Chapter 6
WYATT
One Month Later
Her coffee mug haunts the kitchen counter. Unwashed. Untouched. Exactly where she left it thirty-one days ago, some kind of stain on the rim preserving the last physical trace of her presence.
The cabin feels wrong without her—too large, too empty, too silent. Like a body missing its heart, the spaces echo with absence instead of her laughter. Even the cats sense it, prowling restlessly through rooms that once vibrated with her presence.
Cain and Abel, usually at each other's throats, now move like ghosts themselves, occasionally pausing to stare expectantly at the door before resuming their uneasy circuits. They wind around my ankles more frequently now, purring with an urgency that feels like questions I can't answer.
Outside, summer edges toward fall, leaves beginning their inevitable surrender.
Thorne Range shifts colors almost imperceptibly each day—green deepening to gold at the edges, a warning of the cold to come. The mountains stand indifferent to my loss, their jagged peaks piercing the sky just as they always have.
Inside, nothing changes. Nothing moves forward.
The rangers came by after she left, faces drawn with awkward sympathy. Their trucks announced their arrival long before their boots hit my porch steps—an intrusion I would normally resent but somehow welcomed in my desperate isolation.
"She okay?" Bill asked, leaning against my porch rail, his weathered face carefully arranged to hide his concern.
My eyes flicked to the empty chair where Emma used to sit watching the sunset, her camera always within reach.
"I have no idea," was all I could manage, the words scraping raw from my throat. The truth of them hollowed me out completely. Somewhere in the city, she was living a life I couldn't see or touch, while I remained frozen in the moment of her leaving.
Nights stretch endlessly without her warmth, her smile, her laughter.
Dreams taunt with phantom touches, her scent lingers in sheets I can't bring myself to wash.
The pillow she used remains on her side of the bed, dented with the memory of her head.
Some mornings, waking feels like losing her all over again.
The trail back from the northern ridge cuts deep into my legs, my muscles burn from twelve hours of clearing deadfall.
Physical exhaustion—the only remedy I've found for thoughts of Emma that plague every waking moment.
Stars puncture the darkening sky as the cabin comes into view, nestled against the mountainside like it's grown there naturally.
Something feels different tonight.
Something that feels—then my nose doubles down on that thought.
Wait a damn minute.
Smoke curls from the chimney.
My heart seizes, breath catching painfully in my chest. The axe slips from suddenly nerveless fingers as blood rushes in my ears. No strangers would venture this far into Thorne Range, not with night falling. Not to my cabin.
The distance to the porch disappears under my boots. The door swings open before I reach it, and there she stands, haloed in golden light, wearing my flannel shirt like she never left.
"You're home late," Emma says, voice soft but steady. Green eyes lock with mine, searching for a reaction.
The world narrows to her face—the constellation of freckles across her nose, a slight tremble in her lower lip. For a suspended moment, we stand frozen, the space between us electrified after a month of absence.
Then we collide.
Her body meets mine with such force it steals what little breath remains in my lungs.
Hands grasp, clutch, confirm. My fingers tangle in her hair, pulling her head back to expose her throat.
Her fingernails dig into my shoulders through my shirt.
There's desperation in the way we touch—frantic, almost violent in its need.
"Wyatt," she gasps against my mouth.
The sound of my name on her lips is almost enough to push me over the edge.
I fucking missed it so much. We stumble through the door, unwilling to separate long enough for grace.
Her legs wrap around my waist as I carry her across the living room, knocking a chair aside in our haste. The bedroom seems miles away.
We don't make it there.
The couch catches us as we fall, a mix of grasping hands and urgent mouths. Clothes tear in our impatience. Buttons pop, and fly. Her skin burns beneath my palms, real and alive and here.
My Emma.
When I finally push inside her, she cries out—a sound of homecoming that echoes through the cabin's rafters. God, she feels so fucking good.
So fucking mine.
Our bodies remember what words can't express. I take her with hard, merciless thrusts, and she gives as much as she gets. Hungrily grinding, her pussy possessing, devouring, needing. We move together with none of our usual finesse, just raw need and desperate connection.
A sense of desperation begins to build, pleasure collecting and coiling in tight spirals.
