Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
PAIGE
Two days since he kissed me on his kitchen table, and I still can't pour coffee without my hands remembering his jaw under my fingers.
Serenity knows. She keeps side-eyeing me at the rail while I tighten the girth, and horses don't side-eye unless they have opinions.
"Don't start with me."
She flaps her lips. Gums fully out. Opinion delivered.
The saddlebag's got the thermos, two sandwiches, and a manila folder of flight printouts Gabe left in my ranch box this morning with a sticky note that said Madison booked these.
Don't argue. Madison Moore, the woman who runs everyone's life from a law office in Portland, has apparently decided that Wild Peak's recluse lumberjack and his ranch hand are flying to Texas on Thursday.
That's two days from now. Two days to figure out how to pretend to be in love with a man I'm actually falling for.
Not falling. Fell. Past tense. Happened somewhere between the coffee and the stirrup, and I missed the moment entirely because I was too busy watching him close his eyes after every tree.
Mama called last night. I made the mistake of telling her I was going out of state with someone. She went quiet for six seconds, which is her version of a five-alarm fire.
"Boy or girl?"
"Boy, Mama."
"How old?"
"Forty."
Seven seconds of silence that time.
"Paige Adulsa."
"I know."
"Does he treat you right?"
"He fixed my stirrup in the rain without telling me he did it."
She went quiet again, but different this time. Softer.
"Bring him for dinner when you're back. I'll make the good chili."
That's Mama's version of a blessing. You don't get the good chili unless she's decided you're worth feeding.
The trail up to his cabin is dry today, ruts baked hard from three days of sun. Serenity knows the way now, which should concern me but doesn't. She turns at the fork without being asked, picks the high side of the creek crossing, and walks the last stretch through the firs like she's coming home.
His truck's there. The mill's running. I hear the blade whining before I see him, and when I come through the last stand of cedar, he's at the deck in a white T-shirt gone translucent with sweat, feeding a log through the carriage with both hands.
I stop Serenity. Sit there.
The muscles in his back move under that wet cotton.
His forearms flex against the log. Sawdust sticks to the sweat on his neck, his beard, the dark hair curling at his collar.
He works the way he does everything. Deliberate.
Sure. Like his body's been doing this so long his mind's free to go wherever it pleases.
My thighs tighten against the saddle. Serenity shifts underneath me.
"I know," I mutter. "Hush."
He kills the blade. Turns. Sees me.
Something happens to his face when he sees me now. Since the kiss. The wall's still there, but there's a door in it, and it opens a crack when I ride up, and the man behind it looks at me like I'm cold water on a hot day.
"Hey." Wiping his hands on his jeans. Walking toward me.
"Hey yourself." I hold up the folder. "Madison booked flights. We leave Thursday morning out of Portland. Gabe's driving us to the airport."
"Gabe doesn't need to—"
"Gabe doesn't need to do anything. Gabe wants to. Quit arguing with people who are trying to help you, Harrison."
That almost-smile in his beard. The one I've been collecting since week one.
I dismount. Hand him the folder. Our fingers touch on the paper. Neither of us lets go for a beat too long.
"Sandwiches are in the bag. Turkey and swiss, before you ask." I tie Serenity. "Also brought the thermos, because I know for a fact your coffee is still terrible and I refuse to let you suffer."
"My coffee's fine."
"Your coffee is a war crime, Aiden."
He opens the folder. Reads. His brows pull together at the flight times, the hotel confirmation, the return date. Madison's booked us four days.
"One room?" he asks.
My face goes hot. "We're supposed to be together. Separate rooms would—"
"I'll take the floor."
"You will not take the floor."
"Paige."
"Aiden." I cross my arms. "We're going to your dying mama's bedside pretending to be a couple. If you think I'm letting you sleep on a hotel floor while I take the bed, you don't know me at all."
He looks up from the papers. The sun's behind me, catching his eyes, turning that dark brown almost amber at the edges. I've never seen them do that before.
"I know you," he says. Low. Simple.
My arms uncross. My body makes that decision without consulting my brain.
"Lunch," I manage. "Eat."
We sit on his porch steps with the sandwiches. Same as before. Except now his knee touches mine and neither of us moves away from it. His thigh is warm through his jeans. Solid. I keep my eyes on my sandwich and try to eat like a normal person.
