She laughs, low and happy, rocking her hips just enough to make us both hiss.
“Good,” she says. “Because I’m not going anywhere.”
I flip her under me again, slow this time, kissing her deep while I start moving—gentle rolls that keep me buried, keep her full.
“Never letting you go,” I promise.
And I won’t.
She’s home.
She’s mine.
And tomorrow we start forever.
ELEVEN
WILLA
I wake slowly, the kind of deep, bone-warm sleep that makes the world feel soft around the edges. The quilts are heavy on my bare skin, tangled around my legs from the way Colt and I moved together earlier—slow and deep and filthy and perfect. My body still hums with the memory of him: the stretch, the heat, the way he growled “breed you” like a promise while he filled me until I overflowed. I stretch one arm across the empty side of the bed, expecting to find his solid warmth, but the sheets are cool.
The shower is running.
I smile into the pillow, eyes still closed. The faint hiss of water through the pipes is steady, comforting. He must have slipped out a few minutes ago, careful not to wake me. My heart does that stupid, fluttery thing it’s been doing since the moment I realized I love him. Not just want him—love him. The forever kind. The kind that has me already picturing waking up here every single morning, driving down to teach third grade in Iron Peak when the roads are clear, coming home to him and the horses and this quiet life we just decided on tonight.
I burrow deeper into the quilts, letting the smile linger. The cabin smells like us—woodsmoke, sex, his cedar-and-leather scent on my skin. My thighs are sticky with him, and the dull ache between my legs is the best kind of reminder. I’m safe. I’m his. Tomorrow we hand the flash drive to Sheriff Hank and this nightmare with Matthew ends for good. Then I’m staying. No more running. No more fear. Just Colt and me and the life we’re going to build on this mountain.
I close my eyes again, drifting, the shower a gentle lullaby.
A soft creak cuts through the water sound.
Not the usual groan of the cabin settling in the cold. This is deliberate. Floorboard in the main room, right by the front door. My eyes snap open. The bedroom door is still cracked the way we left it—four inches of darkness beyond. The shower is still running, steady. Colt’s in there. Naked. Unarmed. Singing? No, he doesn’t sing, but sometimes he hums low under the spray. I strain to hear it. Nothing. Just the water and my own heartbeat suddenly loud in my ears.
Another creak. Closer.
My stomach drops.
I sit up slowly, quilts pooling at my waist, bare breasts tightening in the chill that’s seeping under the door. I’m naked except for the faint sheen of dried sweat and Colt’s cum on my inner thighs. No time to grab clothes. I reach for the lamp on the nightstand—click. Nothing. Power’s out? No, the shower’s still going. Maybe just the bulb. My hand shakes as I fumble for the flannel I dropped on the floor earlier. My fingers brush denim instead—Colt’s jeans. I yank them toward me anyway, heart hammering so hard it hurts.
Footsteps now. Two sets. Heavy boots on pine boards, trying to be quiet and failing. Snow crunching faintly outside the window—someone on the porch.
Oh God.
They found us.
Matthew.
The name slams into me like a fist. I scramble off the bed, legs tangled in quilts, nearly falling. My ribs twinge where the bruise is still fading, but the real pain is terror, sharp and electric, flooding every nerve. I open my mouth to scream—Colt’s name, a warning, anything—but the bedroom door flies open before sound can leave my throat.
A black-gloved hand clamps over my mouth so hard my teeth cut into my lip. Another arm bands around my waist, lifting me clean off the floor. The flannel I was reaching for flutters uselessly to the ground. Cold air hits my naked skin. I kick wildly, heel connecting with something solid—shin, maybe—but the man holding me only grunts and squeezes tighter.
“Shhh, baby,” a voice I know too well murmurs against my ear. Matthew. That sickly-sweet cologne he always wore—something expensive and chemical that used to make me gag even when I was trying to love him. “Miss me?”
I scream against his palm. The sound is muffled, pathetic. My nails rake down his forearm, drawing blood, but he just laughs low, the sound vibrating through my back.
“Feisty as ever. Knew you’d fight.”
Another man—tall, ski mask, black jacket—steps into the room, eyes raking over my bare body with open hunger. “Nice view, Matt. You didn’t say she was this fine.”
