Chapter 3 Lucas
Lucas
I don’t do complicated.
That’s been the guiding principle since I got out—keep it clean, keep it simple, keep it moving. Jobs, miles, the next assignment. Denver is new, and new is good. It means routine. Predictable rotations. Quiet mornings where the mountains look like they were drawn with a pencil and a steady hand.
Then Melanie laughed in my truck on the way to get pizza, and every rule I’ve written for myself got a little fuzzy around the edges.
Back at the cabin, the dogs form a perimeter around the coffee table like a furry security cordon, eyes locked on pepperoni like it’s contraband.
Melanie kneels to snap photos of Moose with a slice-shaped plush toy.
She makes a high, ridiculous sound that should scare a dog into next week but instead gets Moose to tilt his head and smile like he understands her.
“Look at you,” she coos, clicking away. “A natural star.”
I pretend to focus on plates and napkins, but my attention keeps sliding back to her.
She’s got paint on one knuckle from a sign they were touching up earlier, hair scooped into a loose knot that’s come a little undone, wool socks with tiny lightning bolts.
She radiates…motion. Even sitting still, she feels like a moving target—in a good way. Alive.
Complicated, my brain reminds me. Saint Pierce complicated. Two flights and a layover complicated. My life is travel, hers is content calendars and adoption drives. Two people heading in two different directions.
“Hey,” Asher says, breaking my looped thought. He nods toward the sliding doors. “Wind’s shifting. Snow by morning.”
I glance outside. He’s right. The air has that metallic edge, sky going from watercolor blue to pewter. “We’ll tarp the woodpile.”
He nods. That’s the thing about working with Asher—you don’t really need to talk to cover the gaps. He and Charlotte claim the loveseat, legs tangled. It’s easy with them. Built on something that held in bad weather.
I load my plate with two slices and sit on the hearth. Melanie drops cross-legged to the rug beside Major, who plops his head in her lap like he’s known her for years. She breaks off a tiny pepperoni, looks at me, then at the dog, then at me again.
“I’m not seeing you,” I deadpan.
“I would never,” she says, and gives Major the treat. He chews with reverence. “Okay, maybe once.”
Charlotte watches us with the look best friends get when they see the match before either party does. I pretend not to notice. I’m good at that.
Conversation thins as pizza disappears. The heater ticks. The dogs melt into sleepy piles of fur and twitching paws. Charlotte leans into Asher, drops her voice. “I’m calling bedtime,” she says, standing. “We have an early start.”
Asher squeezes my shoulder in passing. “You good?”
“Always,” I say. It’s automatic, and true.
Charlotte hugs Melanie. “Steal any blankets you need,” she says. “We overstocked after that first winter.”
When the bedroom door clicks shut, the cabin drops into a softer quiet, like someone turned down the gain on the world. The fire settles, snapping only when a log shifts its weight.
I should go. Easy call. Big day tomorrow? Probably. Even if it isn’t, the right move is thank-you-and-goodnight, exit while the lines are still clean.
“Wine?” Melanie asks, already on her feet, hands in motion. She tucks her hair behind one ear and smiles up at me like we’ve been friends a long time. “Or are you more of a stoic stare-into-the-fire type?”
“Depends on the wine,” I say, standing. “And the fire.”
“Mulled?” She tilts her head.
“That works.”
We end up at the big farmhouse table with mulled wine mugs and the kind of silence that isn’t heavy.
She scrolls through the day’s shots, turning the screen so I can see.
Major’s bowtie, Moose’s grin, the gray-muzzled shepherd pressed against Charlotte’s knee.
Her photos don’t just capture what happened. They catch what it felt like.
“These will help,” I say. “People will see the ones that need them.”
She looks up, surprised but pleased. “That’s the hope. It’s not world peace, but…it’s something.”
“It’s not nothing,” I correct. “Not for the dog that ends up sleeping on a kid’s bed instead of a concrete floor.”
Her eyes soften. “You think like that a lot, don’t you? The single difference a person can make.”
“Comes with the job,” I say. “And with trying to sleep at night.”
She nods like she understands. I think she does.
We talk equipment, then music, then the fact that Denver weather in March needs therapy.
She tells me about the one time she tried to surf for a brand deal and ended up with a heroic sunburn and seven million views.
I tell her about a cargo plane with a broken heater and a deck of cards we used until they turned to fabric.
