Page 8 of Mountain Man's Surrender

Oh.“I’ll take a glass, if you don’t mind.”

With a curt nod, he heads off through a doorway toward what must be the kitchen. I might imagine it, but I think he mutters something likeI could use one myself.

Taking advantage of his absence, I explore the room, drawn to a collection of framed photographs on a side table. Most featurelandscapes, mountains bathed in a golden sunset, a forest of trees blanketed in snow. But one catches my eye, two men standing beside a partially restored classic car, grins splitting their faces.

My breath catches. One is unmistakably a younger Landry, unscarred and in uniform. The other must be my father. The resemblance to the face I see in the mirror every day is undeniable. I’m still staring when Landry returns with two tumblers of amber liquid, one filled much more so than the other. I reach for the half-full one he extends toward me, my hand trembling. He stares at the shaking appendage while the fire crackles and pops.

“That was right before my second tour,” he says quietly, glancing at the framed picture and then taking a long drink.

If I’ve got the math right, I was likely a toddler at the time. But I don’t want to talk about that now. I notice a shadow box hanging on the wall nearby, containing a Purple Heart. “Is that yours?”

His jaw tightens. “Yeah.”

“You don’t have to tell me anything,” I say quickly, sensing his discomfort.

“I don’t,” he confirms then surprises me by continuing anyway. “IED took out our vehicle. I was the lucky one.” His voice is flat, emotionless. “Came back different. Your father, he wouldn’t let me disappear into myself, though. Refused to give up on me, even when I’d given up on myself.”

The image of my father as someone who stood by his friends contradicts everything I’ve believed my entire life. I take a large sip of brandy, the tart apple notes warming my throat before giving way to a cinnamon heat that spreads through my chest.

“That doesn’t sound like the man my mother described,” I murmur, more to myself than to him.

“You said that earlier, too. But which version seems more likely, Aspen?” Landry asks, his dark eyes intense in the growing firelight. “A man who abandoned his daughter without a backward glance? Or the one who refused to let his best friend become another veteran suicide statistic?”

His bluntness makes me flinch.

“I don’t know what to believe anymore,” I admit. The cat chooses this moment to brush against my leg and let out a loud meow. “Is he hungry?”

“I fed him this morning.”

I reach down to pet the little guy. “He looks hungry.”

Landry rolls his eyes but heads back to the kitchen. The cat follows, trotting ahead of him and letting out an eager sort of yippy meow, as if it knows what’s about to happen and is thrilled. I trail behind, too.

“Hungry little bastard,” Landry mutters, but there’s unmistakable affection in his voice.

As he feeds the cat, I take another sip of brandy and drink in the breadth of Landry’s shoulders beneath his flannel shirt, the way his jeans hug his thighs. There’s no denying my intense attraction to him, and not just because he’s the most masculine man I’ve ever encountered, though that doesn’t hurt. No, it’s the rugged strength in his forearms as he moves, the confident way he occupies space, the thick, but close-trimmed beard that makes me wonder how it would feel scraping against my skin.

But a man like him, living alone on a mountain with a history that’s…complicated, would never be interested in a girl like me, at least not long term. But I’m okay with that. Because if the way his eyes linger on me is any indication, the electric current sparking between us isn’t one sided. Not by a country mile.

But there’s something still bothering me about our departure from Simon’s place. “What’s in the envelope?” I ask when the cat is licking loudly at its dinner.

His expression turns wary. “Something you should see.”

My heart pounds as he retrieves the envelope, setting it on the coffee table as I settle on the couch. The handwriting on the front is a familiar script I’ve seen thousands of times before. My mother’s.

I pick it up and hold it for a moment, swallowing the wave of grief that washes over me. Then, with a deep breath, I lift the broken seal and extract the single folded page inside, my heartbeat thundering in my ears as a picture of me from last spring falls onto my lap. As I scan the page, the knot in my stomach from earlier reappears and my vision blurs. I glance up to find Landry’s kind eyes on me. “Have you read this?”

He nods. “Simon showed it to me before he left.”

My throat’s nearly closed, but I ask, “So he wanted to meet me?”

Landry’s lips press together as he slowly reaches toward the envelope, pointing a finger at the postmarked date. Two days before he died in a multivehicle collision on I-91. Or so I was told.

“He was on his way to the city.” My voice sounds strange to my own ears, constricted and small. I don’t need confirmation of the truth. I can feel it deep in my bones, but Landry murmurs just that.

I set down the letter, unable to process everything I’m feeling. Anger at my mother, grief for the relationship I never had, confusion about everything. I drain the last of my drink, my thoughts swirling. But they land on a question I should have asked already.

“Why don’t you just buy the garage?” I challenge, setting aside my empty glass. “If you love working there so much and feel the need to keep it running, why not purchase it yourself?”

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