Page 38 of Naughty With The Mountain Man
“You think you’re a burden,” he says. Not a question. A diagnosis. “You think my house got crowded and my head got loud and the first thing I want is my quiet back.”
“I mean.” I shrug. “Isn’t it?”
“No.” The word lands like a hand on my spine, steadying. “My quiet’s been killing me for years.”
I open my mouth. Close it.
He reaches out, slow, giving me time to move, and tucks a curl behind my ear like it’s a ritual. “You’re not in my hair, Ellie.” His voice drops, raw. “You’re under my skin.”
The floor shifts under me. I grab the only anchor available: sarcasm. “That sounds medical.”
“It is,” he says, not even pretending to smile. “It’s terminal.”
A laugh bursts out of me, wet and shocked. “Micah.”
He exhales, like he’s been holding that breath since the warehouse. “I’m not good at this part. I can kick doors and write plans and shoot straight. This—” He gestures vaguely between us, as if the air is thick with something he doesn’t have words for.“This is harder. But I don’t want you to go because you think I want you gone. I don’t.”
My heart does a full, stupid flip. “You don’t?”
“No.”
“Even after I put marshmallows in your coffee that one time?”
A ghost of a smile. “Even then.”
The relief is so big I have to set the cocoa down or I’ll drop it. I stare at my hands. They’re shaking again. “I don’t… I don’t want to go either.”
He moves then, quick and certain, closing the last inch of space. His hands bracket my face, and the kiss is soft, certain, unhurried—the opposite of fear. When he pulls back, his forehead rests against mine.
“Home isn’t a place,” he says. “It’s a person.” A beat. “You’re mine.”
Tears sting, and this time I let them. They’re quiet and clean and feel like something unclenching. “Say it again.”
“You’re mine.” He inhales against my cheek. “And I’m yours. If you want me.”
“I do,” I whisper, because it’s the easiest truth I’ve ever told. “I want you.”
Outside, the wind lifts the edge of the roof like it’s testing the nails. Inside, the garland straightens itself in a draft and the fire spits a bright spark.
I curl into him, feeling the beat of his heart against my ribs, and for the first time since this started, the wordaftermathdoesn’t meanempty.
It meansbeginning.
Epilogue
MICAH
Snow comes down in big, lazy flakes, the kind that hush the world and make everything look like it’s been forgiven.
The cabin smells like cinnamon and cedar. Ellie’s laughing in the kitchen with Greta while Ranger patrols for dropped crumbs, pretending he’s subtle. Hale’s by the fire, one arm around Wren like he doesn’t intend to let go of her ever again. He won’t. I know the way a man looks when he’s done searching.
I didn’t think I’d ever host people again. Didn’t think I wanted to. Turns out I just needed the right people.
Ellie peeks around the archway, cheeks pink from the heat and happiness, hair up in a loose knot that keeps trying to rebel. “Sit,” she orders me, pointing at the couch. “No lifting, no chopping, no disappearing to ‘check the perimeter’ for the fifth time. It’s Christmas Eve. Let me feed you.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I say, because I’m not stupid.
She points two fingers at her eyes and then at me like she’s got jurisdiction here. She does. She always did. She vanishes back into the kitchen and Greta swats her with a dish towel, cackling.
