CHAPTER 13
LIAM
My eyes opened, and the first thing that hit my nose was smoke. The fire I started yesterday had dwindled and the smoke was wafting up the chimney. I stretched my arms up and wiggled my toes, trying to wake myself up so I could stretch my aching back.
But then I realized that my toes were covered.
Rubbing my eyes, I sat up. I was covered in two blankets instead of just one and, for a split second, I wondered if I’d gotten up again last night. If I did, I didn’t remember it and, immediately, my mind flew to Whitney.
Was she all right? Did she hear me get up?
I stood up just as my vision came into focus and, before I could start for the hallway, I saw a figure sitting in the chair. It was a wide-seated chair I kept next to the couch in case I felt like looking out the window instead of staring into the fireplace. There was a mass of blonde hair on the pillow that sat on the armrest and I could see the thick blanket slowly moving up and down.
I wound around to the mass of hair and looked down at a sight that made me smile.
How Whitney stuffed herself into that small chair and fell asleep, I’d never know. She was sleeping soundly, with her shoulders rising and falling with her breaths. She looked like she might’ve been grinning at something she was thinking about and it tugged at my chest. I couldn’t believe Whitney had moved out here to sleep with me.
Why would she do something like that?
As I stood there looking down at her sleeping form, I found myself a bit confused. Last night was the first night in almost two years that I’d slept without a nightmare waking me up. Some were tamer than others. I didn’t wake up screaming all the time. But I would wake up in the middle of the night for some reason and always have this sense of dread. Whether I remembered the dream or not, that sense of guilt and fear would always be looming over my head.
But last night, it didn’t happen.
I sighed while Whitney shifted in the chair, her legs outstretched as I watched her face wince. I wound around to her feet and picked up the blanket, taking in the swelling of her ankle. It was going down in her toes but was still pretty puffy around her ankle joint, so I went to the kitchen to grab the heating and cooling gel. I rubbed some onto her foot while she slept and I grinned when a soft sigh peeled from between her lips.
The only thing that changed last night was her and I shook my head while I placed some gauze around her ankle.
She had been the reason I’d slept so well. The warmth of her body and the way she squeezed my cock. The way her tongue danced with mine and the way she wanted me to fall into her after it was all said and done. I’d allowed the animal inside to take over and she held on tight for the ride. It was the first time I could ever remember truly losing myself within another person.
And it seemed, at least for now, that her presence kept my demons at bay.
I finished wrapping her ankle so it would stay stable and then I covered her back up. I knew she’d probably be hungry after our encounter last night, so I started whipping up some breakfast. I heated up a couple more biscuits and fried up some bacon before I prepared the coffee pot and, as the smell of coffee flew through the cabin, I heard her yawn.
“Liam?” she asked groggily.
“Take your time,” I said. “I’m just cooking breakfast.”
“Okay,” she said, yawning.
I couldn’t help but feel excited that she was awake. The first rays of sunlight were peeking through the gray clouds after two entire days of snow and, for a moment, I breathed a sigh of relief. Any more snow would’ve buried my truck and I would’ve been risking more rust damage just letting it sit in the snow.
The storm had dumped piles of snow that climbed all the way up to my porch and, even though the sun was shining, there was no way I’d be able to get Whitney back to the resort.
“Looks like it stopped snowing,” she said. “But there’s a lot of it.”
“My truck’s decent but it’s not equipped to handle snow like this,” I said. “My plan was to hunker down until the snow subsided and melted.”
“And those trails I walked before I got lost will be buried and practically unreachable,” she said.
I could hear the sadness in her voice as I turned around with our breakfast plates. She was gazing out the window, taking in the sight of the world but not being allowed to go out in it. I was the type of person that enjoyed being cooped up. I could stay in this cabin, keep to my radio, and never feel as if I was missing out on anything.
But Whitney was gazing out into nature like she was meant to be there. She wasn’t used to being stuck like this.
“I can’t get you back to the resort but, if your ankle’s feeling better, I could take you out in the snow,” I said.
“I don’t have any boots to wear for that kind of endeavor,” she said.
“You wouldn’t wear boots. You’d wear a snowsuit. I’ve got a spare one. It’ll swallow you whole but it’ll keep you warm while you get outside for a bit.”
I handed her the bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit I’d made before I set my plate down on the table.
“You’d do that for me?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said as I made our cups of coffee. “I would.”
After the peace she’d delivered me the night before, I’d give her anything she asked for. We ate our breakfast before I went digging around for the snowsuits I had. Then, I helped her get dressed in a pair of my sweatpants and a shirt before she got into it. It looked absolutely ridiculous on her, especially when she put her white hat on top of her head, but she walked around as if she didn’t have any trouble.
“Ready?” I asked.
I held out my hand for her and she took it without a second thought.
We walked slowly through the snow and I watched as it crunched all the way up to her thighs. This snowstorm had really buried us in here and I kept her behind me, just in case we hit a hole. The last thing I needed was for her to fall waist-deep in snow and not be able to get her out.
But there was one place I wanted to show her I knew she would love.
