The Mountain Man’s Mysterious Bride (Mountain Man Sanctuary #11)

Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

Axel

As I walked in the door of my cozy, quiet cabin, I tossed the mail, my keys, and my wallet on the entry table and slid off my work boots.

I desperately needed a shower after a busy today underneath car after car after car.

Grease covered me from my arms to my fingernails, down to my dirty work jeans.

My muscles ached, reminding me I was no longer a young guy in my early twenties but a guy approaching his forties. Quickly.

As I tucked my phone into my back pocket, a sparkle caught the corner of my eye and I reached for the sparkly envelope, my stomach sinking when I saw my cousin’s name.

My mom warned me last week my aunt had sent the invitations, and they expected everyone to bring a plus one. Which left me shit out of luck.

How had all of my younger cousins got married before me? I was the oldest of the bunch and let’s just say, love didn’t work out for me. At least not in the way I wanted it to.

Love came with…complications.

Most of them I wanted nothing to do with.

I liked my quiet, peaceful, solo adventure.

Unless family events came up and a spotlight shone on me. Axel is single! Axel is single! Alert the masses!

What’s so wrong with choosing to do life alone?

I opened the invitation, scanned the details, and tossed it back down on the table. I’d deal with it later. Hot water and soap first.

My phone buzzed in my back pocket as I climbed the stairs. Mom flashed on the screen and somehow, I already knew what she wanted.

“Hey Ma, can I call you back in a bit? I was just about to take a shower.”

“Hi honey! This will only take a second! We received our invitation today, did you?”

“Yep, sure did.”

“And have you found someone to go with? Because I have a friend from Bingo whose beautiful daughter is single, and I think she would just be perfect for you! Want me to set things up?”

I sighed. Why she wanted me married so badly made no sense to me. My younger sister was married and already pregnant with her second child. Couldn’t she focus her attention on them instead of me? “Nah, that’s alright. I found a date.” I lied, while instantly kicking myself in the shin.

“You have?” Mom squealed into the phone, and I pulled it away from my ear, the high pitch sound traveling through my head. “Tell me all about her! I can’t believe you haven’t told me yet!”

“It just happened today, Ma.” I lied again. “I’ll fill you in on the details this weekend at Sunday dinner. Gotta go, love you.” I quickly hung up before she could say more. I loved my mother more than anything, but she could be quite the pest when she wanted to be.

I tossed my phone onto my bed and stripped my clothes off, dropping them in the hamper on my way to the bathroom. I turned the shower on and cursed at myself in the mirror while waiting for the water to warm up. Why did I lie? I made everything worse.

I should’ve been honest. Now I needed to find a date, and fast.

How the hell was that gonna happen?

After showering and eating dinner, I sat on my back deck with my phone and did the one thing I never thought I would. I searched for a dating website.

Several popped up on the screen and I scrolled through them until I stopped at one, I’d heard the guys in the garage talk about before. It was called Mountain Mates and had high ratings.

I clicked the link, and the website opened, which led me directly to a mobile app for it, the website better for those on computers. I followed the prompts and created a profile within minutes.

When clicking to the next screen, a message popped up. New and improved matches! Mountain Mates now guarantees a match in thirty days or your money back! Click here for more details!

My finger hovered over the button, but I clicked onto the next screen instead. A match was one thing. Keeping the relationship going was another. Besides, I was on here for a one-night date, a mail-order bride, so to speak, a woman who expected little except for a nice night out.

Matches and new messages popped up on my screen as I scrolled through profiles, nixing the looking for marriage types, or any type of long-term commitment.

Soon, I was in a conversation with a few different women. I didn’t expect to like it so much, yet here I was, enjoying the attention.

Why not, right?

For two weeks, I talked nonstop with the woman I invited to my cousin’s wedding. She loved long walks and lazy afternoons in the garden, only the sounds of nature around. She enjoyed reading and wasn’t a fan of loud music, nor did she watch a lot of TV.

After the chaotic, noisy, long days in the garage, working on car after car, I liked quiet. I hated chaos and drama and wanted none of it, and she seemed in agreement.

