“Please Marry Me” – Mail Order Bride Begs The Caged Mountain Man Everyone Feared And This Happened

Chapter 4

When she finished the last repair, he examined her work, running a finger along the neat stitches. Then he did something that surprised her. He reached for her carpet bag and gestured questioningly.

“You want to see what else needs mending?”

He shook his head. Instead, he pointed to the bag’s handle — which was indeed coming loose from the body.

“Oh. Yes, that’s been worrying me. If it breaks entirely —”

He held out his shackled hands for the bag. Despite her curiosity, Eleanor handed it over.

He examined the failing connection with the same focused attention he’d given to building the fire. Then he began working — using his teeth to hold the leather while his bound hands pulled the fallen stitches free and rewove them in a stronger pattern.

“Do you know leather work?”

A pause. A small nod.

“Were you a craftsman? Before?”

His hands stilled completely. For a moment she thought she’d pushed too far. Then he set the bag aside and held up his hands, showing her his palms in the firelight.

Even beneath the dirt and recent wounds, she could see the calluses of long labor. The particular patterns that came from working with tools. He pointed to the fire, then made a hammering motion.

“A blacksmith?”

He tilted his hand back and forth — close, but not quite.

“Farrier?”

Another partial gesture.

“Both? You worked with metal *and* horses?”

A clear nod.

He picked up a small stick and smoothed a patch of dirt near the fire. With careful strokes, he drew the outline of a horseshoe. Then he added decorative elements — the kind of fancy work that spoke of skill beyond mere function.

“You were an artist,” Eleanor said softly. “Not just a tradesman.”

Something flickered across his face. Pride, perhaps. Or pain at the memory. He scrubbed out the drawing with his palm and returned to fixing her bag.

Eleanor watched him work, noting the way he compensated for the shackles, how even in chains his hands moved with remembered skill. She thought of the town’s stories — a wild man, a killer, a beast in human form. Yet here he sat, carefully repairing her belongings with patient concentration.

—

The fire had burned lower, and the desert cold was creeping in. Eleanor pulled out her single blanket — worn thin from use. She looked at it, then at Jacob, who had settled himself against a rock at the edge of the firelight.

“We’ll share,” she decided. “It’s not proper, I know. But propriety seems foolish out here.”

He shook his head firmly and pointed to himself, then the ground.

“You’ll freeze.”

Another shake of the head. He pulled his knees to his chest, wrapped his arms around them as best he could with the chains, and demonstrated how he intended to sleep.

“That’s ridiculous. We’re married, strange as the circumstances are. And I won’t have you catching cold on my account.”

Eleanor spread the blanket on the ground near the fire. “There’s room enough for two if we’re careful.”

For a long moment, he didn’t move. Then slowly, he shifted closer. He lay down on the very edge of the blanket — his back to her — taking up as little space as possible.

Eleanor settled herself a careful distance away, but close enough to pull the blanket over both of them. The chains clinked softly as he adjusted position, trying to find a way to rest that didn’t put pressure on his bound wrists.

Without thinking, she reached out and touched his shoulder.

He flinched so violently the blanket nearly came off entirely.

“I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I just — the shackles must hurt.”

He lay still, breathing carefully. Then, almost imperceptibly, he relaxed. When Eleanor didn’t move her hand, he shifted slightly — acknowledging the touch without pulling away.

“Tomorrow we’ll find a way to remove them,” she promised. “Sheriff Bradley said to send them back with a traveler. He didn’t say they had to stay on until then.”

A soft exhale. Agreement, or doubt. She couldn’t tell.

They lay quiet then — strangers bound by law and desperation, sharing warmth against the desert cold. Eleanor stared up at the vast scatter of stars. Beside her, Jacob’s breathing gradually steadied, though she suspected he wasn’t truly sleeping any more than she was.

Somewhere in the distance, a coyote howled and others answered. The sound should have been frightening, but after the human cruelty of Fow Ridge, it seemed almost welcoming. At least wild things were honest in their nature.

“Jacob,” she whispered, not sure if he was awake.

A slight movement indicated he was listening.

“I want you to know — I don’t expect anything from this marriage except what we choose to make of it. You’re free now. Or you will be, once those shackles come off. If you want to leave, find your own way — I won’t stop you.”

Silence stretched between them. Then she felt him shift, turning just enough that she could see his profile in the dying firelight.

He pointed to her, then to himself, then pressed his palms together — the same gesture from their makeshift ceremony.

*A promise.*

Whatever else he couldn’t or wouldn’t say, he was telling her he would honor what had passed between them.

“All right,” she whispered. “We’ll figure it out together.”