Chapter 8 Mason
mason
The morning light filtered in through Emily’s windows, showing a perfect white winter wonderland outside.
She was still sleeping beside me, and I wondered if I’d ever stop finding her so stunning. She was truly beautiful like this, with her guard down, her lips curled up in the smallest hint of a smile.
Last night had been nothing short of incredible. I wanted to do it again, but I had no idea what Emily wanted from me.
Sitting up, I propped my elbow up on my knee as I looked out the window, lost in thought.
“Looks like it stopped snowing,” Emily whispered, distracting me from my thoughts.
I turned back to look at her, finding her lying on her side, the sheet covering those mouth-watering tits I’d had my mouth on last night. “I didn’t know you were awake,” I told her. “Morning.”
“Good morning.” She fluttered her eyelashes.
“Looks like it dumped a lot out there last night,” I answered, voice rough. “Service is still out. Pretty bad storm.” I’d checked my phone first thing when we’d woken up and wasn’t surprised that it wasn’t back up.
She yawned, stretching her arms, the sheet slipping down. I tried not to look at her tits, willing my cock not to stand at attention to her delectable body. Later, I told myself. If she wanted that. As far as I knew, this was just a one-night thing for her. Just… scratching each other’s itches.
But I knew that one night wasn’t enough. I wanted her again and again.
“What are we doin’ here, Em?”
She furrowed her eyebrows. “We’re just having fun, right?”
I swallowed roughly. “Yeah, fun.” I dipped my head. “I should probably go check on my truck. See how buried it is.” And hopefully, I could grab the duffel bag of extra clothes I kept in the back.
There was an adorable furrow between her brows. “Oh. Right.” Was it just me, or did she look… disappointed at the idea I was leaving?
“There’s no way I’ll be able to go anywhere today,” I told her, chuckling. “The roads won’t be drivable for a while. Who knows when they’ll get the plows out this way?”
She tucked a strand of hair that had come free from her braid behind her ear. “I guess that’s true.” That seemed to make her relax.
Leaning down, I dropped a soft kiss on her lips. “I keep spare clothes in a bag in my truck just in case. Want to grab them.”
Emily nodded. “Okay.” She bit her lip. “So…”
“Breakfast?” I asked, interrupting her. She nodded. “You get dressed, and I’ll go out to my truck, and then we can figure out something in the kitchen.”
“Yeah.” Her stomach rumbled as if in answer. “Breakfast sounds good.”
“Great.” I found my pants, pulling them and my boxers on. The rest of my clothes were upstairs.
I turned to look at her as I leaned against the doorframe, taking her in.
And then, needing the cold air to help clear my head, I headed upstairs to brave the snow.
The snow was deep as I trudged outside, thankful I’d worn a thick coat over here. Luckily, I could get into my truck and get my bag out of it. The Sullivan’s house was a ways into the property, but from my brief evaluation, the storm had dumped what felt like almost a foot of snow overnight.
I turned on my truck for a minute, hoping to find an AM radio station where I could listen to the weather, finally finding one.
“A significant winter storm continues this morning across the region,” they announced.
“Periods of moderate to heavy snow will continue through daybreak. Slick roads, blowing snow, and exceptional cold will make travel dangerous.” The wind whipped around the truck at that moment as if in response, and I shut off my truck, heading inside.
There was no point in staying out here when inside was warm and cozy.
I also checked on the generator, topping it off with more propane, hoping we’d have enough to last the length of the storm.
We were conserving power wherever possible, but I still didn’t want us to freeze if we completely lost it.
Thirty minutes later, Emily joined me in the kitchen, her hair down in loose waves, a light layer of makeup on her face. I’d changed into the clothes from my duffel bag—a pair of gray sweats and a red henley.
“Hey.” She smiled at me, leaning her back against the counter next to me.
Emily’d pulled on a pink sweater with black jeans and a pair of cute fuzzy snowman socks that made me grin down at her. “Hi.”
“What’s for breakfast?” She inhaled deeply. “I didn’t expect you to have started without me.”
