CHAPTER NINE
DIANA
“Ready to add a little danger to the evening?” Soren teases after we stack our empty food baskets at the center of the table. Dinner was delicious, though it was tough keeping up my side of the conversation when Soren’s every move made my stomach flutter.
The bob of his Adam's apple while taking a drink. The flex of his forearm muscles when he opened the ketchup bottle for me. Small details that shouldn’t mean anything have me practically panting in my seat.
“Danger? Has someone actually gotten injured here?” The restaurant made us sign a waiver upon entrance. I figured it was your basic legalese to cover their asses, but maybe they had a legitimate reason for the contracts.
“Not that I know of.” Soren gently guides me away from our table and offers a small axe, worn handle facing me, once we are stationed in an open throwing lane. “The blades are dull as fuck. I could never chop wood with these.”
An image of Soren shirtless, a plaid flannel tied around his thick waist, as he swings an axe down on a hefty log has my temperature rising. I’d pay good money to watch his muscles ripple and gleam with sweat.
So would a bunch of other women, I bet.
Raising the axe overhead with a flare of jealousy, I mimic the person a couple of lanes over from us and toss it toward the gouged wooden wall with a target painted on its center. The blade hits the wall, then bounces pathetically to the ground.
“Damn,” I mutter under my breath. TV makes this look a lot simpler.
“Don’t worry. Hardly anyone gets it right on the first try.” Soren grabs the axe and hands it over again, but this time he adds instructions, standing behind me to direct my movements.
“Smooth move, mountain man.”
“Just demonstrating proper technique, firecracker.” His hot breath tickles my ear as he dips his head low. There’s the barest brush of his lips on my neck before he steps back to give me room to throw.
I swing my arms forward—a brief worry of the handle accidentally slipping out of my sweaty grip and flying backwards to hit somebody in the head—before the axe flies through the air and lands with a thud on the outside of the target.
It doesn't earn me any points if Soren and I were truly playing a game, but at least it stuck in the wood instead of rattling to the ground again.
It makes me feel strong to have embedded the blade in the wood, even those couple of inches.
“Good job,” Soren praises. He pats my shoulder in approval, then yanks the blade out of the wall. “My turn.”
This should be interesting… I cross my arms and watch avidly as Soren braces his feet shoulder-length apart to prepare for his throw. It's hot as hell, and I recall my earlier fantasy of him chopping wood.
“How often do you have to cut up firewood?”
“What?” he asks in surprise. The axe lands near the center of the target, of course.
“You said these blades literally won't make the cut for chopping wood. I'm just wondering how often you have to do that,” I say nonchalantly. Like I’m not compiling a naughty cache of imaginary scenarios where my hardworking lumberjack neighbor steals me away to his remote cabin to ravage me until dawn.
“Well, I'm a mountain man like you so lovingly like to say,” he teases, “So I have to do it quite often.”
“Hmm… I'll have to visit one of those times.”
“Or I can chop wood for you at the Duncans’ place. Our stockpile at home is pretty high already.”
“Even better.” I grin in anticipation.
This first date is supposed to be a barometer test to see how well we get along. If there’s something real here. If Soren is suggesting hanging out again—this time in a sexy woodchopping fantasy—then that must mean he wants more, right?
The rest of the evening flies by with us trading flirtatious taunts and tossing an axe at a wall until Soren drives me home. As we pass his cabin and the sunflower mailbox, I ask, “Where's Sara Beth tonight?”
“At my sister Kennedy's. Her husband is away for his job at McCoy Security, so she offered to have a sleepover at her place.”
“Sounds fun! Who is Kennedy's husband? Someone from McCoy Security conducted a maintenance check on the security system at the clinic, so maybe I met him.”
The man had been extremely attractive in a military-precision type of way with his short hair and neat appearance, and he'd definitely worn a gold wedding band on his finger.
“Wyatt, but you probably dealt with James or one of the other guys because Wyatt usually handles the physical bodyguard jobs. Like now, he's leading a team that's providing security for a three-day event in Seattle.”
“Oh, wow.” That must have been a boon for a small town security firm.
When Soren parks his truck in front of my cabin, we sit in silence for a beat before I ask a question that's been weighing on me all evening. “Does your daughter know you went on a date tonight?”
