Mountain Man’s Fake Wedding Date (Wedding Season #13)

CHAPTER ONE

Frankie

My heart did its usual panicked flutter the moment the bell above the door announced Max Wilder’s arrival.

It was Thursday at ten in the morning. He came regular as a utility bill and twice as inevitable.

And just like a utility bill, looking at him made me want to cry, but for entirely different reasons.

I was behind the counter, pretending to organize a display of drill bits I’d already straightened twice. It was a habit I’d developed on Thursdays — something to do with my hands so they didn’t betray me when he walked in.

He filled the doorway the way he always did. Six-four, built like someone had stacked a mountain on top of another mountain and called it a man. He smelled like sawdust and the sharp scent of the northern pines.

He was dressed in his usual attire, scuffed leather boots, well-worn denim that hugged thick, powerful thighs, a work shirt that looked like it was one deep breath away from giving up the ghost across his shoulders.

He was also, objectively, miles out of my league.

“Morning, Frankie.”

His voice was a deep and low and started a tingle in the soles of my feet that worked its way up to somewhere deeply inconvenient. It was a voice that belonged in a bedroom, whispered words against skin, not in a dusty hardware store at ten in the morning.

Six months of this, and I still turned into a puddle of high-velocity hormones.

“Morning, Max,” I said, my voice surprisingly steady given that my lady bits were currently screaming for attention.

I tucked a lock of dark hair behind my ear and tried to ignore the way my nipples peaked against the lace of my bra.

Traitors. Absolute traitors. “A pound of lag bolts this morning? Or are we moving on to something more exciting today?”

Oh, how I wished.

His lips didn’t quite move into a smile, but the corner of his eye crinkled—a tiny, devastating tell. He leaned over the counter, his large hands resting on the wood. I noticed a pink new scar across one knuckle and I itched to trace it. With my mouth.

“Storm’s coming in off the north ridge,” he said. “My crews are trying to clear the last stand before the wind picks up.” His gaze dropped to my mouth for half a second — or I imagined it did, because I was clearly a masochist — then returned to my eyes.

My no-filter brain immediately took that microscopic moment and turned it into a full-length, feature film complete with heavy breathing and a checkout counter. Me. On the checkout counter. Him. Between my thick thighs.

“I need to reinforce the roof on the equipment shed. I hope you’ve got everything in stock, Frankie. I don’t want to make a second trip.”

“I could think of worse things,” I murmured, which was what happened when my brain briefly disconnected from my mouth. Honestly, at this point my mouth should’ve come with a parental advisory sticker.

His gaze sharpened. “What was that?”

I swallowed hard under the weight of his attention.

For one stupid second, I wanted to believe he wanted me as much as I wanted him.

But men like Max—rich and dangerously handsome—did not fall for curvy girls whose thighs rubbed together and worked in a hardware store.

They hooked up with women who smelled expensive even when sweating. If they ever sweated.

That didn’t keep me from dreaming though.

“I’ll get your order,” I said briskly. “Won’t be a moment.”

I moved quickly, the way I always did when I needed to stop myself from doing something foolish, like saying something I couldn’t take back. I wrote up his order and walked to the back of the store, handing the slip to the guys at the loading dock, then grabbed the screws he’d need on my way back.

“Here you go.” I set the boxes on the counter but didn’t meet his gaze. “Flashing’s in the back. They’ll load it.”

“Frankie.”

Something in his voice made me go still. It was different — lower, with an edge I didn’t recognize. I looked up, and he was frowning, which wasn’t unusual, but there was something focused about it today, a dark intensity I’d never seen before.

Then the bell above the door gave a sharp, frantic clang, and whatever moment might have existed evaporated.

I heard the heels before I saw her. A sharp, rhythmic click that had no business in a mountain hardware store. Then the perfume hit — expensive, almost aggressive.

Tiffany Lane. Max’s ex-girlfriend. The woman who had allegedly broken his heart before fleeing to the city.

She looked as out of place as a swan in a mud puddle.

She was wearing a cream-colored dress and heels that would pay two months’ rent.

Her blonde hair perfectly coiffed despite the mountain wind.

She looked annoyed — her mouth set in a thin, sour line as she surveyed the store with clear distaste. But she was undeniably beautiful.

Unlike me. Plain curvy Jane in a stained polo shirt.

Her gaze skimmed over me like I was part of the display shelving.

“Max,” she said, voice sharp as a box cutter. “I thought I recognized your truck.”

Max didn’t turn around immediately. He drew a slow breath, shoulders squaring, and the stillness that came over him was the stillness of a man preparing for something unpleasant rather than something painful. Then he turned.

“Tiffany. What are you doing in town?”

“Believe me, I’m not here by choice,” she huffed, stepping closer and pointedly ignoring me. “Leo insisted. He’s got this whole small-town nostalgia thing about getting married here. I’d rather get married literally anywhere else, but he refuses to budge.”

I was new to Lone Mountain, having arrived only a few months ago, but people said a lot more around the hardware counter than they probably should have.

I knew Leo was Max’s cousin and was about to marry Tiffany.

I also knew there’d been bad blood before that.

Max didn’t look like a man who controlled half the timber industry in the state, but the Wilder name meant money — old money, the kind built with rough hands and logging crews.

