Chapter 10 - Camila
CAMILA
Iwake up and know instantly that he’s not in bed with me. I open my eyes and blink, taking in the room. Sparsely decorated but tidy. Neat. I smile as I breathe in the pillow beneath my head.
It smells like him.
The whole room does.
I sit up and press my legs together. My entire body is sore, but in the best of ways. Like it’s been thoroughly loved and worshiped. Love. He’s been so open about saying that to me, and yet I’m the one who hasn’t said it back yet. Not that I don’t feel it. I do.
I love him.
I love him without a doubt.
I’m just scared. Falling in love with him is dangerous and crazy, especially with how fast everything seems to be happening. It’s a whirlwind, and I know if my mom were alive, she would hug me and tell me to go for it. She was a hopeless romantic through and through.
I get out of bed, grabbing one of his plaid flannels and covering my body.
I love how it fits me. I use the bathroom and wash my hands after doing my business then go search for him.
He’s in the kitchen looking out toward his backyard, and I take a moment to appreciate the view that is Reed Woodman.
His hair is slightly damp. He must’ve showered without me, and I wonder if I can talk him into a second one.
He’s shirtless in nothing but his dark gray sweatpants that mold to his ass incredibly.
The back muscles make my hands ache to rub his skin and massage away whatever stresses he might have that make him so incredibly serious.
As if sensing me, he turns, and his eyes move down my body and back up until his stare locks with mine.
“Like what you see?” his voice rumbles, and I wag my brows as I approach him.
I love this, too. This easy way we seem to be around one another now that we’ve crossed this line.
He puts his mug down before I close in and wraps his long powerful and warm arms around me, enveloping me in a bear hug.
I squeeze back and love the way he kisses the top of my head before he pulls back.
I’ve never done this.
Spent the night with a man, and especially never been with a man as intense as Reed, but I find myself loving this first is with him. It means something. There is an intimacy in the moment as we stand in the kitchen early in the morning.
“How did you sleep, Cami girl?” he asks atop my head.
I pull back to look up at him with a bright smile.
I’m energized in a way I’m not sure I have ever felt, or at least I haven’t felt since my mom passed.
Like I am ready to attack the day and am looking forward to any and every surprise and curveball life could possibly throw at me today.
Which might be a lot since I need to catch up on the work I didn’t do the day before.
“Great, your mattress is amazing.” I sigh, reaching for his coffee and taking a sip. It’s black with a hint of sweetness.
“Are you stealing my elixir of life?” He makes a dramatically serious face, but I can see the smile trying to sneak through.
“Yes.” I grin up at him and take another healthy sip before handing it to him. I love the way he drinks from the spot where my lips touched the mug and how he puts it down and picks me up.
“Reed, I’m too heavy.”
“Nonsense,” he grunts as he walks us to his backyard and stops in front of an oversized chair that’s all cushioned up. “Shit,” he curses, and I frown.
“What is it?” I ask as he sets me down and smiles at me.
“Be right back!” He winks, kissing the tip of my nose.
He’s back before I know it, with a blanket in his hands. He sits and makes me sit on his lap. We’re all cuddled and bundled up. It’s cozy and surreal.
“This is nice,” I note. He just nods, his eyes on my mouth. We cuddle there as the sun starts to rise and the day awakens. It’s a while until he finally speaks, and when he does, he takes me completely by surprise.
“You need to sell your place.” My first instinct is to laugh, but there is something in the tone of his voice that makes me hesitate.
“You’re crazy,” I mumble. He picks me up like I weigh nothing and makes me straddle his lap so I can look at his face.
He’s serious.
Dead serious. Something about that makes my belly flip and my heart squeeze. But it also has my common sense waving huge red flags.
“I’m crazy about you,” he answers, and I smile gently before cupping his face. His beard is soft and well trimmed.
“You’re sweet, baby,” I whisper, “but where would I live if I sold my place?” I ask, not really sure why I’m indulging in his insanity.
“Here,” he answers immediately, and I worry my lower lip. But not for long when his hand comes up and makes me stop biting it.
“I was standing in the kitchen, looking out here trying to think of a way I could trick you into staying again tonight. The thought of not waking up next to you makes it hard to breathe. Literally. My lungs…” He sounds a little exasperated, and I relax a bit, hoping it will help him do the same.
