Page 13 of Treated to a Mountain Man
"You know him?"
"No." The lie came automatically, a survival instinct honed from years of compartmentalizing my life.
"Funny, seemed like he knew you."
I shrugged, bending to pick up one of the boxes. "Some men get nervous around women. Probably lacks good social skills."
Sawyer didn't respond, but I felt his gaze on me as we carried the supplies to the sugar shack. The easy camaraderie we'd builtover the past two days suddenly felt fragile, like an ice sculpture in sunlight.
We worked through the afternoon and into early evening, but the silence was different now—weighted with unasked questions. Every time Sawyer looked at me, I wondered what he was thinking, what he was piecing together. My past felt like a shadow creeping closer, ready to swallow everything I'd built here. The sun was already sinking behind the ridge when I finally couldn't bear the tension any longer.
"My stomach's bothering me," I said finally, unable to bear the tension. "That storm kept me up half the night—I'm more tired than I thought. Maybe I'm coming down with something."
"You can rest in the guest room if you need to," Sawyer offered, but his tone was careful, measuring.
"No, I should head back. Probably just need some ginger tea and an early night."
He nodded slowly. "Tomorrow then."
"Tomorrow," I agreed, gathering my things with hands that wanted to shake.
The drive back to town was a blur. I white-knuckled the steering wheel, my mind racing through possibilities. Would Will tell people? Would word spread through this small town like wildfire? Would Sawyer find out what I used to be? I drove straight back to Sugar & Spice, my stomach too knotted to even think about food. By the time I'd locked myself in the shop, full dark had settled over Main Street.
BACK AT SUGAR & SPICE, I locked the door and pulled the shades, needing the sanctuary of my kitchen. I'd come to Woodbridge Falls to start over, to be someone new, but the past had teeth and they were sinking deep.
I pulled out Sawyer's maple syrup, the dark amber liquid catching the light like liquid gold. Work had always been my salvation—through addiction, through recovery, through every impossible day when giving up seemed easier than going on. Tonight, candy would save me again.
The familiar rhythm of tempering chocolate soothed my ragged nerves. Melt, cool, warm again—bringing it to just the right temperature for that glossy snap. I made test batch after test batch of truffles, adjusting the maple cream filling, adding a touch of bourbon, a whisper of smoked salt.
As I worked, memories surfaced like bubbles in boiling sugar.
My parents' faces when they'd found me stealing from Mom's purse—again. The disappointment had been worse than anger. They were good people, worked hard their whole lives, went to church every Sunday. They'd raised me right, or tried to.
"We can't keep doing this, Cinnamon Grace," Dad had said, his voice breaking. "We can't watch you kill yourself."
They'd been right to set boundaries, to protect themselves from the chaos I'd become. The promises to get clean that I'd broken. The nights I'd stumbled home high, dressed in clothes that announced exactly how I'd earned my drug money. The lies that fell from my lips easier than truth.
I poured cream into a saucepan, adding syrup drop by drop. Steady hands. Careful discernment. Things I'd learned too late.
The pain from my accident had been the starting point, but I couldn't blame everything on crushed vertebrae and damaged nerves. Somewhere along the way, I'd chosen the pills over physical therapy, chosen the needle over facing reality, chosen to sell myself rather than ask for help.
Rock bottom had been a motel room in Newark, three days into withdrawal, wanting to die but too sick to move. That's when something in me had finally broken—or maybe finallyhealed. I'd called the rehab center with my last functioning brain cells, and somehow, by grace or luck or sheer stubbornness, I'd held on.
Six months in rehab. Another six in a halfway house. Learning to walk through pain without numbing it. Learning that I was stronger than I'd ever believed possible. That the pain wouldn't kill me, but the drugs would.
I piped maple cream into dark chocolate shells, my hands steady now from practice. Each truffle was a small redemption, proof that these hands could create instead of destroy.
But was it enough? Did I deserve the kind of family Sawyer had—people who loved each other through everything, who showed up when life got hard? The jury was still out on that. I'd changed, yes, but the past still clung to me like the smell of cigarette smoke in fabric.
I thought about Sawyer's nephew with his crayon business plans, his sister bringing her kids for holidays. That kind of wholesome love seemed like something from another planet, one where girls didn't sell themselves on the internet, where daughters didn't break their parents' hearts, where past mistakes could actually be erased instead of just glazed over.
A truffle slipped from my fingers, cracking on the marble counter. I stared at the broken chocolate, filling oozing from the fractured shell. That's what I was—something that looked perfect on the outside but was broken within, ready to spill my messy truth at the slightest pressure.
The attraction I felt for Sawyer made everything worse. Every time our hands brushed, every time he looked at me with those intense blue eyes, heat pooled low in my belly. It wasn't the rehearsed hunger I'd faked for cameras and clients. This was real, raw, dangerous. I wanted him in ways that had nothing to do with money and everything to do with the man himself—his unique combination of strength and gentleness, the way he talked about trees like they were old friends.
But I was supposed to be proving myself through skill, not seduction. I was supposed to be Cinn the candy maker, not Sweet Cinn the online fantasy. The two couldn't coexist, and only one deserved to survive.
I finished the batch of truffles, some better than others, and arranged them in neat rows. The maple flavor was close but not quite there—too sweet in some, the bourbon overpowering in others. I'd keep refining the recipe over the coming days. Tomorrow I'd have to face Sawyer again and pretend nothing had changed.
