She searches my face, finding the seriousness there. She nods. "Okay."
I step out onto the porch. The cold hits me again, but I don't feel it.
I have a job to do.
I walk down the steps, boots crunching. I head back toward the tree line. Back toward the threat.
The mountains are beautiful, but unforgiving. They chew up the weak and spit them out.
Avery is soft. Light. She doesn't belong in a war zone.
So I will make sure the war never reaches her.
I reach the spot where the confrontation happened. Snow churned up. Drops of bright red blood on the white powder where the smoker fell.
I kick fresh snow over it, burying the evidence.
I look at the tracks leading away. They were running. Good.
I turn toward Avery’s cabin and pull out my multi-tool.
I spend the next three hours reinforcing the door frame. I check the windows. I find the loose board on the back deck where someone could pry it open, and I nail it down with long, jagged spikes I find in her shed.
When I’m done, the place is still a wreck, but a tighter one.
I stand back, wiping sweat from my brow despite the cold.
The door is reinforced, but the radio crackles with a new frequency. Not Logan. A scrambled city signal.
“We see you, Big Man. One cabin isn't the whole mountain.”
I grip my Sig Sauer. They weren't just scouts—they were a vanguard of their own. They think they can wait for the thaw. They don't realize that on this ridge, I am the storm.
This is my territory. She is my woman.
Anyone foolish enough to cross that line will pay the price
7
AVERY
The door slams shut, cutting off the howl of the wind. Cold clings to Oliver like a second skin.
He stands there, massive back to me, shaking snow from his shoulders. He looks like a mountain—immovable, rugged, capped in white. The tension radiating off him is thick enough to taste. Gone is the heavy static of wanting that’s filled the cabin for twenty-four hours. The air feels sharp now. Metallic.
Dangerous.
"You okay?" My voice sounds small in the cavernous room. I sit on the rug by the fire, nursing lukewarm coffee, wrapped in a blanket that smells of him.
Oliver turns slowly. His jaw sets hard, a muscle feathering near his ear. His eyes, usually that warm mossy green, look dark. Guarded. He scans the room, checking corners, measuring distances.
"Fine," he grunts. He strips off his heavy canvas jacket and hangs it on the peg. His movements are stiff. Agitated. "Just checking the perimeter. Storm’s doing a number on the ridge."
Lying. Or holding back the full truth.
"I’ve learned to read him. I know the tight set of his jaw at a drafty window, the softness in his gaze when he thinks I’m not looking." This isn’t annoyance. This is adrenaline. He vibrates with it.
He walks past me toward the kitchen. No touch. No kiss on my head or hand down my arm like this morning. He moves like a predator pacing its cage.