We climbed the steady incline and I could hear her huffing behind me. Her pace was slowing down and I knew her ankle was starting to bother her. I gripped her hand and slowed my pace down as the hill finally crested into a flat piece of land. Then, I pulled her up alongside me before I heard her gasp.
“Oh my gosh.”
This was my favorite part of this area of the woods. If you continued to climb the rest of the mountain I was on, there was a flat top that overlooked the whole of Gatlinburg. You could see the mountains that surrounded the city with their white tops and their gray-scale sides and, at night, the valley was lit up with glowing lights.
Her eyes sparkled while she took in the view and I had a hard time not focusing solely on her.
“It’s beautiful up here,” she said.
“It is,” I said, my eyes dancing around her face.
“I bet the sunsets from here are breathtaking,” she said.
“They are.”
“This is the reason you live here, isn’t it?” she asked.
“Partially,” I said.
“Are we going back to the one-word answers?” she asked playfully.
I studied her one last time before I turned my gaze out toward the skyline. Then, I drew a deep breath before I began to talk.
“I knew I wanted to be in the military ever since I was fifteen,” I said.
Her gaze immediately whipped over to my face but I kept my stare locked on the town below us.
“I’d always known that was my path. When you enlist, they give you this test to see how smart you are and see what jobs you’d be a good fit for. I laughed at first when my enlisting officer suggested I become a medic but the idea grew on me all through basic training.”
I could feel her eyes on me and I hoped she could forgive the fact that I just couldn’t go any further right now.
“I wanted to help and make my country proud,” I said. “That was it.”
“Did you enjoy it?” she asked.
“I did. For a very long time.”
“What happened?”
I gripped her hand tightly in mine before I closed my eyes and sighed.
“Like you said. It was similar to what happened with you and your career.”
“Ah, my train wreck of a job choice,” she said. “The money sounded so good until I realized what I was actually doing.”
“Leaving your job was very brave,” I said. “You know that, right? You stuck with your morals. Not everyone does that.”
“Is that what you think you did?” she asked. “You think you abandoned your morals somehow?”
I tensed up and felt my body grow rigid.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“Don’t be. It’s just… a lot.”
“If it makes you feel any better, at least you had a plan. This cabin. This mountain. Hiding away.”
“I’m not hiding away,” I said.
“Yes, you are,” she said. “At least call it what it is. But it’s better than what I’ve got going for me, which is nothing.”
“You have a law degree and experience in the corporate sector,” I said. “That’s not something to simply spit at.”
“It’s nice to know you were listening,” she said, smiling.
I brought her hand to my lips to kiss and I watched her turn her gaze toward me. I could see the reflection of the sun in her eyes while the red tint of her cheeks grew deeper. I had no idea what possessed me to show such a public display of affection toward her, but it seemed natural.
Everything with her seemed more natural than I could’ve ever expected.
“I don’t know where to go from here,” she said. “After all of this, I don’t even go back to a home. Or an apartment. I go back to living with my best friend.”
“That doesn’t sound so bad,” I said.
“It does when you realize the only things I own are safely tucked away in my car at the resort.”
“Everything you own?” I asked.
“Yep. All my clothes, books, and furniture.”
“You have furniture in your car,” I said.
“My blow-up mattress, yes.”
Furrowing my brow at her, I watched her shoulders roll back. I watched as her eyes glazed over and I knew what that meant. She turned her gaze back out toward the city but that wasn’t what she was seeing at all. She was allowing herself to slip into the past. She was allowing her memories to consume her.
I would’ve never thought this beautiful, vibrant woman would’ve had memories that swept her away like that.
“Sorry,” she said, mumbling.
“No need to be,” I said. “It happens sometimes.”
“I admire you for having a plan of action afterward,” she said.
“You’ll come up with one,’ I said. “It takes an intelligent person to obtain a law degree. You’ll figure it out.”
But she didn’t seem at all convinced that she would.
“Could I make you dinner tonight?” she asked.
“What?”
“Dinner. Tonight. Would you let me cook it?”
“Any particular reason?” I asked.
“Just as a thank you. For bringing me here. For opening up a little bit. I know how hard that must’ve been for you. I want to thank you for letting me get to know you a little bit.”
Our heads turned and our eyes connected once again before I nodded my head. She smiled up at me before she threw her arms around my neck, elated at the fact that I was going to let her cook again. The fact that something so simple made her so happy, struck me. Could happiness really be that easy? I pulled her close to my body while the scenery around us faded into the background and, for just a moment, I closed my eyes and allowed myself to imagine.
I imagined us dancing around a ballroom with a beautiful dress fluttering around her body. I imagined us holding one another in bed while I slept peacefully at her side. I imagined us laughing with one another on the couch by the fireplace while we talked about memories from our childhood.
Then she released my body and we headed back toward the cabin while the images receded to the back of my mind. I had no idea what this woman had opened up and I had no idea how long she was going to be with me but maybe Paxton was right about more than one thing.
Maybe this wasn’t just about me opening up and talking to someone. Maybe this was about making a connection with someone so I felt a little less alone in this world.
But what would happen once the snow melted and she was gone?