Page 25 of Lost in the Wild

But he’s here, charging down the mountain path at first light for me. Looking for me, wanting to try again. To fight for this.

All I need is that he’s willing to try. Because I know, even if Rowan has his doubts: he’s a fighter. He can overcome anything—even the demons that have haunted him for so long.

“So you want me in this cabin as your roommate?” I tease, warmth spreading slowly from my core to the tips of my fingers and toes. It’s impossible to stay cold when Rowan looks at me like that, with fierce hunger and longing, like I’m an angel sent down from heaven just for him. Yeah, he’s never gonna let me go again—it’s clear from his possessive grip on my waist.

“Fuck that,” he says, and I burst out laughing. The birds are singing up in the branches again, bored now that the tension is melting away down here on the path. “You’re not my roommate, Evie. You’ll be my heart. My woman. My wife. If you’ll have me.”

Vulnerability flickers across his face, and I can’t stand the sight of it. Can’t stand the answering pinch of pain in my chest.

Of course I’ll have Rowan.

Of course I’ll fight for him too. What else am I doing stomping around this mountainside?

We’re made for each other, him and I.

“I have one very strict condition,” I tell him, cupping his smooth jaw. He must have shaved it again this morning, neatening himself before he came down to find me, and that sends a tingly glow through my insides. My thumb strokes his cheek, the contact making him shiver, and I can hardly believe this is happening.

Rowan’s offering me a new life on the mountain? A life in a cabin, with a bed, and in walking distance of a town where I can make friends? A town where I can find a better job than with shitty Pretzel Media, then go home every night to the man I love?

I don’t need to think about this at all. It feels so right.

“Anything,” Rowan rasps. “Name it and it’s yours.”

Clearing my throat, I fix him with my most serious look. “I want another fancy bath, Wild Man.”

There’s a stunned pause—then Rowan throws his head back and laughs, the sound booming through the trees. Above us, birds explode from the branches and flap away, crying out to each other.

“You startled them,” I say, watching them go.

“You startled me.” Rowan picks me up easily, slinging me into his arms like I weigh nothing, and carries me off the path into the trees. “They’ll live.”

“Where are we going?”

Rowan arches an eyebrow. “Where do you think? We need privacy, Evie. Privacy for all the things I’m going to do to you. No random hiker is going to see you like that, not on my watch. Besides, I have a bathtub to fill.”

His cave.

Of course.

A pleased rumble reverberates through Rowan’s chest as I lean up and kiss his neck. He can take me there if he likes, but you’d better believe I’m gonna tease him the whole way.

Ten

Rowan

If my arms weren’t both occupied, I’d slap myself to make sure I’m not dreaming. That this—Evie in my arms, soft and warm, nibbling her way along my jaw—is real, and not a hallucination.

Hard to believe I carried her to my cave like this only two days ago. Hard to believe that she’s here again, up on my mountain; that she came searching for me after I let her down so badly last night.

God knows I don’t deserve the grace she’s shown me. But mark my words: I will earn it. From this day on, I will never waver like that again. I’ll never choose the coward’s path and run away from love. I’ve always been a fighter, damn it—I just lost my way lately. But Evie’s brought me back to life. Back to myself.

And I’ll prove how much this woman means to me, day in and day out, until she never questions that fact ever again.

Ever.

“I’m starting to think this is a kink of yours.” Evie flicks the top three buttons of my shirt open and slides her hand inside, resting her palm against the steady thump of my heart. “Carrying damsels off to your cave.”

My legs are strong beneath me, stepping across tree roots and rocks. My head has never felt so clear.

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