Yet the woman on my doorstep was anything but quiet. Nor did she look like the pictures she sent.

“Hi! I’m Emersyn! I can’t believe I’m here, in the flesh, meeting you! I thought I’d be more nervous and surprisingly, I’m not.” Happiness and light-hearted energy wafted off her in waves, like a party favor had been stuck up her ass, ready to explode with excitement at any second.

This couldn’t be the woman I’d been talking to.

There was no way she was the same Emersyn. Something got mixed up somewhere, and I needed to figure out what the hell was going on.

Emersyn curiously looking around my cabin.

She couldn’t be older than late twenties with gorgeous green eyes and light brown hair, tight leggings that hugged all of her curves and showed every one of them off.

At first glance, she looked quiet, sweet, shy even.

And the worst part? How damn sexy she was.

She was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen before.

Prettier than the woman in the pictures, prettier than anything I’d seen around town lately.

Yet when she burst through my doorway, an entire cart full of bags trailing behind her, I had a feeling she was about to take me on a very wild ride.

And for some odd reason, I kind of wanted her to.

“Uh,” I scratched the back of my head while I desperately tried to gather my thoughts. “I think there’s been a bit of a mix-up.”

Emersyn spun around towards me. “A mix up? What kind of mix-up?”

“You’re Emersyn and you’ve been speaking to me? Axel?”

“Axel? What? No…oh my God.” She looked at me with sheer panic. “I was talking to Dan, and he gave me this address. What is even happening right now? Are you catfishing me? Is that what this is?” Emersyn grabbed the cart handle and walked towards me, the door still open behind me.

“No. I’ve been talking to an Emersyn, too. But she looks like this.” I held my phone up and showed her a picture, a blonde woman with blue eyes, nothing at all like her.

“You look like the pictures sent to me. See?” Emersyn held her phone up to me and I stared at one of my Facebook profile pictures.

“So, someone used my picture? But they also know my address?”

“Well, technically, they said your cabin number was fifty-seven, and this one is sixty, but I figured it was close enough. The only other cabin around is way down the road and number forty-eight.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. The entire situation was absurd. “Were we both catfished somehow?”

“No idea. God, this is embarrassing. I’ll leave now. Sorry to take up so much of your time.” Emersyn smiled, but she looked mortified and upset, her cheeks red and her eyes wet.

She walked around me towards the door and when she got to the doorway, I spun around and called out, “Wait. Don’t go yet.”

Emersyn turned towards me and a lone tear slipped down her cheek. She quickly swiped it away.

“The woman I was speaking to was here for a one-night thing. I have a wedding to attend tomorrow, and I needed a date. Would that be something you’d be interested in?”

Emersyn smiled sadly and shook her head as more tears fell. “No. I want love, marriage, a family. I don’t want to wait until I’m older.”

A knot formed in my stomach. This woman intrigued me, this mysterious woman with a bright light suddenly dimmed by the whole situation. Just how young was she? “How old are you?”

Her face lit up, her playful, green eyes pinned on me. “Are you supposed to ask a lady that?” She chuckled, and I enjoyed seeing her mood improve.

I took a step towards her, a magnetic pull drawing me closer.

My fingers ached to touch her soft skin and my mouth watered at the thought of her taste and her sweet fruity scent.

“Considering the thoughts running through my mind right now, I need to know how much younger you are than an old man like me.” I grinned and her face flushed.

“There’s no way you’re an old man.” Emersyn teased as her eyes traveled down my body, not one attempt to hide the fact that she was checking me out.

Sexual tension cracked between us.

My breathing hitched in my throat.

“I’m thirty-eight.”

“I’m twenty-five. I don’t see a problem. Except one.”

“What’s that?” I swallowed as my dick hardened in my pants.

“I want a lot more than one night.”

I was ready to explode. I didn’t care. I didn’t care she wanted more, and I didn’t. I didn’t care about any of it.

All I cared about was getting my mouth on every part of her sexy, curvy body.