Page 23 of Enticed by the Mountain Man
And just like that, the world feels settled.
Chapter ten
Graham
The morning starts slowly.
Sunlight filters through the curtains, cutting faint lines of gold across the floorboards. The smell of coffee fills the cabin, mixing with the scent of pine from the woods outside.
And there she is, standing in my kitchen like she’s always belonged there.
She hums under her breath as she pours coffee into two mugs, her voice low, tuneless, happy.
I lean against the doorway, arms crossed, and watch her for a minute.
I’ve spent years keeping things simple. Work, sleep, repeat. I told myself that was enough, that I didn’t need more. Then she showed up and everything changed. Now she’s in my kitchen, making my coffee, and somehow the quiet doesn’t feel empty anymore.
I don’t want to remember what it was like before she came.
She looks up and catches me watching her. “You gonna stand there staring or come get your coffee before it goes cold?”
“I’m fine right here,” I say.
Her mouth curves. “You’re a menace before caffeine.”
“Am not.”
She walks over and hands me the mug. “You are.”
I take it, still smiling, and sit at the table while she leans against the counter, sipping from her own. The morning light hits her face, soft and golden. She looks relaxed, no trace of the fear that lived in her eyes when she first got here.
“You’re staring again,” she says, teasing.
“Yeah,” I admit. “I’ve got a lot to look at.”
“Careful,” she warns, a grin tugging at her mouth. “Flattery before breakfast sets a dangerous precedent.”
“Guess I’ll risk it.”
She shakes her head but smiles into her mug.
For a few minutes, we’re quiet. She moves easily through the space, and every sound she makes fits here, the scrape of a chair, the soft laugh when she spills a little coffee on the counter.
It’s the kind of peace I didn’t think I’d ever have.
There’s a time in every man’s life when he stops expecting anything good. Mine came a few years back. Losing people. Losing trust. Letting the quiet win.
Then Maeve arrived, all sunlight and stubbornness, and every part of me that had gone numb started to wake up again.
She sits down across from me, tucking one leg under herself. “You’re quiet this morning,” she says.
“I’m thinking.”
“That sounds dangerous.”
“Probably is.” I take another sip of coffee. “I was just thinking about how much I like this.”
“This?”
