Page 11 of Her Mountain Man Neighbor
I run the words over in my head like a mantra, my hands tightening around the steering wheel.Too young, too sweet, too good for you. Too young, too sweet, too good for you.Repeating it helps. It grounds me. Reminds me why I’m torturing myself trying to resist this girl.
We reach my cabin a few minutes later. I tell Grace to stay put, then I jump out of the truck and grab her stuff from the back, putting up an umbrella. I hold it up for both of us and help Grace down onto the ground, our sides jostling together as we head for the porch. Then I usher her inside and close the door behind us, the sounds of the storm muffling a little.
Midnight is still curled up by the fire where I left her. She lifts her head and blinks her big amber eyes at us, barely stirring before she repositions herself and goes back to sleep.
“Sorry,” I tell Grace. “That’s as good a welcome as you’re gonna get from Midnight.”
She laughs, shrugging off her coat, which I hang up by the door. “That’s okay. I don’t want to interrupt her sleep.” There’s a beat of silence as she looks away from Midnight and stares around the cabin. “Wow, this place is beautiful! I didn’t expect it to be so big…”
“Thanks.” I follow her gaze, trying to see it through her eyes. She’s right, my cabin is pretty damn huge—way too big for just me and my cat—and a lot of the rooms at the back are empty and unused. But the living room is the heart of the cabin, cozy and lived-in, with comfy leather furniture, plush rugs, and a giant brick fireplace on the far wall. When it’s light out, you can seeSugar Creek flowing past. But it’s too dark to see anything now, especially with storm shutters covering the windows.
My gaze drifts back to Grace. She’s still studying my cabin with wide-eyed curiosity, and I watch as she tucks a lock of lilac hair behind her ear, wetting her bottom lip. She looks so damn beautiful. Hell, she always does. Whether she’s soaked in rainwater or covered in mud, she still looks perfect.
“You eaten yet?” I ask.
“No.” She meets my eye apologetically. “I meant to cook something, but then the power went out.”
“You want anything in particular?”
Grace starts to protest. “You don’t need to cook for me…”
“Of course I do,” I cut her off. “You’re my guest. Least I can do is feed you.”
“Well, I don’t know about ‘guest’…I wasn’t really invited. You were just kind enough to let me stay.”
“Sure you were invited,” I say stubbornly. “I picked you up. Brought you here. That’s an invitation.”
She nods. “I guess so.” Then her face splits into a warm smile. “Thanks, Lucian. Honestly, I’m easy. Anything you have would be awesome—even just a sandwich or something.”
Once Grace is settled on the couch in front of the fire, I head into the kitchen and root around for food. She said she’d be fine with a sandwich, but I want to make her something nice. There are a couple of steaks in the fridge, so I sear them in a pan, frying up some potatoes with butter and herbs on the side. When I bring out the food a while later, Grace thanks me, her eyes shining with gratitude.
“It smells amazing,” she says. “Itlooksamazing, too.”
“Hope it tastes good.”
She takes a bite and assures me it does. “This steak is so tender! It’s even better than Bastian’s.”
“Bastian’s? Is that a restaurant?”
“No, Bastian is my parents’ personal chef.”
I can’t help raising an eyebrow. “Damn. You grew up with a personal chef?”
“Yeah…” Grace looks embarrassed, like she regrets mentioning it. “Sorry, that probably makes me sound really spoiled. My upbringing was super privileged in a lot of ways.”
I’m surprised she comes from money. She’s crashing with her sister and Holden in their modest log cabin—doesn’t seem like the kind of thing she’d need to do if her parents are loaded. Grace seems to sense my confusion.
“I’m cut off from my parents now,” she murmurs, her eyes downcast as she busies herself with cutting her steak. “We don’t talk.”
My heart squeezes with pity at the sadness in her voice. The slight stammer of emotion.
“I’m sorry. That’s rough.” I don’t want to make her more miserable, but I can’t help the curiosity that burns inside me as I ask, “Want to tell me about it?”
She sighs, setting down her fork. “They’ve always been controlling, ever since I was a kid. Obsessed with money and status. Mila and I were just props to them, but I always hoped things would change one day. Then last month, things kind of…escalated.” Grace chews her lip, not looking at me. “My parents tried to force Mila to marry a stranger—a rich bachelor from some old-money family. But Mila ran away from the wedding. So they tried to marry me off to the groom instead.” She physically cringes at the memory. “I almost went through with it. But when I finally refused, they cut me off without hesitation. It was the first time I’d ever disobeyed them, and they couldn’t accept it. They flew straight back to the Hamptons and we haven’t spoken since. I…I don’t think I’ll ever see them again.”
My mind reels from her story. It sounds like something out of an old-timey novel, but I can see in her expression that it’s alltoo real. She looks sad and defeated. A rush of anger surges in my veins when I think of her parents trying to marry her off to a stranger, using her for their own gain.
Thank God she didn’t go through with it.
