Page 37 of The Mountain Man's Untamed Bride
As the first stars appeared overhead, I held this unexpected gift of a woman and felt something I hadn't experienced in years—peace. Not the empty silence of isolation, but the quiet certainty of having found exactly where, and with whom, I belonged.
Colonel crowed from somewhere near the chicken coop, as if offering his reluctant approval.
"See?" Scarlett laughed against my chest. "Even your rooster agrees we're a match."
"He's always had good taste," I said, surprising myself with how easily the words came. "But he's still sleeping outside."
The mountain air cooled around us as darkness fell, but neither of us moved to go inside. Some moments deserve to be lived fully, memorized perfectly. This was one of them—the night we both stopped running and started building something real, one day at a time.
Epilogue
“Full Circle”
Scarlett
Early December in the Colorado mountains was no joke. The first real snowfall had transformed Bodhi's wilderness sanctuary into a scene straight from a storybook winter. Four months after my dramatic arrival, I was still discovering new things to love about mountain life—like the way snow dampened all sound in the forest, or how morning sunlight turned ordinary frost into diamonds.
I tapped away at my laptop in what used to be the Raccoon Suite, now my office with its view of snow-capped pines. The satellite internet connection Bodhi had installed after the Langley incident had proven its worth. After three weeks of remote job hunting, I'd landed a position with Heartland Harvest, a digital marketing agency focusing exclusively on small farms and local food producers. My current projectinvolved creating an Instagram strategy for a family-owned maple syrup operation in Vermont.
"Boosting engagement by thirty percent," I muttered, reviewing my analytics. "Take that, corporate sugar brands."
The front door opened with a blast of cold air, followed by the familiar sound of Bodhi stomping snow from his boots. He'd been in town helping Mabel reinforce her storage shed before the next snowstorm hit.
"How's the maple campaign?" he asked, appearing in my doorway with a paper bag that smelled like Mabel's cinnamon rolls.
I saved my work and spun to face him. "Converting the masses to artisanal breakfast condiments, one hashtag at a time."
He laughed, the sound still rare enough to make me pause and appreciate it. The semi-feral mountain man who'd greeted me with suspicion four months ago had softened around the edges—not tamed, exactly, but more willing to share his territory.
"Mabel says dinner at Flint and Josie's is still on for tonight," he said, setting the bag on my desk. "Weather's holding until tomorrow."
"Like wild horses could keep Josie from hosting," I replied, reaching for a cinnamon roll. "She's been planning this dinner since we missed their Halloween party."
"Probably announcing another baby," Bodhi suggested, leaning against the doorframe.
"I doubt it. Josie swore after the twins that she was done expanding the Hawthorne empire." I took a bite, not bothering with the dainty manners my mother had drilled into me since childhood. "Besides, she's been asking weird questions aboutour cabin layout. I think she's plotting some kind of renovation ambush."
He watched me with a half-smile. "You have cinnamon on your chin."
"Goes with the powdered sugar on my shirt," I replied, making no move to fix either situation. The old Scarlett—the pastor's perfect daughter—would have been mortified. The new Scarlett, mountain woman in training, had better things to worry about.
Bodhi had changed too. His beard was still formidable but now slightly trimmed. He ventured into town regularly without looking like he was plotting mass destruction. Most surprisingly, when we'd visited my parents in October, he'd managed actual conversation with my father that didn't end in thinly veiled theological debates.
The visit had gone better than I'd expected. My father, humbled by his resignation and the Richardson scandal, had made genuine efforts to connect with Bodhi. My mother, while still sliding me the occasional brochure for Atlanta-based jobs, had at least stopped suggesting that mountain living was a "phase" I'd outgrow.
"What time did Josie say dinner was?" Bodhi asked, breaking into my thoughts.
"Six," I replied, licking frosting from my fingers. "Which gives us several hours to kill."
The gleam in his eyes told me exactly how he thought we should spend that time. Some things definitely hadn't changed.
***
"To friends and second chances!" Josie declared, raising her glass. The six of us—Flint and Josie, Bodhi and me, and theKovacs, Mabel and her husband Harvey—clinked glasses across the dinner table.
Their home embodied organized chaos—children's artwork covering the walls, half-finished projects on every surface, and the constant background noise of their younger kids playing somewhere upstairs. It couldn't have been more different from the sterile perfection of my parents' home, yet it felt infinitely more authentic.
"And to successful matchmaking," Flint added with a wink in our direction. "I should've charged you a finder's fee, Wilder."
