Chapter 2
TWO
SAbrINA
The firelight dances across Beck’s face like it’s trying to figure him out too.
He’s still holding my wrist—barely. Just enough that I feel the rough pad of his thumb against my pulse point, steady and warm and completely unaware of how fast it’s racing under his touch.
Or maybe he does know. Maybe that’s why he hasn’t let go.
I should pull away.
I don’t.
The storm keeps pounding the cabin like it wants in, but in here everything feels strangely still. Just the crackle of logs, the low hum of the generator outside, and the way Beck’s eyes keep sliding to my mouth every time I speak, then snapping back up like he’s reminding himself not to.
I clear my throat. “You’re staring.”
“You’re wearing my shirt,” he says, voice gravel-rough. Like that’s an explanation.
I glance down at myself. The flannel is soft from years of wear, sleeves rolled three times to keep them from swallowing my hands, hem brushing the tops of my thighs.
No pants. No bra. Just his shirt and a pair of his thick wool socks I found in the bathroom drawer.
I look ridiculous. I also feel… safe. Ridiculously, unreasonably safe.
“It smells like you,” I say before I can stop myself.
His jaw flexes. “That a problem?”
“No.” My voice comes out softer than I mean it to. “It’s nice.”
He exhales through his nose, short and sharp, like he’s trying not to react. But I see it—the way his shoulders drop half an inch, the way his grip on my wrist tightens for one heartbeat before loosening again.
I should be terrified. I should be cataloging exits, calculating how long the food will last, wondering if the black SUV is still out there somewhere, waiting for the snow to stop so it can finish what it started.
Instead I’m sitting on a stranger’s couch in the middle of nowhere Montana, heart hammering because a man who looks like he was carved from the mountain itself is looking at me like I’m the dangerous one.
“Tell me about the SUV,” he says suddenly.
I swallow. “It started in Missoula. I noticed it when I left the hotel—same one that followed me out of the parking garage two nights before that. Tinted windows. No plates I could read clearly. I thought I was being paranoid at first. Then it was behind me on the interstate. Then it was gone. Then it wasn’t. ”
Beck doesn’t interrupt. Just watches. Listens. Like every word is evidence he’s filing away.
“I pulled off at a gas station near the pass,” I continue. “Thought I’d lose them in the little mountain roads. Bad idea. The storm hit fast. I slid. And then… you.”
He nods once. Slowly. “You’re not paranoid.”
“I know.”
His thumb moves again—barely a stroke along the inside of my wrist. I feel it everywhere.
“Who’d you take something from?” he asks.
I hesitate. The truth feels too big for this room. Too dangerous. But his eyes are steady, patient in a way that makes me want to spill everything.
“A client,” I say finally. “Well… ex-client now. Tech startup in Seattle. I was their forensic accountant. They were cooking books. I found proof. I copied it. I didn’t plan to—I just… couldn’t unsee it. Then I quit. Then the calls started. Then the car.”
Beck’s expression doesn’t change, but something shifts behind his eyes. Sharper. Darker. “How bad?”
“Bad enough they’re willing to chase me through a blizzard.”
He lets that sit for a second. Then: “You got the files with you?”
I nod toward my bag by the door—the one he carried in with me like it weighed nothing. “USB drive. Encrypted. But yeah.”
He exhales again, longer this time. “Right.”
I wait for the lecture. The why didn’t you go to the police or you should’ve stayed in the city. It doesn’t come.
Instead he says, “You’re safe here.”
Three words. Simple. Delivered like a vow.
My throat tightens. “You don’t even know me.”
“I know enough.” His gaze drops to where his hand still circles my wrist, then lifts again.
“You didn’t panic out there. You didn’t fight me when I carried you.
You’re not crying now. You’re sitting in a stranger’s cabin in my shirt telling me you stole evidence from people who want it back bad enough to kill for it. That’s enough.”
Heat crawls up my neck. “I’m not brave. I’m just… stubborn.”
A ghost of a smile touches his mouth—first one I’ve seen. Small. Crooked. Devastating. “Same difference.”
I laugh despite myself. It sounds shaky. “You’re not what I expected from a lumberjack.”
“What’d you expect?”
“Less talking. More grunting.”
He snorts. “Got plenty of grunts. Just saving ’em.”
“For what?”
His eyes darken. “When they’re needed.”
The air between us thickens. I feel it in my chest, low in my belly. The fire pops. A log shifts. Neither of us moves.
I should pull my hand back. Instead I turn it over, palm up, so his thumb lands in the center. He stills. Completely.
“Beck,” I whisper.
He doesn’t answer. Just watches our hands like they belong to someone else.
“You said not to tempt you,” I remind him.
“I did.”
“I’m not trying to.” A lie. We both know it.
His gaze flicks to my mouth again. It lingers. “You’re doing a shit job of not trying.”
My breath catches. “Then maybe stop looking at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you already decided I’m yours.”
He goes motionless. For one long second I think I’ve gone too far. Then he leans in—just enough that I feel the heat of him, the scent of pine and woodsmoke and something darker, hungrier. “Maybe I have,” he says, voice so low it vibrates through me. “Question is… you gonna fight me on it?”
My heart slams against my ribs. I should say yes.
Should say I don’t do this—don’t fall into bed with men I just met, don’t trust anyone this fast, don’t let myself want things that feel this inevitable.
But the storm is still raging outside. The doors are locked.
The world can’t reach us. And Beck Ironwood is looking at me like I’m the only thing that’s ever mattered.
I lift my free hand. Slowly, and I press my palm to the center of his chest.
His heart is pounding as hard as mine.
“No,” I whisper. “I’m not going to fight you.”
Something raw flashes across his face—relief, hunger, possession all at once. Then his hand slides from my wrist to the back of my neck, fingers threading into my damp hair, tilting my face up.
He doesn’t kiss me yet. He just holds me there, forehead almost touching mine, breathing the same air.
“Too late,” he murmurs, echoing what I said earlier.
And God help me, he’s right. Because the second his mouth finally closes over mine—slow, deliberate, claiming—I know I’m not leaving this mountain the same person who drove up it.
And I don’t want to.
Not anymore.