Total pages in book: 22
Estimated words: 20337 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 102(@200wpm)___ 81(@250wpm)___ 68(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 20337 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 102(@200wpm)___ 81(@250wpm)___ 68(@300wpm)
"Spill it, Deacon."
"Her name is Cordelia Shanks," I sigh around a bite of scone. "She'll be here tomorrow. And if she dies in the goddamn forest, it's your fault."
Nell's mouth pops open, her eyes growing comically wide. "You hired a woman? Shut the front door!"
"What's that supposed to mean?" I growl.
"Nothing." She drops her gaze back to the dough as if I haven't known her for all twenty-four years of her life. She's a terrible liar.
"You think I'm against hiring women?"
"What? No." She wrinkles her nose. "You just get weird around women. They make you extra cranky, that's all."
"That's because every woman in this town is trying to set me up," I growl. It's ridiculous. There are exactly four single women left in this town—not including my sister, and every time I come down the mountain, some crazy woman tries to set me up with one of them. It drives me up the fucking wall. I've been saying no for six years. It's not changing anytime soon.
"They worry about you," Nell says quietly.
"Well, they need to quit. I don't need their damn pity," I mutter, shoving the scone into my mouth. The butter melts on my tongue and I immediately reach for another one. Nell doesn't stop me this time. She's too busy watching me with that look on her face. The one that says she worries too.
I've given her plenty of reasons over the years. Until six years ago, I was the captain of an interagency hotshot crew, an elite team of highly trained firefighters from different departments deployed to fight wildland fires. We were working a fire in a canyon in the Cascades and were given bad information. Our escape route was cut-off. Three of us survived.
I came back home to heal, except the healing didn't work out quite like I planned. The only things that helped ease the nightmares were fresh air and being able to see the night sky. By the time I got through the worst of the PTSD, the mountains and solitude had grown on me. I had no desire to go back to the fire service or rejoin civilization, so I simply didn't.
Everyone assumes it means I'm still a broken husk of a man. I'm not. I just don't like people. They always want things or want me to do things. Frankly, it gets on my fucking nerves.
"They don't pity you, Deacon," Nell says. "They just want to see you happy, that's all."
"I'm happy."
My baby sister snorts.
"I'm happy," I growl.
"Good, then there's no reason you can't come to the dance tonight."
"Uh, fuck no." I rise from my barstool, shaking my head as I stride toward the door. "I said I was happy, Nelia. I didn't say I was crazy."
"Fine!" she shouts after me. "But you're going to fall in love someday, Deacon! And you better be nice to your new assistant or I'm asking Mom and Dad to haunt you!"
"Love you too, brat."
"Bye!"
Chapter Three
Cordelia
Cordelia
Welcome to Winthrop. Population: I'm going to die in the mountains.
"This is doable," I whisper to myself, creeping down the main street leading through downtown Winthrop. "You're a fierce, independent woman and you can handle this." It's a lie I tell myself when something is most definitely not doable and I'm crazy for even thinking it.
Deacon did not mention that my two weeks were going to be spent 140 years in the past. But either I drove through a portal into the 1880s or Winthrop fell through a portal from the 1880s, because half the town looks like it came straight from one of the old western movies my grandpa used to watch. You know, the ones where they settled disputes by a gunfight in the middle of the street at high noon. The wooden buildings have elaborate false fronts with painted signs and tin awnings held up by wooden posts. There are even hitching posts for horses out front.
What there isn't is cell reception. I'm from Seattle. We have more tech firms and IT headquarters than the south has churches. The fact that this town exists in a cellular dead zone is giving me anxiety.
Or maybe that's the sheer number of trees pressing in on me from every side. Panic already tries to claw its way up my throat, threatening to escape in hysterical laughter.
I should have stuck to conquering my fear of singing in public. A shot of liquid courage, a trip to the karaoke bar, a little off-key Mariah Carey, and boom! Mission accomplished.
I'm far less likely to die on stage than I am out here.
I sigh, shaking my head at myself. When did I turn into such a negative Nancy? Winthrop might not be what I expected, but it's beautiful. Even my anxiety can't deny that. If the ghosts of Wyatt Earp and Jesse James still roam the earth, they probably hang out in places like this.