Though she’d not eaten much since leaving Mistaken, his voracity made Greer queasy. She ate two of the haunches before her stomach revolted, unable to take any more.
“You want the rest?” she offered, handing over the stick.
He bobbed his head, stretched to take it from her, and went to workon the remainder of the rabbit, biting and swallowing and biting and swallowing until the meat was no more.
“We should dispose of the bones, right?” Greer asked. “A ways away from the fire? To keep predators from coming close?”
Finn considered this. “I can if you’re worried.”
“Aren’t you?”
Wordlessly, he shook his head.
“You said it yourself, there are so many things in the forest.”
He shrugged but stood, shucking off the great wool coat he wore.
“What are you doing?” Her question came out sharper than she meant.
He turned, holding out all the bones. She tried to not notice the shine of grease coating his fingers.
“I though you wanted me to get rid of these?”
“I mean your coat. Aren’t you freezing?” She did a double take at his hands. “You’re not even wearing gloves. Or a hat.”
“I’ve always run hot. And it’s not so bad tonight.”
Greer’s breath steamed around her, and it wasn’t until she began to pay attention to it that she realized Finn’s did not.
“Take my coat if you’re so cold,” he offered, nodding toward the discarded garment. “I won’t be long.”
Again, he slipped into the trees, leaving Greer alone at the campsite. She had the strong impulse to throw on her pack and run. There were too many things about Noah Finn that alarmed her.
His eyes.
His strange warmth.
The way he somehow knew her last name, knew she’d come from a town along a shoreline.
She wanted to get as far away from him as she could. Her thumb twitched against the strap of her bag, itching to pick it up. But she stayed still, stayed seated, stayed in the inner glow of the fire and the safety it offered.
There were grizzlies.
And the wolves she’d heard the night before.
And the Bright-Eyeds.
She couldn’t forget the image of those two-toed tracks she’ddiscovered circling her camp earlier that morning. Or the voice. That sly, singsong voice that had followed after her, teasing and taunting.
Though she didn’t fully believe that this fire, however big and bold it currently seemed, was enough to keep away such a monster, it felt safer here than out in the dark and the cold.
So Greer stayed put and waited for Noah Finn’s return.
26
Only…
Noah Finn never came back.
