Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Tessa
The sun had almost completely set, and the rain had started while I was inside, making the small main street of Iron Peak even darker and more foreboding than it had been when I’d gone into the bar.
A chill races through me, and instinctively, I wrap my arms around myself.
“Cold?”
I shake my head in a lie that Holt sees right through.
“Do you have anything warmer than…” His eyes flick over me, taking in my shorts and thin cotton sweater.
Was it my imagination, or did his eyes linger on my bare legs?
“In the car.” I move toward the driver’s door of my car. “I guess I’ll follow—”
“No.” His hand shoves the door shut before I’ve hardly even opened it.
I turn to him, startled. “What are you—”
“Leave your car,” he says. “You’ll ride with me.”
“But my…” It’s not much, but my little hatchback is pretty much all I have left in the world. That, and the few duffel bags stuffed in the back.
“It won’t make it up the mountain roads,” Holt says, his voice softening when he sees my expression. “Not in this storm.”
As if the weather is listening, the wind kicks up, and the rain starts hitting harder, sharp and cold against my skin.
I know he’s right, but I hesitate anyway, my fingers tightening around my keys. Going with him feels like crossing a line I didn’t even know was there five minutes ago. I don’t even know this man.
And yet…
My dad trusts him.
That thought settles something inside me. Dad doesn’t trust easily, but he’s always spoken about his brothers like they are the only people in the world he’d trust his life with—or his daughter’s life.
“We better hurry.”
Holt’s voice snaps me from my thoughts as he moves to the back of my car. Without asking, he pops the hatch and hauls out the two bulging bags I’d only barely managed to wrestle in myself. He makes it look effortless.
I watch while he tucks them behind the seats of his truck, then turns back and offers me a hand.
I don’t hesitate this time. My fingers disappear into his, his grip warm and solid as he helps me climb up into the massive vehicle. The scent of pine clings to him, surrounding me.
It does strange things to my head.
Maybe it’s just because it’s been a long day.
Inside the cab, it’s warm and quiet compared to the storm starting to rage outside.
Holt moves quickly, and in an instant, he’s sitting next to me, starting the engine and pulling out into the street without a word.
The silence stretches as we leave my car and the town behind.
The truck is big, but the cab feels too small all the same. I’m painfully aware of how close we’re sitting.
His hands on the steering wheel are strong and steady, the hands of a working man. Everything about him feels substantial. Like he’s been carved from the very mountains we’re surrounded by.
My gaze drifts over to his thick, denim-clad thighs, taking up so much space. His eyes are on the road, so he doesn’t notice me looking.
This is not the man I met as a child all those years ago. The man who starred as my teenage crush for so many years.
That version of Holt had been safely distant. A perfect fantasy I’d shaped in my mind over the years after one inconsequential visit to my dad when I was only twelve years old. And far too impressionable.
But this man sitting next to me doesn’t feel safe at all.
This man is very real.
I steal another glance at him and the sharp line of his jaw, the way his brow furrows slightly as he navigates the rough road. He looks like a man who knows exactly who he is. And doesn’t apologize for it.
And that’s exactly what he is.
A man.
The thought makes my stomach flutter.
I shift in my seat, suddenly very aware of my body and the way it’s reacting to him.
Holt clears his throat. “Road’s going to get worse. Fast,” he says. “You picked one hell of a day to come out to the mountains.”
It feels almost like a question, but just like my dad, he doesn’t actually ask why I’m there, so I don’t offer up an explanation.
Instead, I simply say, “I guess I didn’t think to check the weather before I came.”
He grunts, and I can almost hear him thinking, rookie mistake.
“How far out is my dad’s place?”
For the first time, he looks at me, sparing me only the briefest glance before focusing on the road again.
“I’m not taking you to Luke’s place,” he says through gritted teeth. “You’re coming home with me.”
Holt
The silence in the truck stretches too long.
It’s not awkward. Not exactly. It’s worse than that.
It’s heavy and loaded with everything I’m trying not to think about.
The storm has kicked up in earnest now. Rain is hammering against the windshield, the roads quickly turning to mud and slick beneath my tires. Despite my urgency to get home and out of the confined space with Tessa, I slow down in an effort to navigate the truck safely.
She’s sitting too close.
And she’s way too much of a woman for the memory I’ve been carrying around for years.
Luke’s kid is just that. A kid.
Only, she’s not. Not anymore.
“You can just take me to my dad’s,” she says. “I’ll be—”
“No.” I don’t mean it to come out so gruff, and I clear my throat and try again. “Luke’s place is too far up the mountain. With this storm, the creeks will spill and close the road. We’ll be lucky to make it to my place in time.”
“Oh.”
She doesn’t say anything else, so I add, “Just for a day or two. Then I’ll take you up there.”
“Okay.” She nods and turns to look out the window.
After a few more minutes of silence, I clear my throat. “You didn’t tell your dad you were coming.”
She shifts in her seat. “It was kind of a last-minute decision.”
That tracks. Luke never would have left the mountain if his daughter were coming. For the first time ever.
