Thorne Range shifts colors almost imperceptibly each day—green deepening to gold at the edges, a warning of the cold to come. The mountains stand indifferent to my loss, their jagged peaks piercing the sky just as they always have.
Inside, nothing changes. Nothing moves forward.
The rangers came by after she left, faces drawn with awkward sympathy. Their trucks announced their arrival long before their boots hit my porch steps—an intrusion I would normally resent but somehow welcomed in my desperate isolation.
"She okay?" Bill asked, leaning against my porch rail, his weathered face carefully arranged to hide his concern.
My eyes flicked to the empty chair where Emma used to sit watching the sunset, her camera always within reach.
"I have no idea," was all I could manage, the words scraping raw from my throat. The truth of them hollowed me out completely. Somewhere in the city, she was living a life I couldn't see or touch, while I remained frozen in the moment of her leaving.
Nights stretch endlessly without her warmth, her smile, her laughter. Dreams taunt with phantom touches, her scent lingers in sheets I can't bring myself to wash. The pillow she used remains on her side of the bed, dented with the memory of her head. Some mornings, waking feels like losing her all over again.
The trailback from the northern ridge cuts deep into my legs, my muscles burn from twelve hours of clearing deadfall. Physical exhaustion—the only remedy I've found for thoughts of Emma that plague every waking moment. Stars puncture thedarkening sky as the cabin comes into view, nestled against the mountainside like it's grown there naturally.
Something feels different tonight.
Something that feels—then my nose doubles down on that thought.
Wait a damn minute.
Smoke curls from the chimney.
My heart seizes, breath catching painfully in my chest. The axe slips from suddenly nerveless fingers as blood rushes in my ears. No strangers would venture this far into Thorne Range, not with night falling. Not to my cabin.
The distance to the porch disappears under my boots. The door swings open before I reach it, and there she stands, haloed in golden light, wearing my flannel shirt like she never left.
"You're home late," Emma says, voice soft but steady. Green eyes lock with mine, searching for a reaction.
The world narrows to her face—the constellation of freckles across her nose, a slight tremble in her lower lip. For a suspended moment, we stand frozen, the space between us electrified after a month of absence.
Then we collide.
Her body meets mine with such force it steals what little breath remains in my lungs. Hands grasp, clutch, confirm. My fingers tangle in her hair, pulling her head back to expose her throat. Her fingernails dig into my shoulders through my shirt. There's desperation in the way we touch—frantic, almost violent in its need.
"Wyatt," she gasps against my mouth.
The sound of my name on her lips is almost enough to push me over the edge. I fucking missed it so much. We stumble through the door, unwilling to separate long enough for grace. Her legs wrap around my waist as I carry her across the living room, knocking a chair aside in our haste. The bedroom seems miles away.
We don't make it there.
The couch catches us as we fall, a mix of grasping hands and urgent mouths. Clothes tear in our impatience. Buttons pop, and fly. Her skin burns beneath my palms, real and alive and here.
My Emma.
When I finally push inside her, she cries out—a sound of homecoming that echoes through the cabin's rafters. God, she feels so fucking good.
So fucking mine.
Our bodies remember what words can't express. I take her with hard, merciless thrusts, and she gives as much as she gets. Hungrily grinding, her pussy possessing, devouring, needing. We move together with none of our usual finesse, just raw need and desperate connection.
A sense of desperation begins to build, pleasure collecting and coiling in tight spirals.
When she comes, her entire body trembles beneath mine, tears tracking silently down her temples into her hair. She clings to me in shuddering spasms, and that's when I snap.
My own release follows immediately, torn from somewhere deep inside me I thought had died when she left, just my body responding in thick, liquid pulses.
Afterward, we lie tangled together, her head on my chest, my arms locked around her as though she might evaporate if I loosen my hold. For long minutes, only our ragged breathing breaks the silence.
