'I can't believe you just slept and left them to--' Her anger is getting the better of her. She takes a deep breath. 'Where have they gone? They can't have got far.'
Still he doesn't acknowledge her and carries on about the little camp as though they were the only ones who had ever been there. He reminds her of Sanchez, and in a way her father too. They were stubbornly unwilling to acknowledge their faults too.
She wants him to say something to give her an excuse or an explanation even though she knows she'll shout at him for it. His silence is exasperating.
'You don't care about them at all do you? You're glad they're gone. Did you tell them to go? Is that what you did? Whisper in their ear that they're not welcome and that they should just do us all a favor and go and die in a ravine somewhere on their own?'
'They've chosen to be on their own. You can't blame them for that. Don't forget McLaren is after you, not them. I don't think Billy can have been in such a bad way after all if they managed to get away without waking either of us. They should be safe enough if they can get themselves back to town.'
'That's it?' Finally she gets him to say something and all he can do is say that they wanted it so they must be alright? What about her? Doesn't he care about how she feels? Doesn't he realize she feels responsible for the state that Billy is in?
'You want me to chase after them?' He stands and looks at her.
'I want you to... I don't know...' The incoherence of anger.
'Let me tell you how it is. Last night I thought I might take the first watch and wait until you were all asleep and ride off on my own. Yes, that's right, I was going to do what they've done.'
So that's it. He hates her too. He wants to leave her behind and right now he's just annoyed that she didn't disappear into the night with the others. Maybe he didn't like her all that much in first place? Suddenly she hates him. All this time he has been stringing her along? She won't stand for it any more. She stands up abruptly and aims a slap across his face.
'Don't be so hasty.' He says, catching her wrist with his good arm. 'You see, I'd meant to go, but I didn't. Don't you want to know why I didn't?'
She wrestles to get her arm free from his grip. She hates him for wanting to run away but she wants to hear him say that he stayed to be with her. She wants to pull her arm away but she likes the feel of his strong hand and the sensation of their physical contact.
'I didn't go because I thought about you. I thought it would be kind of nice to still have you with me. Not just anybody. You. I thought you and me could really be something, and while I thought about that I fell asleep. I'm not proud of being a failure as a sentry, but I'm not going to cry because of how things worked out.'
She likes that he wanted to stay with her. She is so angry with him for letting them down and falling asleep but still likes to hear him say he likes how things have worked out. The two of them. She stops fighting and lets him pull her close. She looks up into his eyes but still can't shake the feeling of responsibility for Billy and Laura.
'I owed that boy,' she says, sad now rather than angry. 'He nearly died for me. Can't you see that?'
'I see it, Emily, and the best way you can pay him back right now is to let him go.'
It gives her a shiver when he doesn't call her "Miss Nixon".
'They've been wanting to run off together for a while,' he says, holding her. 'They said as much last night. And I know you feel like you owe him, but you have to see that you've brought him nothing but trouble so far.'
'They're just kids,' she says.
'I know. But they're good kids.'
She kisses him, savoring the warmth of his touch. She thrills to be so close to him and to be alone with him. It's a thrill, like a gallop on wild horse, exciting and scary all at once. Or is she just scared?
She pulls away.
'What's wrong?' he asks.
'I don't know. It's like they're watching us. I don't feel safe here.'
He turns back to the fire and tries to coax some more flames from the embers.
'I don't think they followed us from the ranch. They'd have killed us in our sleep if they had.'
'That's reassuring.'
They sit close together and watch the little fire recover. The darting flames and rising smoke bring to mind the fire at the ranch and she thinks of her childhood home and all her belongings. For some reason she thinks of the dress she bought from Mannion on the day she met Logan. She never wore it.
She has nowhere to go now. The ranch was everything to her. It was her work and her play all rolled into one. It was her link to her dead father, her one chance to feel she was doing something he'd be proud of. If he saw it now? She tries not to think about what he'd have to say to her.
Somehow it doesn't feel like she thought it would. She feels a sense of loss but at the same time a burden has been lifted. She has no home, but she has nothing to protect or defend any more either. She has nothing to prove, she can't fail any more than she has already. She doesn't need to fight to stop people stealing or trying to buy the ranch. The ranch is as good as gone. There is no more need for blowing up houses or shooting deputies. It is a relief.
Logan has no home. That thought occurs to her too. He has nowhere in particular to go. They are both wanderers now. Somehow that's reassuring.
She sits with her head on his shoulder, saying nothing, waiting together for the coffee to boil.
'We should set off for the mining camp soon,' he says as he gets up. She notices that he isn't using his bad arm at all.
She thinks about the mining camp and how unattractive it sounds as a place to go. She pictures a place full of dirty unshaven men with Humby's attitude to women.
She really disliked the experience of being kidnapped by Humby. She thought she had coped with it well, but now she finds it's left an empty space where her self confidence used to be. She has sat here waiting for Logan to tell them where they are going next. She wouldn't have done that when they first met.
She determines to take some control back. She isn't going to let men run her life, to tell her what she can and cannot do. She's not going to stand for that any more. She'll say where they are going and he'll do what she says. If he thinks he can dictate the way things are going to be then he's no better than Humby.
'We're not going to the mining camp,' she says.
'We're not?'
'We're going back into Walkers Creek.'
She waits for a reaction. He hands her some coffee and sits back down. He sits facing the fire and she wants to try to read the reaction on his face. Is he mad at her? Is he just thinking of a way to make her do what he wants after all? If he wants to fight about this, she'll fight him. This is her life and she's not going to give up the reins to anyone.
'Okay.'
'Okay?'
'Sure. I mean, you've thought this through? You know the town better than I do.'
Now she's angry with him for not making her angry with him. Of course she hasn't thought it through. She was expecting him to fight with her, to argue, to justify where he was going and to make it sound better than a sleazy cesspit.
'You seemed pretty sure just now that they haven't been following us.'
He nods, but looks puzzled.
'So,' she's making this up as she goes along, 'we don't have anything to fear from them.'
He doesn't say anything. It's as though he's waiting for her to say something stupid so he can overrule her idea and end up back with the mining camp option by default.
'And anyway, I don't plan to spend the rest of my life being scared of my shadow and watching out for McLaren or whoever. I'd sooner face up to them and stick a bullet in them if I have to.'
'Sounds like you're in the mood for a fight,' he says, laughing.
'I'm serious.' She isn't laughing.