But what had really enthralled me, what had kept me hanging on Coop’s every word, was hearing about Garnet Bend.
His voice had painted pictures in the darkness, and my photographer’s eye had automatically translated them into images. The way he described the morning light hitting the mountains. A tiny town in Wyoming with a population that could fit in a single Seattle high-rise. Wide-open spaces where you could breathe,really breathe, without feeling like the world was pressing in on you.
It was crazy that we’d both ended up in Montana. After he’d left, life in Seattle had been hard. Every street corner held a memory, every coffee shop a ghost of what we’d been. Then after the accident… The city that had once felt exciting became suffocating. All those people, all those buildings towering over me, creating canyon-like streets that triggered my claustrophobia even in open air.
I’d fled to Billings, thinking smaller would be better. And it was, compared to Seattle. But even with only a tenth of Seattle’s population, Billings had started feeling too crowded lately.
But Garnet Bend… The way Coop described it, Garnet Bend sounded perfect.
Pawsitive Connections with their therapy animals. Al Pacacino. The name had made me giggle, Coop grinning at my reaction like my laughter was a gift. I could picture it perfectly—the alpaca’s haughty expression, the way it would tilt its head just so, creating the ideal portrait angle.
Resting Warrior Ranch, where soldiers who’d been broken by war could find peace. Space where they could roam, where the weight of what they’d seen and done could ease just a little. I understood that need for space, for room to exist without walls closing in.
His friends sounded like characters from a story, but the kind you desperately wanted to be real. Beckett, who trained security dogs, but whose kitten, Chaos, had zero respect for his authority. I’d giggled at the image of this tough military guy being bossed around by eight ounces of attitude, imagining the composition—large man, tiny kitten, the contrast that would tell the whole story. I’d also shoot Audra in the picture, the woman Coop told me about, whom Beckett had fallen in love with recently when she’d shown up out of nowhere.
Lark, who ran the whole Pawsitive Connections operation with compassion and efficiency, who understood that sometimes healing came with four legs and unconditional love.
Travis, the tech genius who’d found ways to be useful to his team without leaving his house, working through whatever demons kept him isolated but not alone.
Every word had painted a picture of a place where broken people could find wholeness. Where trauma was understood, not judged. Where community meant something real, not just proximity.
“I want to see it all,” I whispered before I could stop myself, the words escaping into the morning air like a wish I couldn’t take back.
The body behind me went completely still, then Coop was rolling me onto my back, looming over me with an intensity that stole my breath. His eyes searched mine, and whatever he found there transformed his expression into something fierce and protective and absolutely certain.
“You will.” He cupped my face, thumb brushing my cheekbone with reverent gentleness. “We’re going to get out of this alive, Mia. Both of us. I’m going to take you to Garnet Bend and show you everything. Every single thing I told you about.”
“Coop—” Somehow I didn’t mind calling him that now. He’d told me that’s what they called him at home in Garnet Bend.
Coop wasn’t the enemy.Coopwas part of all the elements that made up Ryan Cooper.
“If this is fate’s fucked-up way of giving us a second chance, I’m not losing it. Not losing you. Not again.”
His mouth crashed down on mine, the kiss desperate and promising and everything I wanted to believe in. I wrapped my arms around his neck, pulling him closer, feeling the solid weight of him anchor me to this moment, this hope, this possibility of a future I’d stopped letting myself imagine.
My body was tender from last night, muscles deliciously sore in ways I’d forgotten they could be. But when he settled between my thighs, when I felt his cock hard against me, that soreness became irrelevant. I wanted him again. Wanted the connection, the closeness, the confirmation that this was real.
He slid his hand down my side, fingers tracing the curve of my hip, and I arched into him, ready to lose myself again?—
The sound of engines shattered the morning silence like gunfire.
Multiple vehicles, their approach unmistakable on the gravel road, growing louder with each second.
We both froze, Coop’s entire body going rigid above me. His head snapped up, and I watched the transformation happen—lover to warrior in a heartbeat. The tenderness in his eyes hardened to tactical assessment. The gentle hand on my hip became a weapon-ready fist.
“Oliver’s back.” His jaw clenched.
We scrambled out of bed, throwing on clothes with the efficiency of people who’d gotten too used to danger. My hands shook as I pulled on jeans, the fabric rough against skin that still held the memory of Coop’s touch. The contrast was jarring—from safety to threat in seconds.
“The cameras,” I said, the words tight with returning fear. “What do we do about them? They’re going to know we messed with them.”
“We put them back where we found them. Exactly where we found them. Oliver’s men will check them first thing, probably assume the lightning surge from last night’s storm fried them.”
“They’ll replace them?”
“Without a doubt. Probably today.” He pulled his shirt on, muscles rippling with controlled tension. “Which means we’re back to only talking freely in the bathroom. I’ll make sure to keep that area clear.”
I nodded, trying to shift my mind-set from the woman who’d spent the night rediscovering love to the woman who needed to survive this hell. Thoughts about Garnet Bend, about meeting Al Pacacino and watching Chaos terrorize Beckett, about meeting Coop’s friends and finding a place where I could finally breathe—I had to lock them away where they couldn’t distract me.
