Chapter 6
Chapter six
As we climb the switchback toward the ridge, City Hall looks like a gingerbread house strung with too many lights as it shrinks behind us in the rearview. Soon, the streetlights are gone, and the icy road narrows under starlight.
I study his profile, his strong nose, the faint stubble on his jawline, and the corner of the sexy lips that kissed me yesterday before we were so rudely interrupted. My heart does a slow, dangerous twirl. “You know,” I say, “most men would’ve been upset with the way Bryce stared me down tonight.”
“Most guys weren’t trying to earn a dance with a woman who out-naughties them.
” He glances over with his eyes full of mischief.
“And Bryce wasn’t the only man looking at you, by the way.
I don’t base my decisions on what others think.
I’ve had my own share of battles. Whatever’s going on between you and Bryce, or anyone else for that matter, doesn’t worry me. ”
His words reassure me, and I settle back in my seat feeling warm and cozy.
I forgot what it felt like to feel safe.
It seems I’m always fighting my way through something.
When we crest the ridge, he points out his cabin as it slowly appears through the trees.
It’s larger than I thought with pretty log walls, and a chimney puffing lazy smoke into the indigo sky.
Tanner parks in the carport and kills the engine. Silence rushes in, broken only by the tick of cooling metal. “Inside, there’s a fire, whiskey older than both of us, and a couch big enough for two people to talk without the whole town listening.”
I trace the edge of his sleeve. “Just talk?”
“For now,” he says softly, tenderly brushing his knuckles against my cheek. “But I’ve been known to improvise.”
He helps me out of the truck and protectively holds my hand as we walk up the path. The porch light flickers on, illuminating curls of snow drifting from the eaves. Tanner unlocks the door, then steps aside to let me enter first.
The cabin is cozy and inviting, with a stone hearth crackling, throwing gold across the wide-plank floors of the main room.
We take off our boots and line them against the wall in the hallway.
He hangs our coats, along with our matching silly hats, on the hooks by the door, and invites me to make myself at home while he stokes the fire.
I drift into the room and find the source of the tangy pine smell.
He has a freshly cut Christmas tree parked in a corner; he hasn’t started decorating.
I sink into the soft-as-butter leather couch and watch the flames paint shadows across shelves of books.
Tanner crouches and adds a few small logs to the flames, then straightens, wiping his hands on his jeans. “Whiskey? Cocoa? Both?”
“Both,” I decide. “And thanks for getting that fire going. I’m still thawing.”
He laughs, low and easy, and crosses to an adjacent kitchen nook. “Stay there,” he says, moving like a man who’s never doubted his place in the world. The kettle whistles, and he pours amber liquid into two mugs, tops them with chocolate liquid, then carries them over.
Our fingers brush when he hands me my drink, and I try to ignore the charged electricity pumping between us.
I sip the warm whiskey and cocoa concoction that goes down like chocolate silk as Tanner settles beside me, close enough that our knees touch while the wind rattles the pines outside.
“So,” he says, “Too naughty. What’s your real story? ”
“I was hoping you’d let me off the hook.
” I groan with a smile. “Lauren exaggerated. Bryce was … intense. He wanted to brand me like cattle after two dates. I knew after the second one I had zero interest in settling down with him. He’s an okay man, but not a match for me.
Besides, who needs the hassle? I’m perfectly okay by myself. ”
“Smart.” He stretches an arm along the back of the couch, not quite around me, but the invitation’s there. “Freedom’s my love language.”
I turn to face him, tucking one leg beneath me. “What about you, naughty one? Rumor has it, you’ve got a trail of broken hearts longer than the Continental Divide.”
“Rumor’s got a big mouth,” he says, tracing the rim of the mug with his thumb. “I date. I don’t collect. There’s a difference.”
The honesty disarms me. I set my drink on the coffee table. “Why me, then? You could’ve danced with anyone tonight.”
He studies me for a moment in the firelight. “Well, you’re absolutely beautiful. That’s a given. But I like how you don’t feel the need to perform. You show up as you are, grumbling with snowflakes on your dress, blushing, flirty, telling Lauren to zip it. Real can be rare up here.”
