"This is... no." "You can refuse," Kaya said, "but if you do, we'll follow you anyway, for the rest of our lives, or until the debt is settled another way." "What other way?" "Death." The word hung in the air like a blade.
Cole felt sick. "You'd die before giving up on this?" "Yes." "That's not honor. That's madness."
"Call it what you want," Kaya said. "It doesn't change the truth." Cole turned away, hands shaking. This couldn't be happening. Not after everything.
Not after months of riding together, working together, building something that felt almost like trust. "I need time," he said finally. "You have until sunrise," Kaya replied. "Then we need an answer." Cole walked.
He didn't know where he was going, didn't care. His boots carried him past the general store, past the saloon with its peeling paint and crooked sign, past the livery where their horses stood waiting. He kept walking until Stillwater Crossing was behind him and the desert stretched out in every direction, empty and indifferent. Until sunrise. That's what Kaya had said, as if a few hours could somehow make sense of something that defied every rule Cole had lived by.
Marriage. The word tasted foreign in his mind, like something from another language he'd never learned to speak. He'd seen marriages out there, rough partnerships born of necessity, loneliness, or desperation. Most fell apart within a year. The ones that lasted were built on practicality, not whatever the hell the women were offering.
And they wanted all three of them to marry him. Not one. All three. Cole stopped walking and stood in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by sage and silence. The sky overhead was deepening toward dusk, streaked with orange and purple, like an old bruise.
He pulled out his canteen, took a long drink, and tried to organize his thoughts into something that made sense. It didn't work. The women weren't lying. He knew that much. Whatever tradition or belief system they'd grown up with, they believed it completely.
Believed it enough to chase him across the frontier for ten years. Believed it enough to offer themselves, their entire lives, to a man who'd done nothing but try to push them away. Except he hadn't pushed very hard, had he? Cole sat down on a flat rock, removed his hat, and ran his fingers through his hair. The truth was lodged somewhere in his chest like a stone he couldn't swallow.
He'd let them stay because he'd wanted them to stay. Because riding alone had started to feel wrong. Because the sound of Lyra's laugh, or the quiet steadiness of Sani's voice, or the way Kaya looked at him like he was worth something, all of it had wormed its way past his defenses without him noticing. And now they wanted to make it permanent. "Idiots," he muttered to himself.
"All of you. Me included." The sun touched the horizon, bleeding red across the desert floor. Cole watched it sink, measuring time in the way shadows stretched and twisted. He had maybe eight hours before dawn.
Eight hours to decide whether to accept something he didn't understand, or reject it and watch them waste the rest of their lives following him anyway. Neither option felt right. He thought about running. Just saddling his horse in the dead of night and riding until Stillwater Crossing was a week behind him. But he'd tried that before, in smaller ways, and the women had always found him.
Always caught up. And even if they didn't, even if he somehow managed to disappear completely, the guilt would follow him. He knew that with the kind of certainty that came from experience. Cole stood, brushed the dust off his pants, and started walking back toward town. Not because he'd made a decision, but because sitting alone in the desert wasn't going to give him answers.
When he reached the edge of Stillwater Crossing, the streets were mostly empty. A few lanterns glowed in windows, and somewhere a dog was barking at nothing. Cole made his way to the small boarding house where they'd taken rooms and climbed the stairs to the second floor. The women were in the room at the end of the hall. He could see light beneath the door, hear the murmur of voices.