Page 60 of Mountain Mens' Curvy Obsession

“I know you’re doing your best. It was my impatience that got me into trouble with Max.”

Chance sighs heavily and settles on the sofa with a glass of scotch. The smoky fragrance reaches my nostrils, but I’m not sure I like the smell of it anymore. I used to love it until not that long ago.

“You were acting on instinct,” Chance says. “And I can’t blame you. Maybe if we’d gone against the doc’s recommendations in the first place, if we’d told you about your family’s feud with the Sokolovs and the circumstances in which we found you in that blizzard—”

“You were trying to protect me,” I reply. “I don’t think anyone’s at fault here.”

“But you will get it all back, Anya. I see you every day. I see how you work with yourself to recover what you’ve lost. Honestly, I wish I could do more, but your mind has its own pace.”

“I think it’s my heart that’s asking me to take it easy,” I say. “I can feel it; the pain I’ve been carrying for a long time. It’s hidden precisely where I keep scratching. That’s why the headaches pop up when I struggle to remember something.”

“Dr. Rollins did say you’d have a hard time with some memories, particularly the ones centered around traumatic events.”

“I’ve had plenty of those, huh?” I laugh bitterly. Chance doesn’t answer. He doesn’t really have to. I can see it written across his handsome, rugged face. The light in the green pools of his eyes darkens as he looks away from me and chooses to focus on his glass. “So, Breonna, eh?”

That shifts the air in the room in a completely different direction.

They’ve been avoiding the subject since her impromptu visit over breakfast. It made everything unnecessarily awkward between us, and I need that to change.

“For what it’s worth, I’m not mad. I mean, I don’t like it, but what you did in the past is yours and yours alone. There was life before me,” I laugh, albeit nervously. “It’s okay, Chance.”

“I’ll be honest. At the time, none of us thought it through,” he says, scratching his scruffy beard. My fingertips tingle with the anticipation of running them through it as well later tonight. “She was willing; we’d been celibate for a while…”

“It was a primal need being fulfilled, right?”

“Right. But we weren’t too clear about where it would lead, not before we got into it. Booker and I, we’re more in sync. If someone strikes us as odd or uncanny, we immediately cut ourselves off from them, emotionally speaking. Nico is kind and appeasing; he tries to stay on everyone’s good side, and I love that about him.”

I allow myself a smile. “She has feelings for him.”

“Yes, I suppose. He definitely doesn’t have any for her. He never did. She is confusing his kindness with something else, and that has led to tension in the past,” Chance admits. “We do our best to be good neighbors, but, like I said, Booker and I… we’re not her biggest fans.”

“Honestly, she’s hurt. But I don’t think she’s fundamentally bad. Breonna has a slew of insecurities left over from her past. I guess we all do, to a certain extent.”

Chance gives me a cool grin. “The keywords being ‘to a certain extent,’ because Breonna is carrying a hell of a lot more than all of us put together.”

“I think she’s trying to be better. I mean, the earlier conversation was eye-opening for me despite the blunder. I think she can’t help but poke and the prod. I think it comes naturally to her.”

Maybe I’m excusing her actions, but I can’t label her “bad.” Breonna is a complex woman, and I have yet to figure out whether her positives outweigh her negatives. It takes time to get to know a person before you can reach such a conclusion.

Chance stills, his gaze softening as he looks at me. “You’ve grown into an incredible woman, you know that?”

“Oh, I don’t know…”

I blush, nonetheless. It feels wonderful to hear such words of affirmation, especially coming from the men who saved me, who brought out the best in me. The men who, in a way, returned me to real life. I may not remember the past two years since Dalton, in particular, yet I’m starting to believe that I spent the time in a sort of limbo, in a heavy fog. Broken and scared.

I’m scared now, too. However, Chance, Nico, and Booker are here with me. And they’ve already proven how far they’re willing to go to protect me.

“I mean it. You are so objective in your reasoning,” Chance says. “Willing to give people the benefit of the doubt, to see the shades in them… it’s refreshing. These days, folks are so quick to judge and chastise, it’s disheartening.”

“You don’t like Breonna.”

“No, but you clearly do, and I respect that. I like the way you look at her from a different perspective. It says so much about you as a human being, Anya,” he replies. “It only makes me admire you more.”

“You, admire me?” I laugh. “Good Lord… I’m basically still starting out in life. I’m actually in the temporarily interrupted process of starting out in life, whereas you and your brothers have been kicking ass and taking names for a long time. You served your country with honor, you put yourselves in the line of fire, and then you came back and helped an entire region flourish. You added jobs to the local economy. The people here look up to you. They depend on you. And even now, you’re trying so hard to keep me safe… I mean,” I pause, choking up. “I mean, you saved me. You killed a man to save me.”

Chance gets up and comes over to me. He helps me out of my seat so he can wrap me in a warm, tight hug. I hide my face in his chest, my nose pressed against his flannel shirt. I breathe him in, welcoming the hints of musk and Mandarin blossoms from his cologne, as his heart beats thunderously along with mine.

“Anya, I would burn the whole world down if that’s what it takes to keep you alive, happy, and in our lives,” he says. “And for the record, despite your age, you have shown a resilience and a determination very few people possess. You have no idea how precious and beautiful it makes you in a world where everybody wants things quick and easy. You beat the odds so many times already. You’re our miracle.”

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