My knees are weak, so I lean into the wall, flattening her to me. I nuzzle my face into her neck, taking a deep breath. She’s so warm and perfect.
A hard wind blows snow against my back. It takes a few seconds for reality to wink back into existence.
Right. A tree fell on my cabin, destroying some of my hard work.
Keeping my forehead pressed into Brie’s shoulder, I roll my head enough to look back at the damage. All in all, it could have been so much worse. At least two of the floor-to-ceiling windows are partially shattered at the back of the house, tree branches sticking through them like welcoming arms letting in the snow. Through the intact windows, I can see the huge oak sitting precisely where the brand new covered porch was about half an hour ago. In the back of my mind, I wonder about damage to the cabin roof, but I’m not sure I really care right now with Brie still clutching to me.
“Nuh-uh,” I grunt when she starts to unwrap her legs. I hold tight, keeping her where she is for as long as she’ll let me. It could be the last time. I don’t know what she was going to say before the tree fell. All she said wasokay. That could mean anything.Okay, but I never want to see you again.Okay, but your sorry excuses make me hate you more. Orokay, but I’m leaving town when the roads are cleared.
She tightens her hold on me, squeezing me back, and I breathe her in. It’s enough to make a grown man cry. With happiness. With hope. With desperation.
Another whistle, another cold gust against my back, and I know we can’t stay like this. I step back, and she gingerly drops her feet to the ground. We still have unfinished business to discuss, but there’s a gaping hole in my cabin and temperatures are only going to plummet.
Aaaand the evidence of my climax is trapped in my underwear, sticking uncomfortably as I move. This is . . . kind of gross.
“Listen,” I say. “You’re not going to try and walk out on me again, are you?”
She drags her teeth over her pillowy bottom lip, her cheekbones high. “Not tonight.”
I let out a relieved breath. “Okay. I—I just need a minute in the bathroom. But I’ve gotta take care of this.” I point my thumb at the giant hole in my house. “It’s going to be dark soon.”
“Got it. No problem. Go.”
After a quick clean-up, I come out to Brie sweeping up the glass, and my heart squeezes tight. It’s so domestic, like she’s right where she belongs. With me.
This is a fucking emergency, Sawyer, don’t read too much into it.
She turns to me. “What do we do?”
“Keep doing that while I use a chainsaw to cut down the closest branches. Then I’ll cover the windows with plywood.” She nods dutifully, and my heart squeezes again. “Thanks.”
It takes thirty minutes to get the worst branches out of the way. I have to do it at awkward angles, holding the chainsaw over my head at times, being extra careful of kickback and where the branches fall. Sawdust and mulch rain down on me, splattering against my safety glasses, but I’m in too much of a hurry to be tidy about it.
When I have enough of a clearing, I take a ladder to assess any damage to the roof over the main cabin. Luckily, it’s in decent shape.
“Alright,” I call to Brie through the opening.
She’s nearly done sweeping up the extra mess I caused.
“I’m going to cover this up,” I tell her.
It’s fortunate that I’ve been lazy about returning extra materials, wanting to do it all at once rather than stand at customer service multiple times at the big box hardware store in Ridgedale.
I’m hefting a sheet of plywood onto the ruined porch when Brie appears. Without a word, she takes one side and helps me angle it over the window frame. She holds up one side while I hold my end with one hand and screw the corners in with the other, making quicker work than if I were alone.
She watches as I take my nailgun to secure the edges—a quick fix for an emergency. I haven’t installed the floodlights out here yet, and it’s getting too dark to see well. The town’s streetlights are distant winks from where we stand.
I keep my eyes on the gun, heart in my throat, and say, “You were going to say something before the tree interrupted us . . .”and I dry humped you to completion.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see her shift.
“I’d like to know what you were going to say,” I press.
She sucks in a breath. “I’m not going to get over everything that happened between us from one conversation.”
My heart plummets. It’s what I should have expected.
“But I think” —she seems to be weighing her words— “maybe we could, like, work through it.”
