Page 28 of Daddy of the Mountain

I looked out over the snow-covered valley below us, trying not to linger too long on the heat rising in my cheeks. Everything felt softer out here—the air, the light, the quiet. Like the mountain itself had decided to loosen its grip for a while.

“Ready for a walk?”

“Uh-uh.”

So we walked. We didn’t head far, just ten minutes or so in a little loop around the mountain.

"Feels like progress, huh?" he asked after a moment, his voice cutting through the stillness.

"Yeah," I said, nodding. "It does."

“You’ll, uh, be wanting to head back home soon.”

There it was. Like an unwelcome shadow, the city loomed over me. Deadlines, emails, meetings stacked one after another. My old life waiting for me to pick it back up, whether I wanted to or not.

“I guess.”

"Alana." His tone shifted, pulling me back. I glanced at him, catching the edge of something in his expression—something guarded.

"Yeah?"

"You’re worried."

It wasn’t even a question. He just knew.

I sighed, dragging my fingers through my hair. There wasn’t any point in pretending. "I can’t help it," I said, my voice sharper than I meant it to be. "My job, my apartment, everything piling up—"

"Your deadlines," he cut in, his tone flat.

"Yeah, exactly." I folded my arms across my chest, matching his stance without thinking. "It’s my life, Silas. I have to go back to it. I can’t just leave it dangling forever. But it’s stressful. Being out here, with you, it’s so . . . easy."

“I get it.”

“Sometimes I wish I could just . . . stay here.”

He was silent for a moment. The snow crunched under out feet.

“I can’t though. Obviously. Living in a cabin doing nothing doesn’t exactly pay the rent.”

“Right.”

My heart pounded in my chest. “I just wish it didn’t stress me out so much.”

He stopped, looked at me for a moment. "Come with me," Silas said, his voice low but steady.

I turned, catching the flicker of something unreadable in his eyes.

"Where we goin’?" I asked, my breath puffing out in little clouds.

"Not far. Trust me."

"That’s ominous," I muttered.

We kept walking until we were a in a small clearing. The air bit at my cheeks, sharp and clean, but it felt good. Bracing. Like it could strip away everything weighing me down, at least for a little while.

"Here," he said finally, stopping in a patch of undisturbed snow. He turned to me, his brow furrowing like he was working through some internal calculation.

"Okay . . ." I glanced around. "What’s this about? You planning to bury me out here or somethin’?"

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