When she comes, her entire body trembles beneath mine, tears tracking silently down her temples into her hair. She clings to me in shuddering spasms, and that's when I snap.
My own release follows immediately, torn from somewhere deep inside me I thought had died when she left, just my body responding in thick, liquid pulses.
Afterward, we lie tangled together, her head on my chest, my arms locked around her as though she might evaporate if I loosen my hold. For long minutes, only our ragged breathing breaks the silence.
"I'm staying," she says, her voice raw. "For good. Forever."
My chest tightens painfully, hope warring with protective caution.
"Your parents—"
"Can't touch me anymore." She pushes up to look at me directly, determination hardening her features. "I graduated, Wyatt. Three weeks ago."
Her fingers trace the lines of my face as though memorizing them anew.
"I went through with the ceremony because I needed that piece of paper.
Then I tore my diploma in half right in front of my parents and told them I wasn't going to law school.
Told them I was coming back to the mountains.
Back to you. And they couldn't do anything to stop me. "
My chest constricts at her words, flooding warmth through veins that have run cold for weeks. Still, fear lingers.
"They called the rangers before—"
"They can't." Her voice grows stronger. "I'm legally an adult with a college degree. I visited every ranger station between here and town. Told them exactly where I was going and why. Made it crystal clear that any future reports of me being 'missing' or 'kidnapped' would be false."
She sits up fully now, my flannel shirt falling open to reveal her naked body beneath. The sight steals my breath all over again.
"I emptied my bank accounts before they could freeze them. Sold my car. Donated most of my things." Her hands frame my face, forcing me to meet her gaze. "I'm not going anywhere, Wyatt. This is my choice. You are my choice."
The weight crushing my chest for thirty-one days finally eases. I pull her against me, burying my face in her neck, inhaling the scent that's haunted my dreams.
"When you left—" My voice breaks. Words have never come easily, but now they seem impossible.
"I know." Her fingers stroke through my hair. "I died a little every day we were apart."
We move to the bedroom eventually, unwilling to let go of each other long enough for proper conversation.
Beneath the quilts, with her body curled perfectly against mine, Emma tells me everything—the sleepless nights in her dorm, the confrontation with her parents, the strategic visits to ranger stations.
"I showed them our photos," she says, fingers trailing patterns on my chest. "Told them about how you saved me when I was lost. How you taught me to see the mountains through your eyes."
Pride swells in my chest at her courage, at how completely she's chosen this life—chosen me—over everything she's known.
"I thought you'd never come back." My confession is torn from somewhere deep and vulnerable. "Thought you'd realize I had nothing to offer compared to—"
She silences me with her mouth, the kiss fierce and claiming. When she pulls back, her eyes blaze with certainty.
"You have everything to offer. You have this." Her hand sweeps to encompass the cabin, the mountains beyond. "You have peace. Truth. A life that means something real." Her voice drops lower, more intimate. "You have you. And that's all I want."
My throat tightens with emotions I've never been good at expressing. Instead, I show her—with my hands, my mouth, my body. This time, our lovemaking lacks the desperate edge of our reunion, replaced by something deeper, more reverent.
After, with sweat cooling on our skin, I manage the words that have lived in my heart since she first walked into my life.
"I love you, Emma. Have since that first week. Probably from the moment you took that shot of the elk and threw yourself at me."
"I love you too. Enough to throw away law school and my trust fund and everything I was supposed to be."
"I'll make it worth it. With interest. Every day."
"You already have."
A thump at the foot of the bed announces Cain's arrival, followed closely by Abel. The cats, who've spent a month prowling the cabin in restless search of Emma, arrange themselves possessively at her feet.
She laughs—that full, unrestrained sound I've missed like oxygen. "Even they refuse to let me leave again."
"Smart cats," I say against her hair, finally allowing myself to believe she's truly home.
Outside, Thorne Range stretches under starlight, jagged and beautiful and uncompromising. Inside, Emma's breathing deepens toward sleep, her body warm and real against mine.
This morning, I woke to empty rooms and cold silence. Tonight, I'll sleep with everything I thought I’d lost forever held safely in my arms.
Tomorrow, we begin our life—the one she chose, the one I never dared hope for.
Together.