He thinks I’m beautiful. Our conversation goes quiet as my nerves start wreaking havoc with me.
Tanner is so special, I don’t want to say or do anything to blow it between us, so I stick with a safe topic.
“What’s that thing over there?” I point to the third shelf down from the top directly in front of us.
“Is that a special coin twinkling next to that knife?”
Tanner turns to where the coin is glinting and sets his drink on the coffee table.
The fire pops, sending a shower of sparks up the chimney as he rises from the couch.
“That,” he says in a low, steady voice, “is my lucky afghani. And the knife belonged to my grandfather. It’s the only thing I carried home from the sandbox that still works. ”
He plucks the memento from its stand and flips it so it spins in the air before he catches it.
“A kid gave it to me outside a bazaar in Marjah. It still smells like canal mud. He was a little guy, couldn’t have been more than eight, and wanted to buy gum from me.
He didn’t have any money. They were dirt poor, so I gave him my ‘American magic gum’ for nothing, but he insisted I keep his coin.
I think it kept me alive two days later.
Or maybe I just got lucky. Either way, I’m glad I hung on to it. ”
Tanner sets the coin back on its holder, then lifts the knife, unfolding it with a soft click.
The blade catches the firelight, worn but sharp.
“My grandpa carried this through Korea. Gave it to me the day I shipped out. Said, ‘Don’t be a hero, just come home.’ I didn’t listen to the first part, but I managed the second. ”
He folds the knife, sets it beside the coin, and shrugs as if it’s nothing.
“I don’t think I’ve ever told anyone outside of my family, that.
But I guess if I’m going to spill a secret on a first date, it might as well be one that doesn’t end with me owing child support.
” He gives me a crooked grin, but it feels like he just handed me a piece of himself.
There’s more to Tanner Stone that meets the eye, and I’m trying to digest what I just heard.
There are a million questions rattling around my brain, but the only one I manage to ask is, “You served?” The words come out softer than I mean them to; it’s almost a whisper.
He slowly nods, as if he’s deciding how much of the truth he should tell me. “Yeah,” he says, joining me on the couch. “Long time ago.”
My eyes narrow, searching for more, but I’m worried I’ll bring up awful memories for him. “Army?” I ask softly.
“Green Beret,” he answers, like a stone dropped in still water.
I shouldn’t be surprised though. It doesn’t take a genius to know there’s something fierce and brave hiding under all those confident flirtatious smiles. “So, Special Forces.”
He shrugs. “Twelve years. Mostly overseas. Mostly quiet.”
My gaze flicks to the thin, pale scar over his right eyebrow. I’m smart enough to know some stories don’t come with maps, and I hold myself back from asking how he got it. If he wants to tell me, he will. In his own time. “You ever …” I stop and rephrase. “Was it hard to come home?”
He looks down at his hands. “It was a different kind of challenge,” he says. “The world keeps spinning. You just … learn to walk the walk until the memories fade.”
I’m quiet for a beat. “You don’t talk like someone who left it all behind.”
A dry, surprised laugh slips out of him. “Some things never leave you.”
I realize I’m pressing, but he trusts me, as much as I trust him.
I’m not sure how it’s possible that we were immediately so at ease with each other, but it’s important for him to know he can tell me anything, and I won’t run.
Not from him. My fingers brush the edge of my glass. “Like what? What never left you?”
He hesitates. “Like knowing how loud silence can be,” he says finally, “or how fast a joke could turn into a last word.”
My eyes soften, and I think my heart is breaking for him. I feel like I’m walking on thin ice, yet I want to know everything about him. All the good, and the bad, everything. “Do you ever miss it?”
“Parts,” he admits. “The clarity. The team. The way fear sharpens everything until it sings.” He pauses. “But I don’t miss the nights I can’t talk about. The ones that still wake me up.”
I don’t flinch and only nod, filing the information away, not to use against him, but to hold gently, and maybe even help. “Passion Pine’s naughty one is a lot more than I expected.”