Shrugging, I stirred the eggs in the pan. “I like to cook.”
When I’d gone off to college, I found I was grateful for all the time I’d spent with Mom in the kitchen, and I’d been the one who had made dinner for all of my friends once I’d moved off campus.
With my ex, I’d made breakfast and dinner for us most nights, too.
Until she stopped eating with me altogether.
She wasn’t hungry in the morning, and she’d work late in the evenings.
Maybe that was when everything started to fall apart.
We’d drifted apart, and our dreams and goals for the future had changed. We’d changed.
“Mason?” When I looked back at Emily, she was frowning. “What’s wrong?”
I shook my head. “It’s nothing.” I didn’t want to talk about my divorce. Not right now. “Breakfast is almost done. Do you want coffee? I made some.”
Luckily, from growing up spending so much time in the house, I still remembered where everything was. It had made rummaging around the kitchen after getting dressed a lot easier.
“Okay.” She gave me a small smile, opening a cabinet and reaching up for a mug. Emily grabbed the milk and a bottle of flavoring, mixing it in until her coffee was lighter than the color of my horse. Sweet, I noted. She likes it sweet. I wasn’t sure why I filed that away for the future, but I did.
It was hard not to notice every little thing about her.
Finishing up our food, I quickly dished everything up onto two plates and carried them over to the island, sliding a plate over to the spot next to me and sitting down.
She surveyed the plate. Eggs, toast, and crispy bacon. “You didn’t have to do all of this,” she insisted. “We could have just had, like, cereal or something.”
Pointing my fork at her food, I gave her a pointed look. “Eat. You need it after last night.”
She made a choking noise, sputtering out her coffee. “Mason,” she admonished.
“What?” I gave her a cocky smirk. “I don’t know about you, but I worked up quite an appetite.”
“You… you’re incorrigible.” Emily blushed, dipping her face to take a bite of eggs. Her hair fell like a curtain, hiding her face from me.
I brushed it back from her cheek to press a kiss to her skin. “Yep. Better get used to it, darlin’. Especially since you’re stuck with me for the next few days. Snow’s pretty deep. There’s no way we’re going anywhere.”
She sighed, looking out the window. “I should probably go check on Smokey at some point today.”
“Okay. What else do you want to do? Turns out we have a lot of time to kill.”
Emily scrunched up her nose. “Well, normally I would just read a book or something. I pre-scheduled all of my content so I wouldn’t have to worry about posting and could take a break from all of that, too. So…”
I nodded. “Reading sounds good.”
She looked up at me with surprise. “Really?”
“Uh-huh. Your family still has the library, right?” I stroked my jaw in thought, my fingers itching at my beard. I kept it short, and I was definitely going to be overdue for a shave soon.
“Well, obviously. Mom and Dad weren’t about to get rid of all their books.
” Emily gave me a weird look. I remembered when we were younger, all three of the Sullivan kids were always reading.
Sure, her older brother Benjamin mostly read comics, but Hunter and I had traded fantasy novels in high school. We’d both loved The Lord of the Rings.
When was the last time I sat down and read a book?
Years, probably. In Washington, I’d been so busy between work and trying to keep my marriage alive, and ever since I’d moved home, I was trying to keep up with learning how to run the ranch.
To take over for dad when he was ready to fully retire and pass the reins down to me.
“Perfect. I remember your dad has a whole bookcase of thrillers. I’ll just read one of those.”
“Okay.” The word was a soft whisper, and when I looked over, Emily had a soft smile on her face, her plate cleaned. It was strange how satisfying I found that.
I reached out, wiping a crumb off her cheek. “Good girl,” I said, my voice a low rumble.
She let out a squeak, but I didn’t think I missed the heat in her eyes. She liked it, I realized. I filed that information away for later, something I definitely planned on pulling out if she wanted a repeat of last night.
Having consumed our food, we cleaned everything up in tandem, enjoying a comfortable silence. A few times, I caught her looking at me, and then dipping her head, cheeks pink. I liked that neither of us needed to say anything, and yet we were shoulder to shoulder, effortlessly acting like…
I shook the thought away. That wasn’t what this was, and I knew it. Fun, I reminded myself. I could do fun. For now. While I was here, while we were snowed in to this house, I could give her a few orgasms and some fun.
