Page 17 of Merciless Mountain Man

“I said I never wanted kids when I was in high school.” I sighed. “All my friends were talking about it. I wasn’t the only one who didn’t want them, of course, but I was sure of it. I’ve been less sure in the past couple of years as I’ve met women around here who weren’t that much older than me when they got married and started having kids.” I shook my head. “Anyway, I suddenly can see all of it. Just maybe not the kids for a couple of years.”

“Or a few years, if you want. We can take as long as you need. That’ll give us more time as a couple.”

I liked that idea.

He took a few steps toward me but stopped several feet away. That wasn’t far at all, but my body told me it was too far. I had to be closer. So I took a couple of steps and wrapped my arms around his waist, pressing my body to his.

“I see why people want to have kids now,” I said. “Well, one of the many reasons. But it makes sense. That feeling that you’ve found someone you want to build a life and a family with.”

I rolled my eyes at myself, and he laughed. But he was smiling down at me, and there was a twinkle in his eye I’d never seen before.

He was just as happy as I was. And that meant everything.

“I’m going to kiss you now,” he said. “And then I’ll take you to a delicious dinner at that Mexican restaurant you mentioned. Or anywhere else you want to go. After that, I’ll take you back to my cabin and give you a night you’ll never forget.”

“I like the sound of that,” I said. “In fact, you’d better get me out of here before we do something that’ll get me fired.”

“You’ve got it.” He paused. “What about your car?”

I gestured to my SUV. “We can come back and grab it after dinner, and I’ll drive it to your place.”

I didn’t need to leave it here overnight. That would definitely get people talking. Seduction Summit was still a small town, andthis strip mall was right next to the main road. Enough people knew me around town that if they saw my vehicle here at two in the morning, there would be talk, for sure. And that talk might get back to my boss.

Or he might drive by himself. He had a cabin up here in the mountains somewhere. Yeah, it was better not to get on the wrong side of Finn Taylor.

Still, I didn’t care if anyone saw us holding hands as we went around to the passenger side of Dane’s truck and he opened the door for me. I was proud to be dating the hottest man in Seduction Summit. And tacos and lovemaking sounded like the best night of my life. The first of many best nights.

EPILOGUE

CASSADY

“Mommy, can we live here?”

I glanced at Dane as we entered the gigantic log cabin near the peak of this part of the mountains. Dane and I had just purchased this property for my business, and I knew how much it would bring in if we could keep it rented. That was a pretty big if, though, as sprawling as this place was.

“This is for vacationers,” Dane reminded our five-year-old, Aurelia.

“But this is perfect,” Aurelia said, pressing her nose to the gigantic picture window that was the entire mountain-facing wall of this living room.

I looked at Dane again. He’d mentioned several times over the past couple of weeks that we could just move in here and rent out our place. We were close to outgrowing the two-bedroom cabin he’d owned when I met him—especially since we were talking about having a second baby.

“Don’t smudge up the glass, honey,” Dane said.

Aurelia had been a surprise. We were married a couple of years when I found out I was pregnant. Dane was worried I’d bedisappointed, but the second I took that test—before I even saw the two lines—I was already getting excited about the thought of being a mom. And knowing it was a baby I’d made with Dane made all the difference.

Having one child hadn’t gotten in the way of my career goals. Yeah, it definitely made running my own business challenging, but at least I had flexible hours. And now we were buying properties, fixing them up, and turning them into rentals, paying local construction guys to do most of the work.

The flexibility meant having a second child wasn’t out of the question. And now that I was thirty-one, my clock was ticking.

“Can we see what’s upstairs?” Aurelia asked, already running across the room.

“Hey, hey, hey,” Dane said. “Wait for us.”

As we followed, I fought the overprotective mom urge all the way while imagining what it might be like to live here. I’d been avoiding doing that for days. I didn’t want to get my hopes up.

We had plenty of money now, and we’d been talking about upgrading. My business was thriving, and Dane brought in a good, steady income from his logging work. We could swing this.

If we turned our much smaller cabin into a vacation rental, it was more likely to stay rented. A property with five bedrooms and four baths like this one would only attract large groups, and the demand wasn’t as high for those.

---