Chapter 32
You Started It
Sun shines through the spotless windows of the cabin in the morning and I wake up happier than I’ve been in… well, ever. I’m still in Wyoming, my vacation rental is finished and more beautiful than I could have ever imagined, and there’s a cowboy wrapped around me keeping me warm.
A little too warm, if I’m being honest, but I don’t dare move. His broad chest moves up and down at a slow rhythm.
I wait for the anxiety to creep in, for the freak out to start when I remember what I confessed to Miles yesterday but it never comes.
Everything just feels so right, just like it did before.
No rush in my blood to leave as soon as possible, no excuses running through my head of why this couldn’t work out.
Just calm, and peace. It’s a little weird, if I’m being honest, but I’m reveling in it.
I’m not used to it. This brand new feeling I’ve never felt before.
Not in relationships or family. Even with people I felt safe with, there was always the panic behind it all.
The worry that it might all be taken away from me at a moment’s notice.
But now, I can just feel the certainty of Miles.
The only sadness I feel is the loss of our time spent apart. Four years that we could have had together. Though, deep down, I know that we wouldn’t have stayed together back then even if we had tried. Neither of us were ready. It had to be now.
My pulse jumps as Miles starts to stir, his arm that’s wrapped around my side pulling me in closer to him. His breath skirts down the back of my neck, sending goosebumps down my arms.
I relax a little, melting into him to savor this moment. I’ve never had a moment like this with anyone. I wiggle in a little, snuggling up to him as much as I can.
“Mac.” His voice sounds like sandpaper. “What are you doing?”
“Getting comfy.”
He sighs, “If you keep wiggling around like that, I’ll have to pin you down another way.”
“You started it,” I accuse.
“Yeah, and I’ll finish it too,” he says.
I turn around to face him, laying on my side. Deep brown eyes stare back at me, with just a little bit of gold. His hair is mussed and he looks just a little bit tired still. This might be my favorite version of Miles yet.
“Hi,” I smile.
“Hey sweetheart,” he says, intertwining our hands underneath the soft quilt. My stomach does a flip. I wouldn’t mind waking up to Miles Autry calling me sweetheart every single morning.
“I bet you noticed that I’m still here,” I tease, earning a laugh.
“I did notice that. I’m pretty happy about it.”
“Oh yeah?” I run my hand up his arm until I get to his cheek. “How happy?”
He chuckles into my neck, pulling me onto him. Miles reaches up, running a hand through my wild hair. “I love you,” he breathes. He says it reverently, like a spell falling over us.
“I love you,” I whisper back. His answering smile is brighter than the sun.
“I’ve never felt like this before, but I think I’ve loved you for a while.
” I lean down, my elbows on either side of his head.
“I’m not very good at this whole relationship thing.
I’ve never really done it before. But I want to try. ”
He laughs, his chest shaking beneath me. “Katie. I’m not good at it either. I’m divorced, remember?”
“You make a good point,” I smile.
“You don’t have to be good at it. We can both learn how, together. There’s no rush. I just know I want you to be here, with me. That’s all we need to think about for now. Sound okay?”
I nod, unable to speak. It takes a lot to render me speechless, but Miles Autry seems to do it pretty often.
I fall into those deep brown eyes, drowning in him.
My fingers reach up to his cheeks, tracing the few freckles the sun has darkened into his skin.
Miles stares back at me through his lashes.
He’s not just looking at me. He’s seeing me.
It’s been a long time since I’ve let someone new this close to me.
Close enough to see past the facade of a sparkling personality and tough exterior.
Miles can see the vulnerability underneath it all.
All of my jagged edges, all of the parts of me I keep tucked away, out of sight.
I should be scared. I should be running away by now, worried that he’ll get too close and up and leave one day when he decides he doesn’t want me anymore. But all I can feel is that burning light in my chest, wanting more and more of him.
I want to be loved. I want to love him. I want to stay here forever.
Leaning up on my elbows, I smile down at him, a curtain of rust colored curls falling between us. My gaze snags on a tattoo I haven’t noticed before. Right on his left chest. It’s an outline of a mountain. It looks so familiar, I swear I’ve seen it before.
“Didn’t realize you were such a tattoo guy,” I tease.
“I wasn’t, until my divorce. Then I figured I might as well see what all the fuss is about. I always wanted them,” he replies, never taking his eyes off me.
My hands roam across his light brown skin, grazing across the dark swirls of ink. Some I’ve caught glimpses of. There’s the playing cards on fire on his forearm I see all of the time. A grove of pine trees, a longhorn skull, a deer.
“What’s the first one you got?” I ask.
He chuckles, turning over so his back is towards me.
“It’s a little cliche, but I wanted the symbol of Wyoming to be my first one.
” There on his shoulder blade sits the Bucking Horse & Rider of Wyoming, filled in with beautiful swirls of color depicting what I assume is the ranch and the Tetons behind.
“It’s where I’m from, the place my family has called home for decades.
It felt like I should honor it somehow.”
I run the tips of my fingers across the symbol. So similar to the one I saw drawn in the window a few weeks ago. Same angles, same style.
“This one is my newest. Got it just this past winter.” He continues, gesturing to a rectangle-shaped tribal tattoo on his connecting bicep. “It’s a Chibcha symbol, a Colombian tribe my ancestors belonged to. Felt right having it near my Wyoming heritage.”
“Are you sure you didn’t have any of these when we met? They look so familiar,” I say.