"We need a story," I say between bites. "For your family. How we met. How long we've been together."
"Truth works. You're a ranch hand. I'm the contractor. Leave out the part where you showed up uninvited with a thermos."
"That's the best part."
"That's the most annoying part."
"Same thing." I bump his shoulder. He lets me. His body lists toward mine a fraction. "What about timeline? How long have we been together?"
"Keep it simple. Few months."
"And when they ask if you're happy?"
He goes quiet. Looks out at the firs.
"I'll tell 'em the truth," he says.
The sandwich blurs. I blink hard, swallow, look at the trees.
We don't talk for a few minutes. Just eat. His hand finds mine between us on the step, threads his fingers through, holds on. Sawdust on his skin, rough against my palm. My thumb traces the scar across his knuckle from the fence wire.
"You called Delaney?" I ask.
"This morning. Told her I'm coming Thursday. Told her I'm bringing someone." He squeezes my hand. "She wasn't pleased."
"I bet."
"She wanted to know how long."
"What'd you tell her?"
"That it was none of her business." His mouth does something that's close to a grin. "She hung up on me."
"Delaney Harrison hung up on you?"
"First time in twelve years she's had anything to hang up on."
I laugh. He watches me laugh with that look. The door-in-the-wall look.
"Paige."
"Hm?"
"Come inside."
My heart moves into my throat.
He stands. Pulls me up by our joined hands. Holds the screen door open.
The cabin's dark after the bright porch. Cool. The stove's cold. On the table, the walnut bowl is sitting right side up, and there's a finished spoon beside it that wasn't there two days ago. New handle. No crack.
"You made another one," I say.
"Couldn't sleep."
"Four in the morning?"
"Three, this time." He's behind me. Close. "Kept thinking about Thursday."
"What about it?"
"About sharing a room with you. About lying next to you in the dark knowing I've got no right to touch you but wanting to so bad my hands can't hold still on a piece of wood."
Everything in my body goes warm at once. I turn around.
He's right there. Sawdust in his beard. Those amber-brown eyes looking down at me with twelve years of hunger he's only just started letting himself feel.
"You've got every right," I tell him.
"Paige."
"Aiden." I put my hand flat on his chest. His heart's slamming. "You've got every right. I'm giving it to you. I gave it to you in that gravel yard. I gave it to you on this porch in the rain. I've been giving it to you every morning with a cup of coffee you never asked for."
His hand comes up. Wraps around mine on his chest.
"Twelve years," he says. "I haven't been with anyone in twelve years."
"I don't care."
"You should."
"I really, really don't."
I pull my hand free. Grab his shirt at the hem. Drag it up. He lets me take it over his head, arms lifting, and I toss it somewhere behind me without looking.
Sweet mercy.
Broad. Thick through the chest, dark hair tapering down his stomach, muscles earned from years of labor. Scars. A faded one across his ribs. Another on his shoulder from the widow-maker. Sawdust caught in the hair on his chest.
My hands go to his stomach. I feel every muscle tighten under my palms as I slide them up, over the hair, the warm skin, the heartbeat that's gone completely haywire.
"Your turn," he says. Rough. Barely holding.
I pull my shirt over my head. Simple cotton bra. Nothing fancy. His eyes drop to it and his jaw works, and there's a sound in his throat he doesn't quite let out.
"Come here," he says.
He doesn't wait. His hands cup my face, mouth coming down on mine, and this isn't the kitchen-table kiss.
This is twelve years of loneliness breaking open.
His tongue slides past my lips and I grip his shoulders, pulling myself up, pressing my breasts against his bare chest. His groan vibrates through both of us.
My bra clasp comes undone with one hand. Practiced or lucky, I don't care which. The straps slide down my arms and his hands replace them, palms covering me, rough thumbs dragging across my nipples.
"Fuck." My head drops back. He takes the invitation, mouth going to my throat. "Aiden."
"Tell me where."
"Bed."
He lifts me. Both hands under my thighs, hiking me up, my legs wrapping his waist. My back hits the loft ladder and he pins me there, grinding into me, hard enough through his jeans I feel exactly what twelve years of wanting does to a man.
The friction against my clit through denim makes me whimper.
"Bed," I repeat. "Now. Unless you're planning to fuck me against a ladder."
