Page 21 of Craving the Mountain Man
I've done nothing but push her away since her brother showed up, because I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought keeping things simple would make it easier to let her go when the time came.
Because I'm a fucking idiot who doesn't know a good thing when it's staring him in the face.
But there's nothing simple about the way I ache for her when she walks out of the room. Her absence makes the air feel thinner and makes colors seem duller.
Nothing casual about the way I'm already mourning something I was too scared to fully claim.
"Evan?" Dylan's voice cuts through my brooding, and I realize he's been talking to me.
"Yeah?"
"I asked if you wanted another beer."
"I'm good." I gesture toward my barely touched bottle.
He studies me with the kind of look that says he's not buying whatever story I'm trying to sell. "You sure? You seem a little distracted."
Across the table, Cassidy's fork pauses halfway to her mouth, and for just a second, her mask slips. I catch a glimpse of hurt in her eyes before she looks away.
"Just tired," I lie.
Dylan's gaze shifts between us, but he doesn't push. Just nods and changes the subject to something safer.
After dinner, Dylan crashes early, claiming the need to be sharp for tomorrow's work. Cassidy stays behind to wash dishes, and I linger in the doorway, watching her.
She doesn't look up when she speaks.
"You don't have to hover."
The words are polite. The tone she might use with a stranger who was overstaying their welcome.
"I'm not," I say, though we both know it's a lie.
"Sure you are." She rinses a plate with more force than necessary. "That or you're practicing how to untangle yourself from me."
I step forward. "That what you think I've been doing?"
She sets the plate down in the drying rack and finally looks at me. "You tell me."
And there it is. The challenge I've been avoiding, the conversation I've been too much of a coward to have.
I don't answer right away. Because the truth is messy.
"I never meant to push you away," I tell her.
"Then why did you?"
The simple question deserves a simple answer, but nothing about this is simple. Nothing about the way she makes me feel is straightforward or easy to explain.
"Because I don't want to ruin this."
She crosses her arms, and I can see her building her own walls now. Protecting herself from whatever blow she thinks is coming.
"This?"
"You. Me. Everything." I run a hand through my hair, trying to find words for feelings I've never had to articulate before. "I'vebeen on my own a long time, Cass. I don't always know how to... do this."
She studies me, and I feel naked under her gaze.