And then at the end, I could walk away.
It wasn’t like she was looking for a relationship, anyway. She’d be jet-setting around the world again soon. So there was no point in getting caught up in fantasies of what could have been.
I’d given up my dreams of the future when my ex-wife had broken my heart. When I’d ended my marriage, the life I’d planned with her since college was suddenly gone, and I’d accepted I might never have it. For a long time, I had been drowning.
Coming back to the ranch had been like drawing my first breath of fresh air in two years.
Riding Whiskey through the trails, I’d gotten my head back on right.
But as I rode, I still knew I was leaving all of that in the past. My chest ached.
It was best not to dwell on it. That was what I kept telling myself.
How I kept putting one foot in front of the other.
I completely immersed myself in work, figuring that keeping busy would keep my mind off of it, and it had…
mostly. Now that I wasn’t working, my mind had time to wander. To think.
I turned off the sink, and Emily finished drying the last dish.
“Well, friend,” I said, trying to ignore how wrong that word felt coming from my lips. I hated it the moment I uttered it, but that was what she wanted, wasn’t it? “Time to enjoy our break from reality.”
I tended to the fireplace in the living room, and we spent most of our afternoon on either sides of the giant couch.
At one point, we headed outside to the barn to check on her horse—but only after I insisted she wear her snow boots and her thickest coat.
The thriller I’d borrowed from Mr. Sullivan’s shelf had only half kept my attention, mostly because I’d spent most of my time staring at Emily, who was engrossed in her romance novel.
She was beautiful. Completely and utterly breathtaking, and I didn’t understand how I hadn’t noticed before. Though maybe I just hadn’t let myself. I’d still been a married man, after all.
Now… I was as single as could be. There should have been nothing to stop me from going after what I wanted.
Except something was still holding me back.
She’s your best friend’s little sister, you jackass, my brain told me.
That’s what’s holding you back. That, and I wasn’t sure I deserved another chance at love.
I’d thought I’d found my forever the first time, and I’d ended up like this.
Who was to say my next relationship wouldn’t end just as bad?
Emily yawned, stretching out her arms above her as she closed her book.
I closed mine, too, not caring that I’d lost my place—I didn’t remember what was happening, anyway. “You finish?” I asked. She gave me a small nod, setting it on the side table next to her. “How was it?”
Her lips curled up into a tiny smile. “Good. I’ve been on a paranormal romance kick lately. This one was about a vampire and a witch—” Emily blushed. “God, you probably don’t want to know about my book, do you?”
Adjusting my position on the couch and leaning back, I frowned at her. “Why wouldn’t I?”
She shook her head. “Most guys, well… They think romance books are a waste of time. That it’s silly, and gives women, and I quote, unreasonable expectations.” She added air quotes around the phrase.
I blinked, practically seeing red. “They what?”
Emily just shrugged. God, I needed to make her understand that whoever had dismissed her in the past—her hobbies, her career, everything—was flat out wrong.
“Come here,” I murmured, opening my arms wide.
She bit her lip, standing up and sliding in between my open thighs.
“Hi,” she whispered as I wrapped an arm around her torso.
“Hi.” I kissed her neck. “The things you love aren’t a waste of time, baby.” I curled a finger around one of her loose strands of brown hair. “The fact that anyone ever told you it was makes me want to—”
“It’s okay,” she tried to reassure me, cutting me off. “I’m used to it.”
“You shouldn’t be,” I growled. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”
Her eyes met mine, and I saw it all there—the doubt. The fear. God, she was too perfect to have any of this plaguing her. “Thank you,” she murmured.
Suddenly, it became my new mission in life to make sure she never heard those words again. That no one ever belittled her ever again.
As long as I lived, I vowed that to myself. Emily Sullivan deserved a life full of happiness and light. She deserved to follow her heart wherever it took her.
Even if it took her away from me.