“You’ve got a tell. A few of them.”
Both eyebrows shoot up now, and I feel no small amount of satisfaction that I seem to have caught him unaware given how many times he’s done the same to me. “And they are…?”
“Not sure I should tell you.”
He barks out a laugh, and I find myself suppressing a smile ashe asks, “Why not?”
“Might need that information for later.”
“For later,” he repeats, and I don’t think I’m imagining the implication in his voice when he adds, “Sounds promising.”
I clear my throat again and look away, focusing once more on the knot that won’t budge instead of the fact that my skin suddenly feels too hot.
Absolutely fucking not. I’m not—no. It’s just been a long day is all. I’m tired. Excess nerves. And he’s fuckin’irritating. And this fuckin’ rope has me at the end of mine.
“The loop,” he says, being helpful again. “Pass the tail through the loop.”
“I got it,” I snap, trying two other routes before doing as he suggested. As I had no doubt it would, the knot immediately comes loose with one sharp tug, just as I’m sure the identical one would do on his own horse’s stall.
“The knot is you, too?” I say, phrasing it as a question even though it really isn’t one.
“They’re an…interestof mine.” He shrugs, but something in his eyes tells me there’s more to it. “That quick release has all sorts of uses. Can come in handy if—”
“Yeah, I’ll bet,” I shoot back, finally letting myself into the stall so I can set about cleaning up for the night. “Why are you messing with my things anyway?” I ask as I grab a rake. “You always pester everyone like this or am I just the unfortunate exception?”
“You are most certainly the exception.”
“I’m afraid to ask why.”
“I’m afraid to tell you.”
For a moment, I go still, my rake hovering over the bedding I’d been about to turn over as I glance his direction. “That why you replaced my watch? I scare you?”
He sighs. “You don’t scare me, wolf.”
“Wasn’t so sure after last night,” I say, alluding to our exchange in the alley, half in an attempt to provoke some truth out of him and half due simply to curiosity. “You want to tell me why you’re more afraid of a knife than you are a gun?”
He’s quiet for a while, long enough that I wonder if he’s going to ignore me until he finally says, “More personal.”
I frown, not sure why I suddenly feel a wash of guilt. “Suppose it is.” I go back to mucking out the stall, more hastily than I normally would with him there watching. God knows he probably had one of the stablehands do his, the extra expense likely not even registering if he can lose as much as he’s been at the poker table.
“You didn’t need to replace it,” I say, doing my best to move around the mustang while looking squarely at the fresh straw I’m putting down instead of at Cypress. “The pocket watch.”
“Least I could do,” he says again. “Besides, the other one was broken, and I thought—”
“I would’ve managed,” I tell him. “I don’t need your pity.”
“Never said you did.”
“Good. Just so we’re clear.”
There’s a long pause, interrupted only occasionally by the soft sound of straw brushing across the stable floor, the crackling hum of the lanterns, the distinct patter of rain falling on the tin roof.
“I do still have the old one,” Cypress says at last, apparently unable to take the silence any longer. “If you want it.”
I should tell him to hand it over. Give him the other one when he does, no matter how much it’s worth. Have that, at the very least, stricken from whatever ledger he’s been keeping between us. But when I go to reach for it in my pocket…I can’t. Not after what happened earlier by the water.
It’s been so long since I’ve been able to remember anything but the end.