And everyone knew Max had ended up running the family empire because he was the tough enough, which left Leo to survive on a trust fund and resentment.

I felt the prickle of irritation at the back of my neck. The fact that Leo was marrying the woman who had once been Max’s — and was now dragging her back here to rub Max’s face in it — made my blood boil.

Max’s jaw tightened and I watched the muscle jump. He didn’t look hurt. He looked cold.

“And you want me to watch you marry my cousin?” he asked, voice flat.

She reached into her bag and pulled out a thick, cream envelope, tossing it onto the counter like it was trash. “His family — your family — really wants you to be there. It’s time to stop brooding, don’t you think? It’s been a year. We’ve all moved on.”

The words… except you, hung in the air.

She looked at him with a mix of pity and condescension. My protective instincts flared. She hadn’t just left Max, she’d stayed in the family, twisting the knife as slowly as possible. And now she was standing there, expecting him to show up at her wedding to another man.

Max didn’t say a word, just stood there with his arms crossed. He was a good man, a man who didn’t deserve to be looked down on by someone who thought the height of culture was a latte with a leaf drawn in the foam.

That was when my no-filter brain grabbed the wheel and hit the gas.

I wasn’t thinking about the fact that Tiffany was a size two and I was a size sixteen with a loud personality. I wasn’t thinking about the fact that my apron had a grease stain shaped like Ohio.

I was thinking about the way she’d dropped that envelope on the counter. Like she owned the room. Like she owned him.

“He won’t be alone.”

Tiffany’s gaze took a slow, deliberate tour of my apron, my hips, and my very obvious non-Tiffany-ness. “I’m sorry — were you speaking to me?”

“I was,” I said, walking straight up to Max. I moved into his space and confidently slid my hand around his thick bicep, feeling the rock-hard muscle beneath the fabric of his shirt. Sweet lord. The man felt like he’d been carved out of oak. I mentally shook my head.

Focus, Frankie, focus.

“Max won’t be alone at the wedding. We’re actually looking forward to it. Right, babe?”

I felt Max stiffen for a heartbeat, his entire body going rigid under my hand. I held my breath, wondering if I’d finally gone too far. Which, to be fair, was a line I crossed fairly frequently.

“Right,” he rumbled, his voice thick and dark.

And before I could tell myself that it was a bad idea, I stood on my tiptoes to press my mouth against his jaw.

But that’s not where my mouth landed.

No, Max turned his head just as I kissed him and my mouth landed on his.

I thought I would actually die.

Die in a really, really good way.

Max made a rough sound against my lips — half growl, half-groan — that sent a delicious spiral of need straight to those girly parts that had been screaming for attention.

The dampness I’d felt earlier turned into a full-blown flood.

And what had started as a polite performance kiss for the ex-girlfriend morphed into a hungry explosion of pent-up wanting.

Well, it did for me.

And heaven help me, it felt that same way for him too.

One arm wrapped around my waist dragging me hard against him while his other hand slid into my hair, tilting my head exactly where he wanted it. And boy, did he want it. His mouth moved over mine with rough, hungry intent, and when his tongue swept against mine, my knees nearly gave out.

God, could the man freaking kiss.

The hard length of him pressed against my stomach, thick and unmistakable, and my entire body lit up in response.

He wasn’t playing along anymore. He was taking control of the kiss completely, owning it in a way that made my pulse pound in places no public kiss ever should.

I could feel the frantic pulse between my thighs as I ground myself against him.

My fingertips dug into his biceps as I clung to him, helpless against the dizzy rush of heat and want and his overwhelming scent. Somewhere in the distance, I vaguely remembered Tiffany existed.

Barely.

Because Max kissed like he’d forgotten we had an audience too.

And when he finally pulled back, he didn’t let me go.

His arm stayed locked around my waist, keeping me tucked against his side while he looked at Tiffany with a calm expression that didn’t remotely match the heat still burning in his eyes.

Tiffany looked like she’d been slapped. Her mouth opened in shock, her carefully composed face crumbling into a mask of indignant fury. She let out a sharp, ugly sound.

“Fine,” she snapped as she turned for the door. “I’ll see you at the lodge. Try not to track in a trail of sawdust.”

The door slammed shut behind her, the bell giving one final, frantic jingle before silence reclaimed the store.

I stood there, my lips all swollen and tingling. I was suddenly very aware of the fact that I was still wrapped in the arms of the most handsome man on the mountain and that I had just lied through my teeth about being his girlfriend.

I looked up at him, my face flushing. “Max, I—”

He didn’t let me finish. He looked down at me, his gaze heavy and focused. He didn’t look awkward. He didn’t look like a man who had just been helped.

“Pack a bag, Frankie,” he commanded, his voice a low, gravelly rasp that made my toes curl. “We’re leaving tomorrow morning. And if you’re going to call me babe in front of my family, you’d better be prepared for me to act like I own you.”

He didn’t wait for an answer. He just tightened his grip on my hip for a second, letting me feel his full, hard length one more time before he let me go and headed for the door.

I stood there, my legs shaking, a dull throbbing ache between my thighs, realizing that I hadn’t just started a fake relationship. No. I had apparently volunteered myself for the emotional equivalent of walking into a forest fire wearing gasoline panties.