Loan agreements.
Feed accounts.
Tax notices.
A man could reveal his entire life accidentally by leaving numbers exposed.
Cole followed her gaze.
“Sorry.”
“For what?”
“The mess.”
Abigail walked toward the table.
She picked up a receipt.
“Blackwood County Bank?”
Cole set down her trunk.
“Yes.”
She looked at another paper.
“Your mortgage?”
“Part of it.”
Her attention sharpened.
Silas Blackwood.
The name tightened something inside her.
Cole saw the reaction.
“You know him?”
Abigail placed the paper down.
“My father did business with him.”
“That sounds unpleasant.”
“It was.”
“How unpleasant?”
She looked at him.
“Enough that I would prefer to discuss it after I’ve slept.”
Cole nodded immediately.
“All right.”
Again.
No pressure.
No attempt to extract the story.
He showed her the rooms.
The first spare bedroom faced east.
The second faced the orchard.
Abigail chose the orchard.
Cole carried her trunk inside.
Then stopped at the threshold.
“This is yours.”
She looked around.
Plain bed.
Quilt.
Washstand.
Small writing desk.
Window.
A wooden wardrobe.
He gestured toward the door.
“Lock works.”
Abigail turned.
“Why are you telling me?”
“So you know.”
Something in her chest tightened.
Cole stepped back into the hall.
“If you need anything, knock.”
Then he left.
Abigail closed the door.
She turned the lock.
Not because she feared him.
Because she could.
For the first time that day, she cried.
Quietly.
Not because she was unhappy.
Because a locked door had never before felt like kindness.
Their first week was awkward.
Not disastrously so.
Just carefully.
Cole rose before sunrise.
Abigail woke soon after.
He made coffee strong enough to remove paint.
She told him so on the second morning.
He looked offended.
“You put six spoons of sugar in yours.”
“Because I am trying to survive it.”
“You could use less coffee.”
“You could learn restraint.”
He stared at her.
Then laughed.
It transformed his face.
Abigail had not expected that.
Cole smiling looked younger.
Less carved by weather.
More dangerous to her peace of mind.
He went to work on the barn.
Abigail explored the house.
By afternoon she had reorganized two cupboards and discovered the kitchen accounts.
The numbers bothered her.
Not immediately.
At first it was only instinct.
A figure carried forward incorrectly.
A payment recorded twice in one place but somehow still missing elsewhere.
She pulled another ledger.
Then another.
At dusk, Cole returned with an armful of wood.
He stepped through the kitchen door and stopped.
Papers covered the table.
The sideboard.
One chair.
Part of the counter.
Abigail stood near the hearth wearing a powder-blue blouse, beige apron, and long burgundy skirt, one hand holding a pencil.
Cole looked around.
Then at her.
“You found something.”
Not a question.
“Several somethings.”