Chapter Four – The Sound of Rope Breaking
The final fibres gave way with a dry snap.
The sound was small.
Yet it seemed to travel across the whole street.
The rope dropped from her wrists.
It struck the red dirt between them and collapsed into a loose coil.
For a second, neither moved.
The woman stared at her freed hands.
Dark marks circled her wrists where the rope had pressed into the skin.
She turned one hand slowly.
Then the other.
The cowboy watched.
He expected relief.
Instead, her expression became more serious.
Freedom had arrived, but safety had not.
That difference was clear in the way she checked her wrists rather than rubbing them.
In the way she raised her head.
In the way her eyes moved beyond him toward the open street.
The cowboy folded the knife partly toward his palm, but he did not put it away.
She noticed.
“Are you expecting trouble?”
“I’m expecting men.”
“That is often the same thing.”
This time he did smile.
Briefly.
Then the sound of a horse stamping in the distance erased it.
The woman straightened.
Her shoulders settled.
Something about her changed once the rope was gone.
She was not calmer.
She was simply herself again.
The cowboy realised, with some discomfort, that the restraint had never made her look weak.
Only interrupted.
