Chapter 8
EIGHT
KNOX
A warm hand wraps around my cock, and my eyelids flutter.
“Mmm.” I sigh and rub my head back into my pillow as the hand strokes me. I’m already painfully hard. “That feels good, baby.”
“You like that?” Quincy asks,
“You know I do.” I open my left eye so I can look at her. She’s propped herself up on one elbow.
Her hair is a mess, still tussled from our activities last night. She isn’t wearing a lick of makeup, but she’s better than any beauty queen to me. The covers are gathered around her waist, giving me a good view of her full breasts while her fist pumps me.
“I like everything you do.”
“Even this?” She gives a little squeeze.
“Yeah.”
“How about this?” She rubs her thumb over the top of cock, spreading the pre-cum around it.
I groan and nod.
“I wonder what you’ll think about this.” She pushes the covers down even more and lowers her head over my groin.
Looking up at my through her thick eyelashes, she wraps her lips around me. Her mouth is warm, moist. Like the waterfall, it’s another oasis that stirs my soul.
And just like everything she does, when Quincy puts her mind to using that mouth, she doesn’t mess around.
Later, after we’ve each come twice, she shoos me outside for my morning walk. Morning in the mountains has its own kind of quiet. No hum of cars. No buzz of city lights winding down. Just the soft rustle of trees, the call of a bird, and the rhythmic crunch of the ground beneath my feet.
As I take in the usual sights and sounds of my little piece of wilderness, it’s impossible to note how different it all feels.
So much has changed in the past few days. Hell, nothing has been the same since Quincy stepped off that plan a week ago.
I don’t know what last night was supposed to mean. Or this morning. I just know it meant something. Something real.
It’s changed my whole damn world forever.
And that scares the hell out of me.
Anxiety masking itself as adrenaline pumps through my veins. I need to do something. Anything to burn off this energy.
Grabbing my axe, I tackle a pile of logs that have been curing and waiting to be chopped into logs.
I’m stacking firewood when Quincy wanders outside wearing another one of my flannels. Like the others, it’s too big and she’s rolled up the sleeves to keep them from falling over her hands.
She’s also pulled her hair up into a messy ponytail. She looks better than anyone should in flannel—my flannel.
She doesn’t say anything at first, but picks up a log and brings it over like she’s done it a hundred times.
“You don’t have to help,” I say.
She shrugs. “I want to.”
I start to object, but there’s no point. Quincy isn’t the kind of woman to lie around in bed all day when there’s work to be done. And she isn’t afraid of getting a little dirty.
It’s just one of the many things I love about her.
Instead, I adjust my hold on the ax and explain what I’m doing as I do it.
She watches me split a piece, and I try my best not to show off. But I don’t tone it down, either. It’s impossible not to strut a little when your woman is watching you so closely.
After a while, I hand her the lighter stuff—kindling and bark for the stove—and we fall into an easy rhythm.
“This is kind of therapeutic,” she says, brushing sawdust off her leg.
“Just wait till your arms are sore tomorrow.”
“Maybe someday I’ll be as buff as you.”
I smirk. “You gonna tell all your fancy city friends you helped your wilderness fling chop firewood?”
She laughs at that, but there’s something in her eyes—something soft. “I haven’t felt like myself in a long time,” she says. “This feels closer.”
I don’t know how to answer that without giving too much away, so I just nod and go back to chopping.
Because the truth is, I feel it too.
With her here, the cabin doesn’t feel so damn quiet. My life doesn’t feel quite so... stalled.
But that’s dangerous thinking.
Because she’s not staying here forever.
And no matter how good it feels to be here with her, I need to remember there’s no future.
After a rainstorm sends us back inside, we curl up together in front of the fireplace with steaming cups of coffee.
I offer to get the Internet up so we can watch something, but Quincy tells me not to bother. We’re good enough on our own.
I watch her fingers wrap around the mug. She’s looking out the window, her knees pulled up on the couch. I could get used to this being my usual Sunday afternoon. I could get used to having her around.
I could get used to thinking she’s mine.
“Do you ever think about leaving Alaska?” she asks suddenly.
It catches me off guard. “Sometimes.”
“Why don’t you?”
“Because this place gave me everything when I had nothing.” I pause. “It’s the only thing that still feels like me and mine.”
She’s quiet for a moment then readjusts herself in her seat. “Do you ever think about... what it would be like to share it with someone?”
I study her profile. The slope of her cheek. The way she doesn’t quite look at me when she says it.
“I used to.”
And then I don’t say anything else, because the truth is I stopped letting myself imagine that kind of future a long time ago. Long before Quincy.
Except now she’s here, and the questions I shoved away are back, tapping on my shoulder, demanding to be answered.
Once the rain lets up, we spend the rest of the day doing little things—tidying up, moving the firewood into the covered stack, checking the trail camera batteries. At one point, she snaps a picture of me with her phone, says she wants to “capture the lumberjack in his natural habitat.”
“Are you going to send it to your cat?” I tease
“Nope.” She tucks the phone away. “That’s just for me.”
Her voice is light, but the way she looks at me—it sticks. It settles under my skin like a splinter.
We have a light supper—leftover chili and cornbread—and she insists on washing the dishes while I dry. It’s ridiculous how right it feels. How easy.
And that’s exactly why I know it can’t last.
The closer I get to her, the more I want something I don’t deserve. Something I can’t keep.
I step outside for some air and pull my phone from my pocket. A notification pings across the screen.
It’s a message from Boone:
“Heads up for next time you’re in town: Something might be coming in for you. But you don’t need to worry about it.”
I frown.
What the hell does that mean?
There’s a meaning behind those words I don’t like, but it takes me a while to remember.
I wonder if it has anything to do with that damn mail-order bride service. The one he signed me up for. I told him to cancel that damn thing.
Whatever. It’s on him to deal with now. I have more important things, or rather, someone more important to focus on.
I look back at the cabin, where Quincy is humming to herself in the kitchen. Wearing my flannel. Standing in my space like she belongs there.
Because she does. I just haven’t quite figured out how to keep her here with me forever.