Eric
eric
“ F avorite color?” I keep asking the questions even though I already know the answers.
It depends on the time of year.
“I don’t really have a favorite. It kind of depends on the time of year, I guess,” Evie responds, scrunching her nose as though she’s just realizing this for the first time.
It’s not that she’s predictable. It’s just that I’ve spent nearly a year studying her and already feel like I know her just as well as I know myself.
Creepy, I know.
I’m not a stalker, I swear. I just happened to find a woman who ticks every one of my boxes, and now she won’t be able to get rid of me.
“Ooh, I have a good one!” she exclaims as she ducks beneath the low, naked branches of a maple right in the middle of the trail. Her tight jeans stretch across her voluptuous ass, and I try to quiet the groan that vibrates in my throat as I think about all the things I want to do to it later. “If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you go?”
Well, that’s easy. To the valley between your thighs where I’d become a permanent resident.
“Africa.” Is the answer I give out loud. “Tanzania, to be exact. I want to hike Mt. Kilimanjaro.”
A rabbit darts across our path, and Bagel lets out a long howl. It sets off Archer, and both dogs struggle against their leashes as they try to run after the poor animal. “Bagel!” Evie admonishes. “Leave the cute rabbit alone, bud.”
She moves to the side as the trail widens again, looking at me as I resume my place beside her. “Kilimanjaro, huh? Are you wanting to do the Seven Summits?”
“Nah. I wouldn’t mind doing Everest and Denali—maybe Vinson, too—but I’m not interested in the others. What about you? Same question.” The sun shines through the trees, momentarily casting Evie in a glow that makes her appear angel-like.
She smiles over at me, and it takes my breath away.
Keep looking at me like that, baby, and our first time won’t be nearly as romantic as I have planned.
“I just went everywhere I wanted to go. I haven’t really thought about anywhere else. There was always the option of getting a travel van and exploring the States, but I’m not so sure about that now.” She side-eyes me, the last few words of her sentence fading into a quiet lead .
“Would you rather be traveling in a van than be stationary here?”
This is one question I don’t already know the answer to, and I find myself holding my breath in anticipation of her response. Scaling back on work is one thing; being completely inaccessible to my bosses and working remotely is another.
Job or woman. Job or woman.
While the answer is fucking simple, I can’t provide for her and our family without a source of income, and while it’s easy to get a job in my line of work, I’ve been with my company for too long to throw away that working relationship.
“I think I’m okay with being stationary for a while,” she whispers, pulling me from my thoughts.
When I refocus on her, she’s not looking at me but staring off the trail through the trees. “Is that water I hear?” she asks with a hint of a smile. “First one there wins,” she says before taking off toward the rushing sound of the waterfall.
Archer begins to yip as we take off after her and Bagel, chasing them between the trees. Her peals of laughter join in with the dogs barking, causing the adrenaline in my veins to pump abnormally fast.
This right here is everything I’ve always wanted.
She’s everything I’ve always dreamed about.
When I catch up to Evie, she’s standing on the edge of a small hill that leads down to the water, taking in the scenery. The sunlight hits the spray from the falls, illuminating the space above the small pool at the base with a rainbow .
“It’s beautiful,” she says in awe.
“It sure is,” I reply. But I’m not looking at it. I’m looking at her.
Cliche, I know.
But hey, I’m a sucker for a classic romance.
Evie looks at me from her peripheral, cheeks lighting up in a rosy pink hue as she turns her head to catch my gaze. I reach for her, intent on kissing her because I want to kiss her every minute of every hour of every day for the rest of our lives, but Archer and Bagel begin to chase each other—or try to anyway, getting their leashes tangled and nearly knocking us on our asses.
“Hold on, buddy,” I tell Archer as I unhook his leash.
“I thought you said he has a bad recall?” Evie asks, releasing Bagel as well.
“If we were actively on the trails and he saw something he wanted to go after, like that rabbit, he’d take off and wouldn’t return until he wanted to. But here, when we’re just hanging out, he won’t wander off,” I explain.
“What if wildlife or another dog passed by here, though?” She walks down the hill carefully, sidestepping the large rocks that speckle the ground.
Fishing out a remote from my pocket, I hold up a hand in surrender and chuckle when her eyes grow wide in terror as she pauses mid-step. “It just vibrates, that’s all. I’d never shock him. Henry’s mother, Maggie, is the one who helped me train him. ”
Evie’s eyes flatten, and she looks like she’s about to argue that my logic doesn’t make sense. However, as she resumes walking, her ankle gives out as she steps directly onto a rock protruding from the ground. Catapulting myself forward to catch her before she falls, we end up in a tangle of limbs, rolling the rest of the way down the hill.
A passerby would probably think it looks like something straight out of a romantic comedy.
When we reach the bottom, Evie somehow ends up directly on top of me, and I think it looks just like heaven.
Both dogs crowd us, whining with sympathetic yelps as they shove their noses at us to ensure we’re okay.
“Sorry,” Evie groans, clutching the front of my jacket.