“You don’t have to trick me into staying again tonight. I love sleeping with you,” I share, but it doesn’t seem to ease whatever is bothering him.
“But what about the day after that? And the day after that? I want your shit here. Mixed in with mine. I want to walk in and have this place look like it’s being lived in, instead of some kind of show room.”
“Big guy, I have a feeling you would hate the mess I come with,” I try to joke, to lighten the heavy mood he seems to be in, but I know it falls on deaf ears when he keeps talking.
“I love you—"
“Reed—”
“I do. And I know this fast. Fuck, it’s warp speed!
But you gotta know something about me, sunshine.
I’m not the kind of man who does anything rash.
I listen to my gut because time after time, it’s proven itself.
Shit, it’s saved my neck more than once when I was in the military.
So, when you’re a man my age, staring forty in the eye, and your heart starts to beat for the first time, really starts to beat, you don’t want to go slow. ”
“Wow.” He just said that. He just said I made his heartbeat for the first time. My nose starts to sting. I knew he wanted me, but this is on a whole other level. One I didn’t even let myself wish for.
This is on the best level.
He wants me to belong to him, and I want him to belong to me. I should say this, but I let him keep talking, because I have a feeling he doesn’t talk about his emotions all that much.
“Camila, I wanna wake up every morning with you, without having to go from house to house. My place is bigger and renovated. I got my workshop in the back. But if you love your place and your heart is set on staying there, that’s fine.
We can build something back there for my work and—" I place my fingers over his lips because I don’t need to hear any more.
I just can’t with this man.
This beautiful slightly grumpy mountain man has stolen my heart a thousand times over, and he has been in my life for less than a season. But I don’t care.
“Can I suggest something that’s not so… rash?
” I ask softly but still feel his body go rigid below me.
Like he’s bracing for bad news or something.
“Breathe, big guy.” I smile. “Can we not sell my place?” His expression turns dark, but instead of it scaring me, I laugh. “Not yet, at least,” I concede.
“Why?”
“Honey, Reed, we’re new. Like, seriously new. This is …what do they call it? A honeymoon phase. I know myself. I’m a mess, and I don’t mean that in a funny way. I’m disorganized but know exactly where things are in the chaos.”
“I don’t care,” he clips, and I relax into him. My hands in his hair I play with the ends of his hair.
“But you might. We don’t know. And honestly…
if it doesn’t, I don’t want to be left looking around, wondering where I’m going to…
hang my hat, so to speak. I don’t have family I can just crash with.
Stella would let me stay with her, but that’s not the point.
I just… I want to be smart about this.” His jaw clenches, and my hands move immediately to smooth it out.
“Please understand,” I plead with him, and it isn’t until his eyes soften, turning a little warmer, that I breathe again.
“Fine. I don’t like it, but I get it. Sorta.”
“Sorta?”
“You saying you have no family is BS. I’m your family.
And I come with two asshole brothers, a crazy-as-hell sister, and a meddling mom.
What’s mine is yours. So, you got family,” he mutters.
Those words mean more to me than he can imagine.
“But I get it,” he mumbles. “You need time. You don’t wanna get rid of it, fine. But under one condition.”
“What’s that?”
“You move in today.”
“Today?” I gasp and giggle. But that dies down quickly when I see he’s serious.
“That’s insane. How? I have to work, and you do, too. How will—"
“I can call my brother Eli, and my buddy Brandon is always game to help. Half your shit is still in boxes, anyway. It won’t be hard,” he cuts me off and shrugs like it’s no big deal. And that’s when reality does a double whammy.
“Oh my god!” I bury my face in the crook of his neck, and he pulls back so he can look at me
“What?” he asks, like what we’re planning is completely normal.
“Big guy, I haven’t even met your family, and I’m moving in! Do you know how crazy that is?”
“Extremely,” he answers without blinking. At least I know he sees it. “But I also know it’s the one thing that makes the most sense to me. Don’t you?”
“I do,” I admit because there is no way I could lie to him. “Okay. Fine. Let’s move me in today.”
“Thank fuck,” he growls before his lips fall on mine. We don’t move from that spot for the next couple of hours. He’s very thorough with how he’s showing me how much he likes the idea of me living with him.
But even with the late start, by the time the sun sets, thanks to the help of his brother Eli and his buddy Brandon, I’m all moved in.