Page 13 of Rugged Mountain Man
This man had cooked for me. Twice.
He had braved a storm, for my sake.
He had given me the coat off his back to ensure that I was warm.
The phantom memory of his touch on my bruised cheekbone made me blush. Had anyone ever touched me so gently in my entire life?
As soon as I walked out of Brock’s house, I swore I wanted nothing to do with another man. It was too painful to get it wrong. It hurt too much, to open my heart, and receive only cutting words and insults in return.
But what if I got it right this time? What if Cormac was willing to love me the way I’d craved to be loved for so long?
Tentatively, I reached out and pressed my knuckles to his cheek. His skin was cool, clammy, and his stubble rasped like sandpaper.
Then a searchlight swept across the windshield, momentarily blinding me. A caravan of three snowmobiles veered into view, navigating around the fallen tree. They parked next to the car and a figure in a full-body black snowsuit approached the driver’s side door, pulling it open.
“You must be Mika,” a man said. I recognized his voice from the satellite phone.
He removed his ski camp, revealing smiling golden brown eyes, and the same square jaw that Cormac had.
“I’m Rafferty,” he said. “You called me about my pain-in-the-ass brother. I brought a few friends along for backup."
“He lost consciousness a few minutes ago,” I said.
Rafferty sighed.
“This is exactly why I nagged him about carrying that damn sat phone. He spent five days lost in the mountains last year because he broke his ankle and he couldn’t hike back to town. I was worried sick.”
My heart squeezed to see Rafferty’s concern. Cormac was lucky to have him for a brother, to know that he had family who cared about him. He sighed and hauled Cormac over his shoulder into a fireman’s carry, which couldn’t have been easy, given Cormac’s size.
“Come on, Mika,” he said. “Let’s get you two out of this storm.”
“You’re going to wear a rut in the floor,” I said.
Rafferty groaned and stopped his restless pacing of the waiting room in Juniper Creek’s hospital. Cormac had been in surgery for over an hour by now.
I don’t know what I was still doing here. Rafferty could look after his brother. I needed to find a place to stay now that I was in town. But I couldn’t bring myself to leave, plucking at a stray thread on my sleeve. I wanted to hear if Cormac was okay.
More importantly, I wanted to see if he remembered what he’d said in the car, right before he passed out.
“So,” Rafferty said, dropping into the seat next to me. “How long have you and Mac been dating?”
“Oh,” I floundered. “We’re not—”
Rafferty raised his eyebrows, waiting for an explanation. What was I supposed to say? Cormac and I weren’t dating, obviously. But we weren’t friends either. We just met.
And yet, he’d put his safety at risk for my sake. He’d cooked for me. Twice. He’d given me the coat off his back to keep me warm.
Someone will go the distance for you, Mika…
My mouth went dry and I swallowed hard.
“My brother has avoided women like the plague for a decade,” Rafferty went on. “Did he tell you about the divorce yet?”
I nodded, twisting my fingers together in my lap.
“Then you know it wiped him out,” Rafferty said. “Took him down for the count and he never managed to get back up.”
I looked away, scrubbed at my palm with my thumb.
