Chapter 7 – Chapter 7

It was eight days later. Eight nights of Bran being in Jeremiah's bed, but rarely sleeping there at night. Catching naps in the afternoon as Jeremiah chopped wood and cared for the horses, so that he would be awake and aware of everything Jeremiah was doing with him—to him, inside him—in the night.

The snow was almost completely melted outside the cabin now, and when Bran looked up the mountainside toward Antelope Gap, he could see more rock than snow—and blue skies overhead. But each time he looked up there, Jeremiah would come up beside him, put an arm around him, and say, "Not yet, I don't think. Not safe up there yet." And more often than not, he then would pick Bran up in his arms and carry him back into the cabin and fuck him—in Jeremiah's chair or on the bearskin rug, or bent over the table, or on all fours on the braided rug. Rarely on the bed during the day. But always on the bed, repeatedly—in the dark—in the night. Repeatedly because Jeremiah almost always apologized for the size of what Bran had to accommodate after the first fucking and Bran would respond by demanding a second one.

The afternoon of the eighth day Bran was laying a fire in the fireplace and Jeremiah was standing at the window at the front of the house. The windows had been unshuttered, except in the dead of night, since Christmas day.

"You need to take a crap," Jeremiah said in a soft voice. "And you need to stay back there and quiet until I come and get you."

"I don't—"

"You need to go on back there now," Jeremiah said, giving him a hard look and standing at the front door.

As Bran was moving in the connecting corridor behind the cabin to the outhouse, he heard the front door open and Jeremiah go out onto the porch.

He crept back into the cabin and took a peek out of the window to the front porch. Four riders were strung out across the front of the cabin, one more forward to the other. Bran scurried back to the outhouse.

"Hello, Warren," Jeremiah called out. "What brings you up into the mountains in the winter? I ain't seen no stray cows—yours or anyone else's."

"Strange that you'd be up here in the winter too, Jeremiah," Warren Savage, owner of both the Big O ranch and the Hayden saloon, said. His voice was a friendly one. The two men were both cattle ranchers. Such men normally held together, sharing interests against the increasing encroachment in the region of sheepherders and farmers.

"Christmas. I like to celebrate it alone in beautiful surroundings. Have done it for years," Jeremiah answered. "Even have a tree, which I understand are real popular in the East now. Want to come in and see it?"

Bran started to creep back to the corridor to the outhouse in panic, but Savage's answer stopped him and he returned to standing beside the window and straining to hear.

"No, thanks. They put up a tree in the saloon this year too. Good for business. I guess we'll continue doing that for Christmas."

"So, what brings you and your boys up this way?"

"Looking for a missing man. A city boy from down in Hayden. Been missing since before Christmas. His name's Branton Niederman. Goes by Bran. You ain't seen anyone like that up here, have you? Short, but in good shape. Blond. Looks young, but isn't a child no more."

"Old enough to make his own decisions, is he?" Jeremiah asked.

"Left some obligations in Hayden. But mostly we're worried about him. His folks want him back real bad."

"His folks?"

"Yep. You seen anyone like that up here from before Christmas?"

A fifth man was nosing over toward them. Jeremiah could see that he'd been in the barn.

"Two horses in the barn," the newly appearing cowboy said to Savage as he approached.

"Both with brands from my ranch on them, did you see?" Jeremiah quickly said. "Needed an extra one to carry supplies up here. I'll be staying a spell." He then turned to Savage. "Just me up here, Warren. If I see a man answering that description, I'll surely let you know. But until then, a Merry Christmas to you."

"And to you too, Jeremiah. Quite a snow we had up here. You look like you took the brunt of the storm right here."

"Yep. Almost two feet before it stopped. But it's meltin' off pretty good now."

"It seems to be, yes. Don't know if you heard, but for the first time in years, it didn't bury Antelope Gap on the west side. Folks over there said that, despite the snow, the pass never got shut down. Ain't that something?"

"Yep, that sure is. You take care now. And I hope you meet up with your man. But if he walked up this way into the storm, I doubt you'll be finding evidence of him before spring—and maybe not even then. Bears have gotta eat too."

Savage tipped his hat and the five riders turned and rode off.

Jeremiah waited until they were well out of sight before he gave Bran the signal that he could come out of the outhouse, where he had scurried to before Jeremiah could find out he'd been by the window.

But Jeremiah somehow had known Bran was there. "You heard?"

"Yeah, I heard everything real good," Bran said. "But I don't owe them anything down in Hayden and I'm of age. He didn't say anything about the painted pony, did he?"

"No, he didn't say anything about the painted pony. So, it looks like we fixed that up. But I meant whether you heard what he said about Antelope Gap. He's saying it's safe to go over that pass now—in fact, always was."

"But . . . if they're out there looking for me . . ."

"Maybe it's not that safe," Jeremiah quickly said. "But at night, of course." Jeremiah obviously wasn't looking for an excuse to see Bran off.

"Yeah, there's nighttime," Bran answered. They both looked at each other like they were thinking that the purpose of the night for them was something far different from riding over a mountain.

"Guess you have two choices then," Jeremiah said.

"Two choices?" Bran's heart began to beat fast.

"Yes. You can go over the mountain tonight—or you could wait and go down to my ranch with me in a couple of weeks. I've got enough food up here for two for a couple of weeks. And I got plenty of room down in the ranch house if you're interested in going in that direction rather than over the mountain. So, what are you thinking?"

"I think you know what I'm thinking," Bran said, a smile taking over his face. "But what are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking of what we could use to darken your hair. Just for a while. Just until Warren Savage stops lookin' for you."