7. Elsie
Elsie
The fire is warm and I’m so grateful that I’m stuck in this cabin with someone who knows what they’re doing. Hugo got it lit in under five minutes, while I stood in the middle of the room with my arms wrapped around myself trying to not panic.
I’m not fine with this situation. The cabin is one room and Hugo is very large, and the kiss from last night is still between us, and it’s like a giant elephant in the room.
"Radio signal's patchy," he says, crouching at the hand-crank unit on the shelf. "I got enough information through to Darnell. He knows where we are."
"Great," I say. "So, people know we're trapped in this creepy cabin. Excellent."
"It's not creepy."
"There's a jacket on that hook that has cobwebs on it, how do I know if they left it here and forgot about it, or if they were murdered."
"That's Reilly's jacket, he left it behind, he keeps saying he has to get it but forgets."
"That makes it worse, Hugo."
He almost smiles, but turns back to the radio and I watch him work. The wind is serious now, the door rattles hard, as the gusts hit against it, I can also hear the snow falling harder against the ground, windows, and cabin.
Hugo checks the door, checks the woodbox, and counts the emergency rations on the shelf, before he turns back to me. "We're fine for the night," he says.
"That must be your favorite word, we’re fine."
He shakes his head. "It's been true whenever I say it." He picks up the folded blanket from the cot and holds it out.
"I'm fine," I say.
He glares at me. "You're shivering."
Damn the man, he’s watching me too closely. How does he manage to do that without me knowing? "I'm just cold."
"That's what shivering is," he says and I’m not sure if he’s being sarcastic or not.
"Hugo."
"Elsie."
I take the blanket, and wrap it around my shoulders, and sit on the edge of the cot. I try to think about this situation like it’s normal: we’re just two people in a one-room cabin on a mountain with a storm outside that’s shared a kiss. Completely normal and fine.
"We should eat something," he says, already opening a tin on the shelf.
"So are we pretending last night didn't happen," I say, "or are we pretending it was a mistake again?"
He goes still.
"Because I've done both already and I'm tired."
He sets the tin down but doesn’t turn around right away. When he does, his face has a blank expression on it. "It should not have happened," he says.
"Why not?"
"You know why."
"Tell me again."
He crosses his arms, it’s not aggressive, instead it seems as though he’s trying to contain himself. "You work for me. You're twenty-four, you came here hurt, and I don't want to be another man who makes that worse because he couldn't keep his hands to himself."
I look at him. "I was hurt," I say. "I'm not helpless."
Something shifts in his face. "That's not what I meant."
"That's what it sounds like. You are deciding what's right for both of us because you think I don't know my own mind.
" I keep my voice even because I mean this, I want him to actually hear it.
"Daniel treated me like my feelings were too much.
You're treating them like they're not enough to trust. I don't know which one is worse. "
Hugo is quiet for a long time. "I'm not trying to take it away from you," he says finally. "I'm trying not to take advantage of it."
"There's a difference between taking advantage and letting me choose."
He looks at the floor, then back at me. "You're in Forge Creek for three more weeks. After that you go back to your life and I'm still here."
"I know that."
"So what does this become?"
"I don't know," I say. "But that's not a reason to not start."
He does not answer, instead, he goes back to the shelf, finds two tins and starts opening them. His jaw is tight and his shoulders are set and I can see the argument still running in him, but he’s listening. And that’s all that matters.
We eat the canned soup that Hugo heated on the stove. It’s not good, but not terrible either. We sit on opposite ends of the small space and the cabin gets warmer while the storm gets louder.
"Daniel was charming," I say. I am not looking at him. I’m focused on the bowl in my hands.
"In public. He was very good at being in public, whereas in private he made me feel like I was too much, too emotional, too romantic for my own good.
" I pause. "When he left, he turned it into a story.
Something he could talk about, and I became the cautionary tale about the woman who loved too hard.
And fourteen thousand people agreed with him, and I started to think that maybe he was right. "
Hugo says nothing, but I can feel his gaze on me, he’s watching me and listening to every word.
"You don't make me feel that way," I say. "You make me feel like the ground is solid beneath my feet. And I hate that you want to take that away because you're scared."
"I'm not scared," he says.
I look at him.
"I don't know what to do with wanting you," he says. "That's the truth."
His voice is flat, like being honest is a vulnerability.
"I've spent a long time being the man who handles things," he says.
"My dad wasn't around much, my mum needed someone reliable, and the crew needed someone reliable.
The town calls when roads wash out because Hugo will go, and that's fine, because that's who I am.
" He looks at the stove. "I don’t have a lot of practice with wanting something just for me, something that has nothing to do with responsibility or fixing a problem. "
"And I'm that thing," I say.
"Yes."
The silence spreads between us, my heart racing at his words.
"So the reason you keep stepping back," I say carefully, "isn't that you don't want me."
"No."
"It's that wanting me scares you."
"Yes."
"Okay," I say. "Then we're the same."
He looks at me.
"Daniel scared me off wanting anything," I say. "And you scared me because you made me want something again before I was ready. We're both scared. The difference is I'm not using it as a reason to stop."
I stand up, the blanket falls off my shoulders, and I let it fall to the ground as I cross the room to him. He watches me come, his gaze zeroed in on my face, but he doesn’t move, I’m not even sure if he’s breathing.
"I want you," I say. "I know my own mind, I know this is complicated and temporary, and I don't have a clear answer for what will happen in three weeks." I stop in front of him. "But I'm asking you to stop deciding for me."
He looks at me for a long moment. "Are you sure?" he asks.
It’s not quite a question. It’s him giving me an exit, making sure I know it’s there. "Yes," I say.
