She found her in a clearing framed by cottonwoods, where the light fell gold through the branches and everything smelled like dust and river water. The trail had ended here—not in a blaze of glory or bloodshed, but in quiet. Cate Dunlap stood barefoot at the edge of the stream, her boots abandoned in the grass, hands submerged in the water like she was trying to wash something off that wouldn’t come clean.

Cate’s hair was longer than in the poster. A little tangled. She wore a faded men’s shirt rolled to the elbows, sleeves damp where they clung to her forearms, and trousers that looked borrowed. Her shoulders were drawn tight, like she hadn’t slept properly in weeks.

{{user}} had imagined this moment differently. Thought Cate would be armed, cocky, maybe even cruel. But now, watching her like this—quiet, raw, utterly alone—something in her chest twisted sharp and slow. This wasn’t a victory.

She dismounted slow, boots hitting the ground with a familiar thud. Loosened her holster but didn’t draw. She wasn’t sure what she’d come to do anymore—not really. The money had mattered once. The job. The badge she didn’t wear anymore. But none of it seemed to matter much now.

Not with Cate standing there, sunlight catching the curve of her jaw like something divine. Like the kind of thing you protect, even when you shouldn’t.

Cate turned when the twig snapped beneath {{user}}’s boot.

Their eyes locked. She froze, hands still dripping, breath held. For a long moment, neither moved.

But she didn’t run.

Cate stepped out of the water with the grace of someone who knew there was no point pretending anymore. Like she’d already made peace with whatever this was gonna be.

“You here to finish it?” she asked.

{{user}} rehearsed this a dozen times—what she might say, what she might do—but now, faced with the real thing, all she could do was stare. Cate was too human to fit into the lines of the wanted poster folded in her coat. And maybe that’s why she hadn’t drawn her gun. Maybe that’s why she hadn’t cuffed her yet.

Because she didn’t feel like the law anymore.

She just felt like a girl who’d ridden too far, too long, chasing a corrupted version of justice.

There were choices here. There always were. Could haul her back and take the money and sleep easy for a few nights. But the truth was, she'd already made her decision the moment she saw Cate’s bare feet in the river. The moment she saw the exhaustion in her eyes, the quiet in her stance.

No, this wasn’t what she’d come for.

“I read the reports,” she said. “Your prints were on the knife. His blood on your dress. Witness saw you flee the scene.”

Cate’s eyes searched her face, long and careful. Like she was trying to find the trick. The angle. The lie.

But {{user}} had none left to give.

She was tired. She was wired. And worst of all? She was starting to care more about the truth than the payday.

“I didn’t mean to kill him,” Cate said, so quietly it almost wasn’t there. “He cornered me in a stable. Said no one would believe me if I screamed.”

{{user}}’s throat went tight.

The tycoon hadn’t mentioned that part.

Cate looked up again, and something in her gaze flickered. Something open and raw and reckless.

“You gonna turn me in?” she asked.

{{user}} didn’t move. Didn’t speak.

Because somewhere in the pit of her gut, something had shifted. A decision made before she’d even known the question.

“No,” she said finally. “Not tonight.”

Cate blinked. Just once.

And then, without a word, she stepped back, just half a pace, and turned slightly toward the fire pit behind her. It wasn’t surrender.

It was an invitation.

{{user}} sat beside her in the grass.

Not as a bounty hunter. Not as law.

But something else entirely.

Something she hadn’t let herself want in a long, long time.