Page 18 of Christmas With the Navy SEAL Mountain Man
I mutter the words to my reflection as I check my beard one last time. The man in the mirror looks different somehow. Same scars. Same hard jawline. Same blue eyes that have seen too much. But something's changed in those eyes. Something that looks uncomfortably like hope.
It's been three weeks since Leah first stomped onto my property in her impractical boots. Three weeks since she crashed through my carefully constructed walls with her determination and her smile. Two weeks since she spent the night in my bed, and I in hers. Fourteen days of falling into something I never thought I'd have again.
Connection.
The timer on my phone chimes, pulling me from my thoughts. The venison steaks need to be flipped. The potatoes checked. Everything needs to be perfect for tonight.
Because tonight isn't just dinner. Tonight is Christmas Eve.
And for the first time in years, I'm not spending it alone.
My hands are steady as I attend to the meal, but my mind is anything but calm. Last Christmas, I sat in this same cabin with a bottle of whiskey and the ghosts of my fallen team for company. The year before that, I was still in the hospital, my body pieced back together but my mind shattered.
Tonight, Leah will be here, bringing light and warmth into this space that has been my fortress against the world. And I'm terrified.
Not of her. Never of her. Of what she makes me feel. Of how much I've come to need her laugh, her touch, her presence. Of how quickly she's become essential to me.
We've spent nearly every night together these past two weeks, alternating between her apartment and my cabin. I've learned the sounds she makes when I touch her just right, the way she curls against me in sleep, the rhythm of her breathing when she's dreaming.
I've learned that she talks to herself while she works on her graphic design projects. That she can't cook worth a damn but tries anyway. That she cries at sappy Christmas movies and knows all the words to every song on the radio.
And somehow, impossibly, she's learned me too. She doesn't flinch at my scars or press for details I'm not ready to share. She knows when I need space and when I need her close. She reads my silences like they're full paragraphs.
It's terrifying how well she sees me.
The sound of tires on the snow covered access road reaches me through the open kitchen window. She's early. My heart rate picks up, a physical response I can't control whenever she's near.
Setting the kitchen timer, I move to the front door, opening it before she can knock. She stands on my porch, snowflakes caught in her dark hair, cheeks flushed from the cold, arms full of gaily wrapped packages. The sight of her in her red coat, smiling up at me, hits me like a physical blow.
Mine. The word rises unbidden in my mind.
"Merry Christmas Eve!" She beams, stepping inside as I move aside. "I brought presents, and before you panic, yes, I know you said no gifts, but these are small, I promise."
I take the packages from her arms, leaning down to kiss her softly. She tastes like peppermint and smells like vanilla, and for a moment I forget everything but the warmth of her lips against mine.
"Merry Christmas," I murmur against her mouth.
She pulls back, eyes sparkling. "Something smells amazing. Please tell me that's dinner, because I've been thinking about your cooking all day."
"Venison steaks. Rosemary potatoes. Roasted Brussels sprouts."
"You had me until Brussels sprouts," she says with a mock grimace, unwinding her scarf and shrugging out of her coat. "But I'll eat them because you made them."
I hang her coat by the door, watching as she moves through my cabin with the easy familiarity of someone who belongs here. Two weeks, and already the space feels different with her in it. Warmer. Alive.
"Wine?" I offer, gesturing to the bottle breathing on the counter.
"Yes, please." She sets her packages under my small Christmas tree—another change she's brought to my life, the fresh pine now standing in the corner adorned with simple wooden ornaments I carved and white lights she insisted on.
As I pour the wine, she comes up behind me, wrapping her arms around my waist, pressing her cheek between my shoulder blades. "I missed you today."
The simple confession warms me more than it should. "You saw me this morning."
"Still missed you." Her voice is muffled against my shirt. "Town council meetings are much less fun without a grumpy mountain man to come home to."
Home. The word echoes in my chest. Is that what this is becoming? What we're becoming to each other?
I turn in her arms, lifting her chin with one finger. "How was the meeting?"
