Page 36 of Welded Defender
My head jerks toward him. “What?”
His lips twitch like he’s embarrassed, but he doesn’t look away. “You carry a lot. It shows. But when you smile… it’s like for a second, none of that weight’s there. I like seeing it.”
Heat blooms in my cheeks, hotter than the fire. My chest flutters with something sharp and sweet all at once. I don’t know what to say.
So I don’t say anything. I just let myself lean sideways, letting my cheek brush his shoulder.
I move to pull back, but Landon wraps an arm around me.
“It’s okay,” he murmurs. “Rest.”
So I don’t pull away. My eyelids grow heavy, each blink slower than the last. His flannel shirt smells like cedar and laundry detergent. I feel the rise and fall of his chest—once, twice, three times—and my own breathing slows to match. The weight of his arm settles across my shoulders, warm and certain. His heartbeat thumps beneath my ear—steady as a metronome. The fire pops. The wind whispers outside. And somewhere between one breath and the next, the knot between my shoulder blades unravels and I fall asleep.
***
When I wake, it’s to sunlight and Wes’s voice. “Wakey, wakey, eggs and bakey.”
My body snaps forward so fast my neck cricks. The cushion beneath me still holds the warm impression of where I’d been curled against Landon’s side. He stirs beside me, eyelashes fluttering, his arm stretched across the back of the couch in the exact same protective curve it had formed around my shoulders all night.
“Well, well, well,” Wes drawls. “Look at you two. Cozy.”
“Wes,” Landon says, his voice low and warning, but Wes just smirks, arms crossed as he leans against the doorway.
“Relax,” Wes says. “Although—you picked a hell of a night to stay over.”
“What night?” My voice comes out hoarse with sleep.
Wes jerks his thumb toward the window. “The one where we’re officially snowed in.”
I turn my head, and my breath catches.
The world outside has disappeared under white. Three feet of snow press against the porch railing like a wall, and fat flakes still swirl down, erasing any trace of the driveway. The pine trees bow under the weight, their branches heavy and drooping.
My fingers curl into the couch fabric. The walls seem to creep closer. My throat tightens—that familiar vice grip that used to come when he’d block the doorway with his body.
Then Landon’s pinky finger grazes mine on the cushion between us. The small callus on his knuckle rasps against my skin.
“Got enough firewood to last a week,” he says quietly. “And the generator’s full.”
Wes rattles a box of pasta from the doorway. “Spaghetti carbonara: the sequel.”
A laugh bubbles up before I can stop it. My shoulders drop half an inch from where they’d crept toward my ears.
Snowed in.
I watch a cardinal land on the buried bird feeder, a bright spot of red against the endless white, and realize my breathing has slowed to match Landon’s steady rhythm.
Snowed in.
And for the first time in a long while, being stuck someplace doesn’t terrify me. Not with them. Not with him.
CHAPTER 20
Marcy
The storm howls outside, snow piling higher against the window panes until only a dim blue glow filters through. By noon, the fence line has vanished completely. I keep glancing up from the mixing bowl, expecting that familiar tightness in my chest—waiting to feel trapped—but my hands stay steady as I measure vanilla extract, and I catch myself humming along with the mixer’s whir.
“Are you sure you didn’t own a bakery before you moved here?” Wes asks around a mouthful of cookie, leaning against the counter with crumbs scattered across his shirt.