"Thought about it." He carries me up the loft stairs, one arm under my ass, one gripping the rail, like I weigh nothing. I'm biting his neck and I feel the rumble of his laugh against my teeth.
The loft bed's made tight. Military corners. I'm on my back before I can appreciate the irony, and he's standing at the edge, unbuckling his belt.
I undo my jeans. Shimmy them down, kick them off the edge. He watches every inch of skin that comes into view with an intensity that makes my toes curl.
"Get down here," I tell him.
His jeans drop. Boxer briefs. The outline of his cock straining against the cotton makes my breath stutter. He shoves them down, steps out, and he's built the way the rest of him is. Thick. Unforgiving.
He comes down over me, one knee between my thighs, forearm braced by my head, and his cock drags hot and heavy against my inner thigh.
"Twelve years," I whisper, cupping his face. "I've got you."
His forehead drops to mine. Breathing hard. Then his hand slides down my stomach, past my navel, into my underwear, and two rough fingers press flat against my clit.
My hips jolt off the bed.
"Soaked," he says against my mouth. "Christ, Paige."
He strokes. Slow, deliberate circles, reading my body the way he reads a tree. Finding the rhythm that makes me gasp, adjusting when I arch, pressing harder when my thighs clamp around his wrist.
"Aiden. Please."
His fingers slide down. Push inside me. Two, thick, curling up, and my spine bows off the mattress. His thumb stays on my clit while he works me, and the sounds coming out of my mouth aren't words anymore.
"That's it." Low. In my ear. "Let me hear you."
I come around his fingers with my fist in the sheets and his name broken apart in my throat. He doesn't stop. Keeps stroking through the aftershocks until my hand grabs his wrist.
"Condom," I pant. "Please tell me you have—"
"Wallet. Jeans."
"You carry condoms in the woods?"
"Bought 'em two days ago. Right after you left this cabin."
I laugh, breathless, and it turns into a moan when he pulls his fingers out and puts them in his mouth. Those dark eyes on mine while he tastes me.
"Lord have mercy," I whisper.
He retrieves the condom. Rolls it on. Comes back over me.
The first press of him at my entrance makes us both go still. He's big. I'm ready but I still feel every inch as he pushes forward, slow, watching my face.
"Okay?" he asks.
"Don't stop."
He doesn't stop. Slides in to the hilt, fills me completely, and the stretch burns so good my nails dig into his back. His head drops to the crook of my neck. The sound he makes there is raw. Broken open.
"Move," I tell him, wrapping my legs around his hips.
He moves.
Slow at first. Deep, grinding strokes that hit something inside me that makes my vision blur. Then faster, hips snapping, the bed frame protesting underneath us, and I'm meeting every thrust, pulling him deeper with my heels.
"Harder."
He braces both hands on the headboard. Drives into me. The angle changes, hitting my clit with every stroke, and the pressure builds so fast I can't breathe.
"Paige." Ragged. "Look at me."
My eyes find his. Dark, blown, stripped of every wall he's ever built. He's right there. No hiding. No pulling back. Right there.
"I see you," I tell him.
He breaks.
I come a second time with him buried deep, his face pressed to my neck, his whole body shaking, and I hold him through it with both arms locked around his back, feeling every pulse, every breath, every sound he makes against my skin.
We stay tangled. Neither of us moves. The loft's gone golden with sunset through the small window, and his weight on me is heavy, real, grounding me to this bed in this cabin on this mountain.
"Aiden."
"Hm." Muffled against my collarbone.
"Did you just—"
"Yeah."
"Was that—"
"Yeah."
I run my fingers through his damp hair. My chest is full. Dangerously full.
"Three in the morning," I say. "You carved me a spoon at three in the morning."
He lifts his head. Looks at me. And there it is. The smile. The full one. The one nobody on this ranch has ever seen because he's been saving it, apparently, for a twenty-nine-year-old cowgirl with a thermos and no sense of self-preservation.
"Carved you two," he says. "Broke the first one."
I kiss him. He rolls onto his back, pulling me on top, arms around my waist, and I press my face into his chest and breathe.
"Thursday," I say into his skin.
"Thursday."
"We'll be fine."
"We'll be fine."
I don't know if that's true. But lying on his chest in a loft that smells like cedar shavings, listening to a heartbeat that's finally slowed down to something steady, I believe it.
That's enough for now.