Still, I force myself to move slowly. I’ll be dammed if I’m going to scare her away. Now that I’ve found my girl, I’ll do everything in my power to keep her. And if that means controlling every single one of my physical urges to take her to bed, make love to her until she cries out my name and claim her as my woman, I’ll do it.
For now.
I top up her wine glass and resettle myself into the chair before telling her about my family and life on the mountain. Born and raised in Rock Creek, life in a remote mountain town was all I knew, and all I ever want to know. I hoped like hell I wasn’t making it sound too wild or feral. I desperately want her to love it here.
“It sounds amazing.” She shifts on the couch and the flannel she’s wearing creeps a little higher up her thigh. My fingers itch to walk up that sensitive skin and find the sweetness beyond.
Instead, I clear my throat. “It is, mostly.”
“It’s so beautiful here and peaceful. The perfect place to raise a child. Why do you say, mostly?”
It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell her that the only thing that would make my life better was to have her in it permanently. Waking up with her sweet warm body in my arms, and kissing those lips every day while I watched her soft belly grow with the child I put in her, would be the one thing to make lifeperfect.
But there’s no way I can say that. Bad ankle or not, she’d run screaming out of here. I’m not going to risk it.
“Tell me what you want to do now that you’ve quit school?” I ask instead.
For a moment I think she’ll challenge the way I avoided her question. But to my surprise, she takes a sip of wine and says, “All I’ve ever wanted was to be a wife and mother.”
I almost choke. “What?”
She blushes hard, her cheeks turning a bright red. “I know, it sounds so old fashioned and anti feminist and all that. I wasn’t even going to tell you.”
“There’s nothing you can’t tell me, sweetheart.”
Her smile is shy and sweet. “You know what’s even crazier?”
Nothing about what she’s said so far was crazy. In fact, it all sounds pretty fucking good to me. I tell her as much.
“I’ve never even…” she shrugs and ducks her head.
“Never, what?”
“I’ve never had a boyfriend,” Sophie admits. “I was always so busy studying, there was never time. And I guess…well…I’m not really the type of girl boys fight over.”
“Maybe not boys, sweetheart.” My voice is low, only barely controlled. “But thismanwould go to war for you.”
She sucks in a breath and looks away.
Shit.I went too far.
I’m good at a lot of things. Chopping wood, building houses, and even raising a son, but I’d be damned if I knew how to properly talk to a woman. Not when it mattered. And this woman definitely matters.
Instead of sticking my foot even further into my mouth, I jump up from my chair and move into the kitchen. “Ready for dessert?”
Sophie
The chilli was amazing,but when Griff hands me a warm gooey cinnamon bun, I think maybe I’ve died and gone to heaven. I close my eyes with every single bite and let the sweet sensation of the sugary goodness wash through me.
“I don’t think I can be held responsible for my actions if you keep eating like that.”
I snap my eyes open to see Griff holding himself perfectly still across from me. His knuckles are white from gripping the arms of the chair, his strong forearms flex with the effort. His blueeyes bore into me and send a shiver racing through me directly to my core.
Never mind the fact that he’s just said he’d go to war for me.
Oh. My. God.
Maybe this is what’s been missing all this time? I’d been entertaining the idea of a boy. When what I really needed was a man.
