The inside of his truck was clean and smelled like old leather. Ian turned the key, and the engine roared to life. His radio only got one station, the one out of Galena, but the DJ was on a role with songs she remembered from high school. Every time Ian looked over at her with a smile that was now easier to see without his beard, she felt like she was flying. Window rolled down, she let her fingers catch the late-summer breeze as Ian turned onto the main dirt road that led to town. It was a forty-five minute drive, and he was quiet on the way, but it wasn’t an awkward silence. Ian was a man who didn’t waste words. He didn’t talk just to hear himself as Cole had done. And back in the cabin, he hadn’t charged in there after their spat and demanded she admit she was wrong. He’d gone into his room, thought about why she was disappointed, done something sweet by shaving for her, then compromised about taking her out. He was thoughtful in ways that surprised her, coming from a man who looked like him.
The mysteries around her fiancé stacked up, layer by layer, and because he hadn’t given her any real explanation as to what made him the way he was, her curiosity was growing cavernous. She’d met men with handsome, rugged looks like Ian when she’d been in Anchorage, but they’d all seemed the same. Arrogant, and they knew their place at the top of the food chain. And while there was no question Ian was a powerful man and knew his abilities to fix equipment and hunt, he didn’t have that air about him that said she was beneath him. On the contrary, he seemed determined to lift her up. He could’ve made her promises that he would provide the meat for their house if she took care of the garden and the canning. Instead, he was taking her into town to get her hunting and trapping licenses because the man seemed bound and determined to make her self-sufficient. It scared her because a secret part of her wanted to become dependent on him until she could find her strength again. She didn’t like how he’d talked about getting herself out of a bind in the winter. She wanted them to get out of any situations that arose together. But she understood he wasn’t trying to keep her reliant. He was trying to make her more capable, as she needed to be to make a life out here long-term. The idea of trapping during the winter season scared her, but it also excited her. Ian was taking over the lessons where Uncle Jim had left off. For that, her respect grew deeper and wider for the man sitting next to her.
Feeling brave, she scooted over as close to him on the bench seat as her seatbelt would allow. He responded by draping his arm over her shoulders. She rested her head against his shoulder and smiled out the front window at the lush, green landscape. Summers in Alaska were beautiful, and she was sharing this one with Ian. Twenty-six, and she had the giddy fluttering in her stomach like a teenager with a crush.
“How old are you?” she asked. He looked younger now without his beard.
“Thirty.” He arched his eyebrows and cast her a quick glance as he pulled past the Welcome to Galena sign. “An old man compared to you.”
“Robbing the cradle,” she murmured, waving to Janet Graves who was watching the truck from in front of the radio station.
“I like ’em young and tender,” he teased as he pulled into a parking spot in front of the general store.
Elyse laughed and poked her bony arm. “I don’t know how tender I am, old man.”
“I’ll get you tender enough,” he said so softly, she had to strain to hear him. “Wait there, and I’ll get your door.”
Stunned, she murmured, “Okay,” through a baffled smile. For a backwoods man, he sure had a surprising amount of manners.
Galena was a small town, but that didn’t stop it from being a natural hub for the small villages around it. Settled right off the banks of the Yukon River, this was ground zero for boat deliveries for the outlying towns. Even with the small population, the town had a local police force, radio station, and hospital facility. It even had a feed store for all the homesteaders who called this territory home base.
Getting her licenses from the guy behind the counter at the general store only took twenty minutes, and while she waited, Ian stocked up on groceries. She was so ready to start filling the freezer. Meat was expensive, and she was feeling mighty guilty about the money he was spending on food. Ian didn’t seem to mind, though, and was cordial to the cashier as he checked out. Even when he paid the sixty-two bucks for her hunting-trapping-sports fishing license, and an extra five bucks for waterfowl stamps, he didn’t even bat an eye. He just told Mr. Neery he sure appreciated it and led her out of the store with his two armloads of groceries.
“Favorite store in town?” he asked as he loaded his wares into the back seat of his Ford.
“Easy. Feed store.”
“Why?”
“Because sometimes they have baby chickens in there, and they’re so little and cute and fluffy.” Her voice had gone all squeaky as she mushed her fists together in front of her face, so she cleared her throat and finished, “And there is, you know, horse feed in there.”
Ian let off a single, booming laugh and shut his door. “Well, we need some feed anyway, but I have a feeling you don’t think dusty bags of oats are as cute as baby things.”
Ian’s nostrils flared, and he gave a thoughtful frown at the feed store down the street. But before she could ask what was wrong, he hooked his arm over her shoulders like a proud rooster with a new hen, and damn, he dumped all those butterflies back into her middle. He led her slowly down the street, looking in each store window as they passed. He told her he’d only been here a couple times, a long time ago, and that the town had built up a lot since then.