He gives me a small smile. “Good. Now it’s your turn,” he says in a teasing voice. “You know plenty about me. What’s your story?”
***
Tanner
The whiskey and cocoa mix wraps around me in a rich, boozy hug that tastes like sin and comfort all at once.
She’s curled against me, with her bare feet tucked under my thigh.
The hem of her white snowflake dress rides up enough to tease the curve of her knee.
I smell her perfume every time she moves.
It’s vanilla something, laced with marshmallow, and the Montana wind tangled in her hair.
Whatever it is, makes my mouth water, and my cock press up against my zipper.
I’ve only spilled a sliver of my past, but the confession felt raw.
I can’t remember the last time a woman cared enough to ask me about the time I spent serving.
And unlike the few people who have asked, Winter didn’t pry or offer any pitying nods.
Instead, she traced a lazy circle on my forearm with her fingertip and simply listened.
To be honest, it was a relief to tell her at least part of my story.
She was bound to find out eventually, might as well get it over with.
My shrink thinks the trauma I experienced in Afghanistan is the main reason I date so many women, but never form any bonds.
But this feels different with Winter, and unlike my last string of dates, I’m not asking about her just to kill time before we screw, or to be polite, I really want to learn everything about her.
I set my mug on the side table, and twist to face her fully.
Her eyes are the color of brown velvet that don’t need a stitch of makeup to pull you under.
“Your turn,” I say in a gravelly voice, warmed by the liquor and my overwhelming attraction to her.
“What do you do, mystery naughty woman? Besides make a man forget his own name?”
She laughs, a throaty sound that vibrates through me, and takes a slow sip from her mug.
She licks her lips deliberately, and damn if it doesn’t send a jolt straight south.
“Oh, Tanner, you won’t know what I’m talking about.
It’s a super-niche field. Very specific.
The type of thing that sounds boring until it saves your life. ”
I move close enough to feel the heat radiating off her skin, and prop my elbow on the back of the couch. “Try me. I’m a quick study.”
She tilts her head, considering me with that sly half-smile, as if deciding if I’m worth the reveal.
The fire pops, sending a spark skittering across the hearth, and she exhales, setting her mug aside.
“Alright. I customize pagers for people who work in remote locations. Road workers, linemen … folks out in the sticks where satellites play hard to get.”
“Pagers?” For a split second, my brain stutters as visions of 90s-style beepers clipped to hospital scrubs come to mind, but then it clicks, hard and fast. My pulse kicks up, not from the flirtation anymore, but from the insane coincidence.
“You’re not talking about the Summit Sentinel Pager, are you? ”
Her eyes widen in astonishment. Her hand freezes mid-gesture.
“Yes. God, that’s my baby.” Her voice drops to a husky whisper as she lights up with pride.
“I designed the core tech myself. It’s not your grandma’s beeper.
Ruggedized casing that can take a 20-foot drop or a blow from a hammer without flinching. ”
I’m hooked, and lean closer with my knee against hers as the couch dips under our weight.
She’s animated now, and moving her hands as if she’s wiring a circuit right there in the air and gripping an invisible tool.
“It has a solar-recharging battery that lasts six months in the backcountry. It’s waterproof to 10 meters, dust-proof, and the signal?
It punches through interference, with mesh networking capable of bouncing off repeater nodes, you can daisy-chain across a valley.
No more dead zones killing comms during bad weather. ”
She pauses, catching her breath, and there’s a vulnerability in her expression, as if she’s afraid she’s lost me with her technical explanation.
She’s not only sexy as fuck, she’s brilliant.
I grin at the way the fire’s glow dances on her skin, highlighting the scar on her knuckle, probably from a slipped soldering iron, and I want to kiss it and make it better.
“I’ve heard the new model will have biometrics, right?
Fingerprint lock for secure data bursts, integrated with a subdermal RFID for hands-free auth in gloves. ”
Her jaw drops literally for a heartbeat before she snaps it shut with a grin, equal parts shock and delight. “How the hell did you know that? It’s not even public yet.”