19. Nash
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Nash
The first thing I notice when I wake up is that the house is too quiet.
Gray light spills through the bedroom window upstairs, the same guest room we collapsed into after leaving the office sometime past midnight.
The second thing I notice is that I’m warm.
Which should not be possible, because Juniper House is the kind of place that feels it was built to punish human comfort. Drafty windows. Old bones. The sort of “historic charm” people romanticize right up until they can’t feel their toes.
So much so that neither of us thought it was a good idea to stay last night in the ice-cold. But by the time we were done, it was just too damn dark.
And maybe, a little bit of us, did want to stay.
Because now…
I’m warm because there’s a body pressed against mine.
As real as the ache in my chest and the slow, even rise of her breath against my shoulder.
Her hair is loose, not braided, which is unusual. Tessa always seems to be one neat tug away from winning a courtroom battle. Right now, she clearly slept hard, deep, and didn’t spend a single second planning for it.
Then her eyelids flutter, and she shifts, trying to burrow deeper into warmth.
And I feel it in my ribs. That stupid, terrifying tug.
The part of me that wants to pull her closer and pretend this is normal. Pretend this is ours. Pretend this didn’t start as a lie I blurted out in a council meeting. The reckless idiot I am, making all of this an act.
Tessa’s brow tightens in her sleep, and she makes a small sound. Annoyed, even unconscious, which honestly feels on brand.
I hold my breath and stay still.
Because if she wakes up and remembers everything at once…
Juniper House. The journal. The map. Our families’ signatures side by side. A promise someone let rot.
And us.
I don’t think there’s enough coffee in Oregon to save me from that moment.
She blinks awake slowly, eyes unfocused at first.
Then she looks up.
Right at me.
Her gaze sharpens, a blade being drawn.
We stare at each other for a beat, both of us silent, both of us probably thinking the same thing:
Now what?
Then Tessa shifts back an inch, and the warmth between us breaks a spell.
“Good morning,” I say automatically, because I’m a moron and my mouth keeps trying to make things normal.
Tessa’s expression is closed off. “Is it?”
I swallow. “Okay. Fair.”
She pushes herself upright, hair falling over one shoulder, eyes scanning the room as if she expects to find a witness. She expects Juniper House itself to accuse her.
There’s a sweater on the floor. My shirt draped over a chair.
And then I see it.
Through the window.
I sit up too fast, shoulder bumping hers.
Tessa glares. “What?”
I stare at the glass.
Snow clings to the outside, packed tight. The world beyond is nothing but a white blur.
My stomach drops.
“That…” I say disbelievingly. “That wasn’t there last night.”
Tessa looks, and the second she sees it, her whole posture changes. “Oh, shit.”
I swing my legs over the side of the bed and stand, the cold floor biting my feet. I cross the room and yank the curtain aside.
It’s as if someone erased the road.
Snow drifts are stacked up against the porch railing. The truck is half covered, a rounded shape in the yard, trying to disappear.
And the sky isn’t sky.
It’s a low, heavy sheet of gray, pressing down hard.
I stare for a long beat, trying to make my brain accept it.
Then I hear Tessa behind me.
“No,” she says flatly.
I turn. “No?”
“No,” she repeats, throwing on her leggings. “This is not happening.”
I huff a short laugh, half panic, half disbelief. “Tessa, I don’t think the storm asked permission.”
She shoots me a look that could cut steel. “This is your fault.”
I blink. “My—”
“You brought me here,” she snaps.
“You dragged me here.”
“I did not drag…” she starts, then stops, then pivots. The technicality doesn’t matter because rage is easier than fear. “If you had kept your mouth shut at that meeting—”
“If I had kept my mouth shut,” I interrupt, “I wouldn’t be engaged to you, and none of this would’ve happened.”
Tessa freezes.
So do I.
Because that came out wrong. It came out as an accusation, when what I meant, what I actually meant, is that my life went off the rails the second I tried to impress a council that never took me seriously.
But Tessa Long doesn’t hear subtext when she’s angry. She hears weapons.
“Do not put this on me.”
“I’m not,” I say quickly. “I’m just saying—”
“You’re always just saying,” she bites back. “That’s your favorite thing. You say something reckless, and then you smile and hope it lands like charm instead of shrapnel.”
I swallow hard. “Okay. That’s fair too.”
Tessa yanks her sweater on, hands shaking slightly as she shoves her arms into the sleeves. She acts as if she doesn’t notice. But her body is betraying her.
Mine is betraying me too, for the record.
I still feel her warmth running right through me.
I turn back to the window, force myself to focus on the actual problem.
We’re snowed in.
The truck is buried. The drive is gone.
I try to spot Old Mill Road extension.
There’s nothing but white.