Time folds without fanfare. The fire sinks to coals. The dogs snore like small motors. The wind noses the eaves. Somewhere in that drift, Melanie leans her chin into her palm and just…watches me.
“What?” I ask, half-smiling because it feels impossible not to around her.
“You’re different than I expected,” she says.
“How’s that?”
“Quieter,” she says. “But not closed.”
I study her, the frank curiosity, the warmth. “You’re louder than I expected.”
She laughs, unoffended. “But not obnoxious?”
“Not obnoxious,” I confirm. “Just…alive.”
For a beat, neither of us looks away. Then she stands abruptly, like if she doesn’t she’ll talk herself out of something. “Come on.”
“Where?”
She grabs a blanket from the back of the couch and heads for the sliding door. “Stars.”
We step onto the deck. The cold finds every uncovered inch of skin, clean and bracing.
She lifts her face to the sky and sighs like she’s been holding that breath since October.
The stars are obscene—thousands of them, needles stuck into black velvet, a white smear of the Milky Way low over the ridge.
“It looks fake,” she says, teeth chattering through a laugh.
“It’s real,” I say, voice low, hands already loosening the blanket to wrap it around her shoulders. She shivers and leans instinctively into me when I step closer to share heat. The move isn’t calculated. It’s magnetic.
“Thanks,” she murmurs, tilting a fraction so her temple brushes my jaw. The contact is light. Enough to change the temperature of the night.
I should step back. I don’t.
She turns, the blanket tugging between us, and looks up at me. Close. Closer than all my good intentions. Up this close I can see the gold flecks in her eyes. A small scar on her chin I didn’t notice inside. The way her mouth finds a smile even when she isn’t fully meaning to.
“I don’t do complicated,” I say, because if I say it out loud it counts as a plan.
“Me neither,” she says, voice barely above the hush of the pines.
We stand there, two liars telling the truth the only way we can: by not moving apart.
“Okay,” she whispers, like we’ve negotiated something. “Then we keep it simple.”
“How?” I ask, even though I already know the answer.
“Start with this,” she says, and lifts on her toes.
The first kiss lands like a slow exhale, like dropping a pack after a long march. Warm and careful, then warmer, less careful. I feel her hands fist in the front of my jacket, the small tug that says don’t go far. I don’t plan to.
We head inside, quickly and quietly, to the guest room.
The fire roars in the room, and I lean in, claiming her lips once more. I manage to lock the door with her barely noticing.
She kisses me harder, both of us making our way toward the bed in the center of the room. I laugh as we fall in a pile of tangled limbs.
“Shhh,” she whispers. “We don’t want to wake up the whole house.”
I make the motion of zipping my lips, and her eyes blaze at me. She’s so fucking beautiful.
When I first met Melanie this isn’t where I expected the night to go, but had kinda hoped. Who am I kidding? I’ve wanted this woman since the moment I saw her.
“You’re so fucking pretty,” I tell her, reaching for her once more, kissing the ever loving fuck out of her.
She laughs and the sound resonates deep within my chest. “You’re not too bad either.”
I kiss the top of her forehead, my hands plunging into her dark wavy hair. I pull back to study the exact shade of her coffee-colored eyes. “Are you sure you’re okay with this?” I ask, not wanting to dive into the meaning behind it.
If she lived here. If I lived there. If it was another time, maybe we could be something more. But I don’t want her to take what tonight is to mean anything more than it is. A one-time thing. Although, I don’t know how I’ll get enough of her. Once definitely won’t be enough time.
She nods. “I’m good.” Her eyes darken. “Are you?”
I smile, my hands moving from her lustrous hair and down her long, slender neck. “I’m more than okay.” And now I want her to know me.
To know what we can be together.
She rises from the bed, and I sit on the edge of it, watching her. Studying her. Wanting her to know everything about me in this snap of time we have together.
I keep moving down her body, taking my time until my hands land on the hem of her t-shirt. I lift and she raises her arms in the most seductive way. Wow.
My heartbeat amps up as I gaze at her sexy red bra. Did she wear this thing for me?
I’d like to think she did, even though when she got dressed this morning she had no clue I existed. Well, time to change all of that.
I reverently cup her breasts, my hands over the thin lace of her bra. The top of her tits spill out, and I move my head closer, wanting a taste. I pay attention to the way her fingers travel through my hair. It drives me crazy… in the good kinda way.
I make quick work of getting her bra off and tossing it over my shoulder. She stands between my legs, and as I look up at her, I swear for a split second I can see my future in her dark eyes.