He smiles, “Yeah, Mac, I’m pretty sure.”
I know I’ve seen that one somewhere. Not as a tattoo though. Just the design of it. Burned into wood like a brand.
My heart drops into my stomach. All of his tattoos are familiar, because I’ve seen them all around the cabin.
First, the deer I saw out the window that turned out to be the spitting image of the one inked onto his side.
The longhorn skull across his back, the exact same as the symbol I saw in the fireplace.
The pine trees of all different shades, wrapping around his bicep.
Those were branded into a fence post. Now, the symbol I saw etched into the window sill upstairs on the night we kissed.
There’s even an outline of the tetons, complete with snow capped peaks and a small forest of trees on his muscular thigh. The exact same as I saw on the window sill downstairs.
Ever since I started seeing symbols around the cabin, I thought maybe it was some sort of code. Or, at the very least, signs of the past popping up. But they were signs of Miles. Pointing me towards him. To our future.
He opens his mouth to say something, but stops, sitting up. “Do you hear that?” he says, voice low.
We fall silent and I can just make out a shuffling noise downstairs. Miles stares towards the door, eyes wide.
“What is that? Is someone here?” I ask, knowing he won’t have an answer.
He rolls off the bed, pulling his sweatshirt back on, jumping into his jeans. “Might be some animals. Raccoons or something. I’ll go check it out.”
“I’m coming with you,” I jump up before he can stop me.
“Katie, just stay here,” he starts to protest.
“I can fight off raccoons just as well as you can, Autry.”
Miles cracks open the door slowly, creeping into the hallway. The cold hardwood floors creaking just a bit as we walk. The shuffling has stopped. In fact, there’s no noise at all. Just a smell wafting up the stairwell as we descend. It smells like–
“Did you start a fire?” Miles whispers.
“No, I was just going to ask you that.”
Yellow and orange flames erupt from the stone fireplace in the great room, warming the cabin. Embers pop and float upwards as coals glow below. It’s as if the fire has been going all night. The scent of smoky pine fills my lungs.
“I swear, that fireplace has a mind of its own,” I laugh. Miles frowns, as if he’s trying to solve a complicated math problem.
“One of us had to have started the fire last night, no one else has been here,” he says, searching the room for any clues. He makes it over to the window, pushing open the crimson curtains. Sunlight floods into the cabin.
Vibrant hues of red, purple and orange glow in the light from the garden.
The marigolds that were wilted, gray and dried up yesterday have blossomed to life overnight.
They look better than they did when I planted them this spring.
If I hadn’t seen the state of them yesterday with my own eyes, I wouldn’t believe they could have changed that quickly.
“Did you plant new flowers?” Miles asks, on the same train of thought as I am.
“No.” I walk up to the windows to get a better view of the flower garden. “They were pretty much dead yesterday. How is this possible?” I whirl back around to Miles, who is standing in the middle of the kitchen as if he’s frozen in place.
Those dark eyes burst aflame again as he starts to laugh. Before I know it, a giggle bubbles out of my throat too. We would look deranged to anyone that walked in, standing in the middle of the kitchen laughing at nothing.
“I’m sorry,” he gets out, taking a deep breath. “I just used to call this the haunted cabin when I was a kid, and now all of this…” Miles shakes his head in disbelief. “Well, who am I to say it isn’t?”
“Do you think Codie came back and did all of this? It couldn’t have been Hazel, she’s back home by now. And she’s the only one who knows I’m here.”
A smirk breaks out on Miles’s face, “Hazel knows you’re here?”
“Yeah, I kind of ran back here as fast as I could after I dropped her off. Why?”
“Does she know about me?” He sounds a little timid. Like if I give the wrong answer it would crush him.
I laugh. “If you’re asking if she knows that you exist in this world, that would be a yes since you met her and talked to her a few times.
” He cocks his head to the side, giving me a pointed look.
“If you’re asking if she knows how I feel about you, well, she knows that too.
She kind of… brought it to my attention.
I hope you’re okay with that, because it’s a little too late to take it back.
” I walk towards him, wrapping my arms around his neck.
His hands absentmindedly come to my waist, giving me a little squeeze as he pulls me closer.
The invisible string between us pulling tight.
Miles smiles down at me, nothing but soft warmth in his expression. “Of course I am. It sounds like I should thank her. I like people knowing that you’re mine.”
“Yours, huh?” I tease, swinging my hips side to side. “We’re going to get so much shit for this from Parker and Codie.”
“Good.” He leans down, pressing a kiss onto my forehead. “I’ve spent four years wishing I could call you mine, I’m not wasting another minute pretending this pull between us is nothing.”
“Wow, Miles, who knew you were such a big softie. It only took me four years and a few months to finally get you to admit you like me.”
“Love,” he grumbles.
“That too,” I giggle as his lips land on mine again. Another spark traveling up my spine.
A knock sounds at the front door, pulling us apart.
We stare at each other wide-eyed for a few moments before jumping into action.
I’m smoothing my hair down, thanking past Katie for putting on all of my clothes before coming downstairs.
Miles is straightening his plain white t-shirt, walking towards the hallway.
Miles opens the front door before I can get to it and grumbles something to whoever is on the other side.
The wooden door swings open further as I finally reach the front room, revealing none other than Walter Autry on the other side.
His blue plaid flannel shirt drooping off his shoulders, cowboy hat crooked on his head.