He reaches up and his hand comes to my jaw the way it did last night, but this time there is no stopping. He kisses me slowly, like he’s making up for every time he doesn't. His other hand finds my waist and pulls me in and I go, because I’m done pretending I don’t want to.
"I'm trying to be careful with you," he says, against my mouth.
"I know."
"I want you too much to be good at being careful."
"Hugo."
"Yeah."
"Stop talking."
He makes a low sound and kisses me harder, and we stumble back toward the cot, and I stop thinking about three weeks from now or Daniel or any of it. He pulls back just enough to look at me, his breathing already uneven, his hands at my hips like he is trying to decide something.
"Tell me to stop if you need me to," he says.
"I don't need you to stop."
He kisses me again, slower this time, and his hands slide under the hem of my sweater and find skin, and I make a sound against his mouth that I would be embarrassed about if I had any embarrassment left.
"Off," I say, pulling at his flannel.
He shrugs it off. Underneath is a thermal shirt and I pull at that too and he helps me, dragging it over his head, and then his hands are back on me and I have a moment of just looking at him, this broad, solid, serious man standing in firelight with his hands on my waist, watching me like I am the most important thing in the room.
I reach for my own sweater, but he stops me.
"Let me," he says.
He takes his time. Pulls it over my head slowly, unhooks my bra with a patience that undoes me a little, and then he just looks at me, standing in the warm light of the stove, and his jaw tightens.
"God," he says. Low, like he did not mean to say it out loud.
"Good or bad?" I ask.
"Good." His hands come up to cup my breasts, thumbs brushing slowly, and my breath catches. "Very good."
He bends his head and puts his mouth on me, and I stop being clever about anything.
We end up on the cot in a tangle of the rest of our clothes coming off. He’s unhurried in a way that is almost maddening, his mouth moving down my throat, my collarbone, my stomach, and every time I try to rush him he pulls back and starts again slower.
"Hugo."
"Yeah."
"I need you to—"
"I know what you need."
"Then—"
"Elsie." His voice is rough and certain. "Give me a minute."
I give him the minute and he makes good use of it. His hand slides between my thighs and I stop forming sentences entirely. He watches my face while he touches me, not looking away, and that alone is almost too much, the focused, careful attention of him.
"There," he says, when I gasp. "Okay."
"Hugo, please—"
"I've got you."
He doesn’t rush. His fingers move slow and then not slow, and I have both hands fisted in the blanket and I’m entirely at his mercy and I don’t care at all, because he’s looking at me like I’m something worth paying attention to, like he’s memorizing this, like he has been waiting a long time to have permission to want something and he’s not wasting a second of it.
When I come it is deep and slow and he keeps his hand on me through all of it, watching my face with that serious expression, his jaw tight, until I stop shaking.
"Okay," I say, when I can talk again.
"Yeah," he says. There is something almost satisfying in his voice. Not smug. Just certain.
I pull him up and he comes over me, his weight settling, and I feel how much he wants this and I reach for him.
"Wait," he says. He shifts, finds his jeans on the floor, digs in his pocket.
I blink. "You have—"
"Emergency kit in the field bag." He shows me the foil packet.
I laugh, a real one, and he looks at me for a second with an expression I have not seen on him before, something warm and unguarded.
"You laughed," he says.
"Is that a problem?"
"No." He leans down and kisses me once, soft. "It's good."
He rolls the condom on and then he’s right there. I pull him closer, and when he pushes into me I exhale hard against his shoulder because he’s not small and he does not hurry and every inch of it is deliberate.
"Okay?" he asks.
"Yes." I tilt my hips toward him. "More."
He gives me more.
He moves slowly at first, deep and careful, and I wrap my legs around him and try to pull him closer and he resists, setting his own pace.
"Hugo," I whine.
He slows to an almost stop. "I hear you."
I whimper. God, no, please. "I'm not asking you to stop."
"I know." His voice is rough at my ear. "I want to feel you."
I stop pushing and let him have his pace and it is the right call because every stroke is deep and precise, my thighs tighten, my breath comes shorter, and my fingers dig into his shoulders.
"Look at me," he says thickly.
I look at him, his jaw's tight, his gorgeous brown eyes are dark, and there’s sweat at his temple.
"You're not foolish for wanting this," he says. "You hear me?"
Something in my chest cracks open a little. "I hear you," I say.
He moves harder and I meet him and we stop talking, because his control frays at the edges, his hands gripping my hips, his breathing rough against my neck. I feel the way his body tightens as he moves faster, his movements are chaos and I love it.
When I come the second time he’s right there with me, his whole body going taut, his face buried in my neck, a low sound against my skin that I feel more than hear.
We stay there for a moment, both breathing hard, neither moving.
Then he rolls to his back and takes me with him so I’m against his side, his arm around me, and the cabin’s warm and the storm is still raging outside.
His hand moves slowly up and down my arm and I love it. I don’t want to move.
"I should say something smart," I say finally.
"You don't have to."
"Occupational habit."
He makes a sound that is almost a laugh, I close my eyes and just lie here in bliss.
The cot is narrow and he’s very large. It should be uncomfortable, but his arm is solid and warm and I don’t move, I feel so comfortable and wanted.
"Fourteen days to the inspection," I say, eventually.
"I know."
"The upper ridge file is done. That was the last gap."
"Good." He says it flatly and I don’t know what to make of it.
"You're welcome," I say, grinning against his arm.
"Thank you," he says, pressing a kiss to my head.
I don’t say anything else. I came to Forge Creek because I didn’t trust love anymore.
Because a man I trusted, who I loved, used me up and spat me out.
He showed the world a version of me that made me doubt everything I knew about myself.
He turned me into a laughing stock. Now I’m lying in Hugo' arms while the storm shakes the cabin, and I’m starting to think love was never the problem.
Maybe I was just trusting the wrong man.