almost snorting a quick laugh, holding it back at the last second. Here he’d been torturing himself thinking about sex with her, and she’d been thinking about food. There it was in a nutshell, the difference between men and women.
His dick took that as a challenge to refocus her attention. He knew he could. He had the self-control to really make a woman happy, several times a night. Give him five minutes and she wouldn’t be thinking about eating pizzas and Pop-Tarts, she’d be eating—
Fuck! Shit! He needed to get out of here. He needed to go, and go now.
Then a bright curtain of crimson waved over the sky, and he saw a black shape on the other side of the road. He was on his feet and the shotgun in his right hand, pulling her upright with his left, before his brain finished forming the word bear. She didn’t yelp, though he knew he’d startled her. He released her to pull open the screen door, then pushed her up the step and onto the screened porch. He joined her, putting himself between her and the door and silently closing it.
He pointed toward the bear, hoping she could see his gesture in the deeper darkness of the porch. She turned her head in the direction he’d indicated, and went totally still as she spotted the problem.
The bear was rooting around on the ground, likely snuffling for fallen acorns. The breeze was in their faces so it hadn’t scented them, and a bear’s nose was far more acute than its eyesight. Likely they could have stayed still and remained sitting on the steps without the bear ever knowing they were there—and he had the shotgun—but he didn’t want to kill it if he didn’t have to, and neither did he want Sela in harm’s way. They were safer on the porch, where he could quickly get her inside if the wind shifted and the bear scented them.
They stood motionless, watching the creature root around. They heard a few grunts and snuffles, then it moseyed deeper into the bushes and was soon lost from sight. Ben listened as it got farther and farther away, and the sounds faded.
He realized he was holding Sela’s slim wrist, his big hand wrapped completely around it. Her skin was cool and silky smooth under his rough fingers, and the impact of willingly touching someone after years of holding himself apart was so strong that he felt as if he’d been punched in the solar plexus. He had to force himself to release her.
“I gotta go.”
He pulled the screen door open. His voice sounded raw and a little strained, but at least he’d gotten himself moving in the right direction.
She didn’t ask him to wait. Instead she said, “Be careful.” Then she let herself into the house, leaving him there, and he heard the click of the door lock.
He blew out a gust of relief when he was once more walking the road, heading back home. He kept the shotgun in his hand because obviously the bears were active tonight . . . and she hadn’t asked him to wait until the bear they’d seen was farther away. She hadn’t fussed, but her quiet “be careful” carried the weight of a benediction that warmed him all the way home through the red night.
Chapter Seven
The new day dawned as hot as the one before. The valley inhabitants began gathering early in the open field beside the bank. The big smokers and grills were operating, watched over by the tired men who had been cooking all night and refused to let others take over because they suffered from the stereotypical male fixation with grills and the belief that no one else could operate one as well as they could. The delicious smell of grilled and smoked meat permeated the air, making Sela’s mouth water even though she’d had breakfast, such as it was: a bowl of dry cereal, some nuts, and water. She hadn’t felt like bothering with making either coffee or tea because that would mean boiling water, and now she was feeling the lack, but that would soon be remedied.
Long tables were set up and covered with plastic picnic cloths. Some of the more enterprising women had big jugs of sweetened water and tea bags basking in the sunlight to make sun tea. Of course almost no one had shown up with nothing other than meat to cook; Sela didn’t know how the dishes had been prepared, but there were pots of beans, big platters of salad, mashed potatoes, and anything else the women could think of that needed to be cooked and eaten before it ruined. Sela had made a big salad, using all of her romaine lettuce before it went bad; better eaten than wasted.
There were some vehicles, pickup trucks that brought the heavy items, but for the most part people had walked to conserve their precious gasoline. Some kids had ridden their bicycles, and a few people had saddled up and ridden their horses. There were a lot of horses around, some used in tourist trail rides, some privately owned. She figured they’d see a lot of horse and bicycle traffic in the months to come.
Patio umbrellas and pavilion tents were set up for shade, folding chairs were placed around the tables, kids were running around shrieking and playing, and despite the seriousness of their circumstances the atmosphere was more like a giant picnic than a survival effort.
She and Carol and Olivia had loaded most of their stuff in Josh’s old Radio Flyer wagon and pulled it to the field, where Carol commandeered the space under a pavilion tent. At Sela’s suggestion, they had brought a small portable grill, charcoal, a blue enamel camp kettle, and a few bags of coffee. She and Carol swiftly got the charcoal going and the coffee brewing. Soon the smell of coffee was luring a constant stream of people to the pavilion, where they found themselves cornered into either offering ideas or volunteering to help—Sela hoped they were doing both, but one thing for sure, if they got a cup of coffee then their names were going on Carol’s list.
After helping herself to a single cup of much-welcomed coffee, she murmured to Carol, “I’m going to walk around, see who all is here and what they’ve done.”
“Take a pen and notebook, and jot down their names,” Carol replied, handing both items to her.
Good idea. She roamed the big field, not only noting exactly what different people had to share but also seeing who was the most organized and prepared, because they were the people Carol would want to talk to. She kept an eye on Olivia, who had connected with some of her school friends; there was a lot of laughing and dramatic gesturing going on. And she couldn’t help checking the perimeter to see if Ben would appear at a distance, watching but not joining.