Want surges, hot and insistent, but it’s threaded through with something steadier, something that feels suspiciously like hope. Like future.
We take our time.
There’s no rush, no performance. Just whispered names, soft laughter when we bump elbows or get tangled in the quilt, quiet gasps when a touch lands exactly right. Every moment feels likeanother line of some story I didn’t know I wanted—one where intimacy isn’t about distraction, but about being seen.
At some point, the lamp gets switched off, and the room goes mostly dark, lit only by the faint glow from the stove below and the occasionally wild beat of my pulse in my ears. We move in that half-light, trusting hands and breath and the sound of each other more than sight.
Whatever happens between us in this bed—what we share here—that’s ours. Private. Something I won’t narrate to anyone, not even the memory that likes to replay the worst parts of my life.
All I’ll let myself hold onto is this…
Her head tipped back on my pillow, lips swollen from my kisses.
The feel of her fingers gripping my shoulders, like she’s anchoring herself to me and not to the storm or the mountain or the idea of a story.
The way she says my name when she’s not trying to be careful with it.
The moment after, when everything goes quiet and neither of us moves, both of us breathing hard, holding onto each other like a lifeline.
She settles against my chest, her leg thrown over mine, claiming space like she belongs there.
She does.
My hand finds her hair, stroking slow, heartbeat finally easing as the adrenaline drains away and something softer takes its place.
“Hey,” she murmurs, voice drowsy, lips brushing my skin. “You okay?”
I think about all the nights I’ve lain awake in this cabin with nothing but ghosts and bells for company.
Then I think about this one, with her heartbeat pressed against my ribs and her breath warm over my heart.
“Yeah,” I say quietly, and mean it all the way down. “I’m okay.”
She hums, content, eyes already sliding closed.
Tomorrow, I’ll put her in my truck and drive her back down the mountain. Tomorrow, we’ll talk about texts and miles and what comes next.
But tonight, on this last snowbound night, in this bed that finally feels like it’s holding more than memories, I make myself another promise:
I’m not letting this be a closed chapter.
I’m going to see her again beyond the snow and the sleigh and the storm.
Because for the first time in a long time, the future doesn’t look like a blank stretch of white.
It looks like a road with her at the other end.
THIRTEEN
IVY
Leaving the cabin feels a little like trying to leave a dream while I’m still half-asleep.
The world below is back to normal—roads plowed, sky a bright, almost smug blue—but up here everything still feels suspended. There’s a coffee mug by the sink with my lipstick on it. A quilt rumpled from a night that changed everything. Rhett’s flannel on the back of a chair like he might shrug into it and pull me into another kiss before we go.
“Got everything?” he asks, leaning in the doorway, keys in hand. Sunlight cuts across his shoulders, making him look like some kind of lumberjack angel.
“I think so,” I say, checking my tote bag again. Phone, charger, stabilizer, camera cards, laptop. Socks. Feelings. All present and accounted for, even the ones that don’t fit neatly in any pocket.