“Yes.” He shifts to face me from the driver’s seat, scrubs a hand over his beard, then shrugs.
“I've never had to broach the topic of dating with her before, and I probably wouldn't have mentioned you yet, except she already met you at the veterinarian office. It seemed silly to keep you a secret after that.”
“Understandable… How does she feel about you dating? She's not harboring any Parent Trap ideas about you and your ex, is she?”
“God, I hope not because that's never happening.”
“ We are never, ever, ever… ” I sing instinctively, unable to let the opportunity pass.
Soren groans in mock annoyance with a hand to his heart. “Taylor Swift? Really?”
“Maybe, as a thirty-six-year-old woman, I should be embarrassed about listening to her, but she's only a year younger than me, so I'm not. We're basically peers,” I joke.
“How do you know how old she is? I love Bon Iver, but I couldn't tell you his age.”
“Her birthday is the day after mine, so it's one of the few celebrity facts I know because that kind of stuff is interesting to me.”
A speculative look enters his eyes. “You know what? I do actually know Brad Pitt's birthday because it's the same day as mine. It was one of those 'On This Day’ trivia facts.”
“See? You get it.”
“Guess I do.” A half-grin shines from his handsome face, and I flush. Soren is too damn attractive for his own good. For my own good.
Struggling with the passenger door handle, I pop it open and hop down to the gravel drive with a huff.
The cool mountain air is a welcome respite from the heat of the truck’s cab, with Soren so close.
His intoxicating scent. His giant, bear-like presence that makes me feel protected rather than intimidated.
“Whoa, where are you running off to so quickly?” Soren’s fingers wrap around my arm and tug me to a stop outside the front door.
Facing him with a trembling smile, I avoid his gaze. “Nowhere. I just…” Words fail me. An overwhelming sense of rightness descends each time I’m around Soren. It grows stronger and stronger the longer I’m with him.
But that feeling also worries me.
This is our first official date. It went well, but the hopes I have far exceed the limits of a getting-to-know-you date. And I don’t want to scare Soren off, especially when he was initially wary. With good cause— his daughter .
Soren studies my carefully arranged features. “What’s wrong? What happened in the last five minutes to send you running from me?”
Damn the too-perceptive man.
“I’m not running from you per se,” I stall, wondering how much I should reveal.
“Could have fooled me. One minute we’re joking together, and the next you're fleeing my side like a bunny on the loose.”
To be vulnerable or not.
That is the question.
“Come on, firecracker, don’t hide now.” He cups my cheek in his rough palm. “What happened to no longer curbing your desires, hmm? Shouldn’t that apply to not keeping your thoughts a secret?”
“Just call me out, why don’t you?” I mumble, glaring into his probing amber eyes.
Because he’s right.
I’m supposed to be growing, not limiting myself. Romanticizing my life means hoping for the best, not escaping the potential of rejection before it can hurt me.
Allowing my head to bang against the front door, I grimace, then give in.
Becoming your best self can really suck sometimes.
“You… are… a dream come true, Soren. From the ridiculous conversation about celebrities to the way you care for Sara Beth. I’ve never met someone I’ve felt such an immediate connection to, and it got to be a little too much in the truck.”
I don’t think he expected that level of honesty because his body jerks, then tenses. Oh god… He’s about to race back down this mountain to escape the crazy lady who confessed her—
“I feel the same way.”
Wait, what?
“Do you know how much control it takes to not kiss you or grab your hand or toss you over my shoulder and take you home?” He dips his head to whisper his lips across mine.
“A whole fucking ton. You’re the first woman since Sara Beth’s mom that I’ve wanted to pursue a serious relationship with, and what I felt for Marsha doesn’t even come close to how I feel for you.
But I want to do this right. We started fast; I don’t want to burn out. ”
“Me neither.”
“So, we do this the traditional way. We date and enjoy being together and I leave you with a kiss goodnight rather than tasting that sweet pussy of yours again,” he growls, plunging his tongue into my mouth in a crude example of what he’d like to be doing instead.
My hands smooth up his chest to tangle in his hair, my fingernails digging into his scalp as we both groan in pleasure.
Slow.
I can work with that.