Reaching up, I smooth her hair off her face. “You okay?”
“Yeah, are you?” She begins to lift herself off me, but I tighten my grip on her waist. “God, I’m sorry!” she says, and I tangle my fingers in her hair as I pull her down and roll us over.
“I’m not.” I smash my mouth to hers, devouring her lips as she spreads her legs to make room for me between them.
Evie always tastes sweet—whether it’s from the candy canes she kept sucking on during the New Years party or the strawberry candies she keeps in random bowls around her house. Every time I kiss her, she reminds me of sugary treats .
And I’ve discovered that I have one hell of a sweet tooth.
Evie
I can’t get enough of ’s mouth on mine.
When this man kisses me, I swear it’s not for the purpose of rubbing our lips together because that’s what you do in intimate situations. It’s as though he’s literally trying to consume my body and soul so that he can savor them, even when we aren’t kissing.
Even though the sun began its descent a while ago, and we’ve started cooking dinner, all I can think of is later —when we finally get to go to bed and do other things.
If this man’s kisses are this good, I can’t imagine what it will be like when we finally have sex.
You’re turning into a bonafide horndog, Evie.
“What’s got you all dreamy-eyed over there?” asks with a smirk as he prepares Archer’s dinner—a mix of ground meat and vegetables and powdered vitamins that he makes himself every week.
“Nothing,” I reply sheepishly, looking at Bagel happily chowing down his bowl of kibble. It’s high-quality and expensive, but it makes me feel like perhaps I should start looking into preparing his food from scratch as well, even if he gets real food as snacks.
I return to chopping peppers for our stir-fry. I wasn’t expecting gourmet meals this weekend. Growing up, camping with my parents always consisted of hot dogs one night and the fish my dad would catch the next—anything to keep it simple and easy to clean up.
, however, has an entire cooktop set up over the fire, complete with a large pot and a cast iron skillet because ‘he really enjoys cooking.’
Unwillingly, and I mean that word with every fiber of my being, my thoughts stray to Jonathan and how he fed me because being a caregiver was like second nature to him. I reach for my necklace, tipping my head back to gaze at the sky as the day bleeds into night and the stars begin to dot the heavens like specks of glitter.
“Is that necklace important to you?” asks as he gives Archer his food before washing his hands at the station he brought. “You play with it a lot. Especially when you go wherever it is you go to in that beautiful head of yours.”
“Do you believe in magic?” I ask as I hand over my cutting board of veggies.
grabs a bowl from his portable refrigerator. I wasn’t kidding when I said he brought enough gadgets to stock a kitchen. All we need is four walls and a roof, and we’ve got a house.
As he removes the plastic wrap from a bowl of marinated chicken, he cocks his head to the side. “Like magician magic?”
“No.” I shake my head with a laugh. “Like… I don’t know… Miracles? I guess?” I’ve told no one abou t my weekend at Sutton Lake or the things that happened afterward. No one knows about Jonathan and how we came together for one beautiful weekend, only for him to disappear from my life until I saw him a year later with the family he’d once told me had died in a car accident.
A skeptic would say he lied and played me for a fool.
But other things happened when I returned to that cabin, which suggested that although I might have been going crazy, no one was out to trick me. The entire town couldn’t have been in on it.
“I think you’re my miracle,” says sweetly, planting a soft kiss on my lips as he heads toward the fire pit.
“I’m being serious.” I sit at the picnic table, leaning down to scratch behind Bagel’s ears before he runs off to find his shark toy in the tent set up for the dogs. It has a giant fluffy dog bed and numerous toys we both brought. Archer also heads into the tent, having finished inhaling his dinner, and grabs an elk antler to chew on before flopping down next to my pup.
“I am, too,” he laughs. “Okay, but in all seriousness. I’m not really sure that I do believe in magic . I believe that things happen for a reason, but the world can be a pretty shit place. It’s why I like to come out to the woods.” He gestures around us. “Out here, it feels like none of the bad stuff can touch you.”
“Have you experienced something you can’t explain, though? Like something that couldn’t be possible without magic?” I press.
He’s going to think you’re a nutjob. Just drop it, Evie.
But I don’t want to drop it. I want to tell everything. Before we go any further.
What’s the worst that can happen? He’ll think I’m crazy and won’t believe a word of it.
“I can’t say that I have.” He stirs the chicken in the skillet and peers up at me. “Have you?”
“You asked if my necklace was important to me. It is. But the story behind it is kind of… unbelievable. I’ve never told anyone about it.” My eyes begin to sting, and a low whine turns my head to see Bagel staring at me from his place in the tent, like he always does when I think about Jonathan too hard.
“Well, I’m all ears. I’d love to hear about it. That is, if you’d like to tell me,” says gently.
“I think…that I’d really like to be able to tell someone finally.” Bagel pads out of the tent and hops onto the bench beside me, nudging beneath my arms until he’s snuggled in my lap.
With a deep breath, I begin my tale of the magical weekend I spent on Sutton Lake two Christmases ago. And I tell all about the last man I’d fallen this hard for.