Catherine slapped him.
The sound shocked both of them.
The stranger didn’t move.
Catherine’s eyes filled instantly.
“I’m sorry.”
He touched his cheek.
Then, astonishingly, the corner of his mouth moved.
“Good arm for a frozen woman.”
She stared.
He turned away.
“My name’s Jud Harrison.”
“Catherine Prescott.”
His shoulders went rigid.
Only for a heartbeat.
Then he picked up another piece of firewood.
Catherine noticed.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You know my name?”
“No.”
But something in his voice told her that wasn’t entirely true.
The next three days were torture.
Not because Jud Harrison treated her badly.
Because he treated her too well.
He pretended otherwise.
Every kindness came disguised as irritation.
When Catherine woke thirsty, water appeared beside her bed.
When she complained that the cabin was too warm, Jud grunted something about wasting wood—then placed another log on the fire.
He inspected her frostbitten toes twice a day with the seriousness of a surgeon.
He repaired her coat.
He built new soles into her boots.
At meals, his portion was always smaller.
On the third evening Catherine finally noticed him slicing the last piece of salt pork into two uneven pieces.
He placed the larger one on her plate.
“Stop that.”
Jud looked up.
“Stop what?”
“Giving me more food.”
“You need it.”
“So do you.”
“I’ve got reserves.”
His expression remained perfectly serious.
Catherine looked at his enormous chest.
Despite herself, she laughed.
The sound startled her.
It was the first time she had laughed since Thomas’s final appeal had failed.
Jud stared at her.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re smiling.”
“No, I’m not.”
“You are.”
“Must be fever.”
His smile vanished so quickly she wondered whether she had imagined it.
But something had changed.
The frightening stranger from the storm began becoming a man.
He carved tiny wooden birds while sitting near the fire, then threw them into a drawer whenever Catherine noticed.
He left crumbs outside for chickadees.
He spoke to his mule, Solomon, with more patience than he spoke to humans.
And every night, after Catherine fell asleep, Jud checked the door twice.
Sometimes three times.
A man did not check locked doors like that unless he had once learned what could come through them.
On the fourth morning, Catherine awoke to silence.
No wind.
She hurried to the window.
Sunlight struck the snow so fiercely it hurt her eyes.
“The storm stopped.”
Jud stood outside splitting wood.
She pulled on her repaired boots and stepped onto the porch.
Snow stretched untouched through the valley.
“Jud!”
He kept chopping.
“The weather cleared.”
“For now.”
“We can leave.”
“No.”
Catherine descended the steps.
“You said when the storm stopped—”
“I said the pass is buried.”
“I can walk.”
“No.”
“I’ll crawl.”
Jud buried the ax in the stump.
“You don’t understand those mountains.”
“And you don’t understand my brother!”
She ripped open her coat and pulled free the satchel.
Jud’s eyes fell on it.
Catherine was crying now.
She didn’t care.
“This is why those men were following me.”
She dropped the leather book onto the chopping stump.
Jud stared.
“I stole it from Hollis Breen’s bank office in Rock Springs.”
Jud’s face changed.
“You stole from Breen?”
“You know him?”
“Everyone within two hundred miles knows Hollis Breen.”
“Then you know what kind of man he is.”
Jud said nothing.
Catherine opened the ledger.