I want to ask why now? Why visit her father after all these years of staying away? But it doesn’t feel like my place to say anything.
Instead, I focus on the drive and let the silence build again.
“I would have been fine, you know?” She breaks the quiet, surprising me with the thread of strength in her voice.
“Fine?” I glance at her. “At the bar, you mean?”
She nods, and I chuckle.
“I would have,” she says quickly. “I could have handled myself. I’m used to that kind of thing.”
I glance at her, just long enough to see the confident set of her jaw. It’s easy to see how stubborn and fiery she could be.
“There’s no way you’re used to that kind of thing, doll. There’s nothing quite like a group of feral mountain men in the middle of nowhere with fresh meat.”
She frowns and opens her mouth to protest again, but I stop her.
“I have no doubt you can hold your own,” I say. “But those men aren’t to be trifled with.” I’m not lecturing. Just stating a fact.
She rolls her eyes, unwilling to concede.
Brat.
“I wasn’t scared.”
It’s a lie. Either that, or she’s too naive to see the difference. Either way, I let it go.
“Why are you here, Tessa?” I ask instead, giving in to my need to know. “Aren’t you in college?”
She hesitates, just a beat too long.
“Between semesters.”
“Between semesters,” I repeat. “You’re in what… your third year?”
“Fourth.” She shrugs. “Technically.”
“That makes you…twenty-four?”
“Twenty-six,” she corrects. “I took a few gap years to work first.”
Either way. Young.
And yet… not.
She’s an adult. I can see that with my own two eyes.
Still.
And there’s something about her answer that’s not sitting right with me. I don’t know much about college, but I do know that March isn’t between semesters.
She’s leaving something out.
I don’t push. It’s not my place to pry.
“I just needed to see my dad,” she continues. “It’s been too long and… well, I think I just needed a little connection.”
Connection.
Something about the word hits oddly.
The storm worsens as we climb higher on the mountain. Spring storms in the mountains can be brutal, and it looks as if this one is no exception. I was right not to take Tessa up to Luke’s cabin. It’s even farther up, the road even rougher. We wouldn’t make it.
Besides, I can’t in good conscience leave her alone in the middle of the woods during a storm.
At least that’s what I tell myself.
For now.
The truth is, the longer she sits beside me, the more I want her there. Within reach. Where I can see her and keep her safe.
None of that should make me feel any kind of way. But I don’t examine that too closely. Not yet.
Right now, I need to focus on getting her safely to the house.
My hands tighten their grip on the wheel. It’s dark now, the mud getting deeper in sections, and right where I was worried it would be, a washout.
“Fuck,” I mutter under my breath, but she hears.
“What’s… oh.”
She sees the stream that’s crested the banks and flows over the road. “Can we get across?”
I nod, tensing my jaw, and put the truck into four-wheel drive. “Hold on. It’ll be a bit wild.”
Tessa braces herself on the dash as I navigate the truck through what could easily become an impassable river within the hour. The rear tire catches and pulls to the side, trying to pull the truck over, but I’m ready for it, and with a quick maneuver, I guide the truck up and over the side.
“You weren’t kidding when you said the road would get bad.” Next to me, Tessa shakes her head, but she doesn’t remove her grip on the dash.
“It’s just going to get worse,” I tell her. “But we’re almost there.”
By the time my cabin comes into view, the trees are swaying in the wind, the rain coming down in sheets, making visibility almost nonexistent.
I pull up as close as I can to the porch and kill the engine. “I’ll grab your bags, just get up to the porch as—” I stop when I look down and see the little white runners on her feet. “You’ll sink,” I tell her, changing my mind. “Wait there. I’ll help you.”
She hesitates for half a second, then nods and stays put while I grab her bags, depositing them on the porch before going back for her. The rain has already soaked through my shirt by the time I open her door.
“Okay,” I say, “arms around my neck.”
Her eyes widen. “I can—”
“I’m sure you can,” I interrupt. “But you won’t.”
Remarkably, she listens and leans toward me.
I lift her easily, the weight of her settling into my arms, warm and solid. She’s lighter than expected. Softer, too. And she smells fucking good. Like strawberries, of all goddamn things.
Her hands tighten at the back of my neck as the wind gusts over us. Instinctively, she snuggles into my chest, and for one dangerous second, all I can think about is how easily I could keep her right here in my arms.
I don’t.
Instead, I move fast. My boots sink into the mud as I carry her toward the house and up the stairs to the covered porch, doing my best to shield her from the worst of the rain.
I set her down gently, my hands lingering for a beat too long at her waist before I step back, putting some much-needed distance between us.
Tessa looks up at me like she wants to say something, but I don’t give her the chance.
I reach past her and open the door to the cabin.
I wait for her to step inside, grab her bags, and follow her in.
The cabin is warm and quiet. The faint scent of pine that follows me everywhere mingles with the smell of my coffee from earlier.
“Make yourself at home,” I tell her, already turning toward the kitchen. “This storm’s not going anywhere for a while, and judging by the state of that road, neither are we.”