“Okay,” I say, more to myself than her. “We just… we wait it out.”
Tessa lets out a sharp laugh, humorless. “Wait it out.”
“What do you want me to do?” I snap. “Yell at the sky?”
She storms past me toward the hallway. “We need to leave.”
“Right now?” I call after her. “Through what, Tessa? The wall of snow?”
She doesn’t answer.
That’s how I know she’s spiraling.
Tessa doesn’t spiral the way I do. Loudly, chaotically, with dramatic internal monologues and hand gestures. She spirals quietly, a machine tightening bolts, until something snaps.
I follow her downstairs, tugging my boots on as I go, shirt half buttoned, because apparently I enjoy suffering.
Tessa heads straight for the front door.
She yanks it open.
A blast of cold air slaps into the house so hard it feels personal. Snow swirls onto the porch, sharp and stinging. The drift at the foot of the steps is almost knee high.
Tessa stands there, staring, trying to intimidate nature into backing down.
I step up beside her. “Okay. So. Option A: we become snowmen.”
She doesn’t laugh.
Her jaw is clenched tight enough to crack a molar.
“This is ridiculous,” she says, shaking with fury. “No one said there was a storm.”
“No one said there was a storm because it wasn’t on the forecast,” I shoot back, then immediately regret it because that sounds defensive instead of the fact that we’re both trapped in a frozen nightmare house that contains our families’ worst secret.
Tessa slams the door shut and storms toward the kitchen.
I follow again because leaving her alone right now is a bad idea.
The kitchen is cold. The old radiator in the corner ticks and pops, trying its best but resenting it. The pipes, as Tess flicks on the faucet, groan before the tap finally coughs out cold water.
Tessa grabs her phone off the counter where we left everything last night.
She taps the screen.
Her eyes narrow.
Then she taps again.
“No.”
I pull mine out. Check it.
Nothing.
No signal.
Not even the sad little one bar lie.
“We’re in a dead zone,” I say.
Tessa’s gaze snaps to mine. “Of course we are.”
“That’s not—” I start.
“It’s always something with you,” she barks. “Always another mess. Another plan. Another risk.”
My throat tightens because there it is.
Tessa Long thinks I’m the kind of man who creates a mess and expects other people to clean it up.
And I can’t even blame her, because I have spent my whole life pretending the mess doesn’t scare me.
I rub a hand over my face.
“Okay,” I say slowly. “What do you want me to do right now?”
She whips around. “I want you to take this seriously.”
I stare at her. “I am taking it seriously.”
“No,” she snaps. “You’re doing that thing where you act calm so everyone else has to be calm too. Like your confidence is supposed to make the problem disappear.”
My jaw tightens. “Maybe I’m acting calm because if I stop, I’m going to lose my mind.”
That shuts her up for half a second.
She crosses her arms. “So lose it.”
I blink. “What?”
“Lose it,” she repeats, stepping closer. “Stop trying to be the fun one who shrugs off consequences. Stop trying to pretend this is fine.”
My throat throbs, anger flaring because fear is already in there, and anger is easier to hold.
“You think I’m pretending?” I snap back. “You think I’m not aware we’re trapped in your family’s haunted winter house with a map that might blow up my whole ranch?”
I immediately regret that phrasing because her expression goes colder.
“That came out wrong.”
“Oh, it came out honest,” she bites back. “That’s the difference.”
I step closer too, because apparently we both love making bad decisions in small kitchens.
“You want honesty?” I say. “Fine. Here’s honesty. I have no idea what I’m doing.”
Tessa’s brows knit. “What?”
“I don’t,” I repeat, sharper now because it’s spilling out faster than I can stop it. “I’m making it up as I go. I’m trying to build something for my family, and I keep hitting walls because everyone thinks I’m still the kid who jokes his way through life.”
“You—”
“And maybe I am,” I cut in, too fired up now to stop. “Maybe I do smile too much. Maybe I do talk too much. But that doesn’t mean I don’t care.”
Her jaw clenches. “Then stop proving my point.”
“What point?” I snap.
“That you can’t handle pressure without turning it into spectacle,” she throws back.
The words hit hard.
Spectacle.
Fake engagement.
Town gossip.
My stupid mouth in the council meeting.
I feel heat rush up my neck, shame burning.
“You think I wanted that?” I demand. “You think I enjoyed standing there and lying because I panicked?”
“You did it anyway.”
“Yeah,” I say, breaking around the edges. “I did. Because for once I wanted them to look at me like I wasn’t a joke.”
Silence drops.
Tessa’s breathing is sharp, controlled. Her eyes are fixed on mine, trying to decide if she believes me.
And I don’t know why her belief matters so much, but it does.
“I don’t have time for this,” she says finally, turning away.