Page 14 of Stone Cold Mountain Man
“Fuck,” he grunts into the crook of my neck. “Come for me.”
The feeling of his cock moving in and out of me and the feel of his breath against my skin is enough to send me flying. I close my eyes and fall off the edge, our shared orgasm consuming us both. Holding onto this man is the only thing keeping me from being pulled out into the vast nothingness.
For once, I’m not too much.
I’m perfectly enough.
11
Wade
A month.
It’s been a month since the storm that trapped her in my cabin, since the night she reached for my hand in the dark and asked me to keep her warm. And in that month, the mountain has shifted. Not the land itself—the ridges are the same, the trees still bend under the weight of snow—but me.
I used to think quiet was the only thing I needed. That solitude was safety. I’d convinced myself that love, connection—hell, even conversation—were things best left for other people. Not me.
Then Taylor showed up with her chatter and her laughter and her ridiculous plant, and suddenly the silence wasn’t enough anymore.
We haven’t spent a night apart since. She drifts between her cabin and mine like it’s the most natural thing in the world. When the snow started to ease, we dug paths from one porch to the other, a little trail connecting us. And somewhere along the way, I realized that I don’t just like having her nearby. I need her with me.
I love her.
The thought doesn’t scare me like I thought it would. It feels steady. Right. I just need to find the right moment to tell her. The right words.
That’s the problem, though. Words have never come easy to me. I’m not a man of speeches. I’m a man of actions—splitting wood, fixing roofs, keeping things running. But Taylor… she deserves to hear it out loud. Deserves to know what she means to me.
So today, I walk the trail toward her cabin, rehearsing in my head. Nothing fancy. Just honest.
Taylor, I love you. I don’t want a life without you in it.
I step into the clearing and stop dead in my tracks.
There’s an SUV parked in front of her cabin. Shiny. New. Not hers.
Before I can make sense of it, the front door bursts open. Taylor storms out, her voice sharp with fury.
“I didn’t ask you to come here, and I sure as hell didn’t ask for your opinion!”
A man and woman follow behind her, dressed too neatly for the mountain, their words tumbling over each other.
“Taylor, this is for the best—”
“You don’t belong out here, sweetheart—”
It doesn’t take a genius to piece it together. Her parents.
Pain slices through me at the thought of her leaving. Once, the idea of Cedar Ridge Cabin being mine alone was the dream. Now the thought of her packing up, disappearing back to wherever she came from—it’s unbearable.
“Taylor,” I call, my voice cutting across the clearing.
Her head whips toward me. Relief floods her face, and hope sparks in my chest.
“Wade,” she breathes. She crosses to me like I’m a lifeline. “These are my parents. They just showed up.”
I nod. “I gathered.”
The man—her father, I assume—gives me a look that tells me he doesn’t think I’m good enough to scrape the mud off his boots. The woman’s expression isn’t any better.
