"I see you, Tessa." His thumb traced along her jaw. "I've seen you since the day you walked into my cottage with a door code and a suitcase and turned my whole damn life upside down."
She laughed, a small, surprised sound. "I ruined your peace and quiet."
"You ruined everything." He was smiling, and he couldn't remember the last time that had happened so easily. "I was perfectly content being miserable, and you had to come along and make me want things."
"What things?"
He didn't answer with words. He leaned across the console and kissed her, one hand sliding into her hair, the other cupping the back of her neck. She made a soft sound against his mouth and kissed him back, her fingers curling into the front of his shirt.
The gear shift was digging into his ribs. He didn't care.
When they finally broke apart, both breathing harder than they should have been, Tessa's eyes were dark. "Inside?"
"Yeah." His voice came out rough. "Inside."
---
The cabin smelled like cedar and dust and something faintly smoky, the way places did when they'd been heated by wood fires for decades. Brian found the light switch, and a lamp in the corner flickered to life, casting warm shadows across the knotty pine walls.
There was a stone fireplace on one wall, a worn leather couch facing it. A small kitchen with a propane stove. A doorway leading to what he assumed was the bedroom.
Tessa stood in the middle of the room, arms wrapped around herself. Not from cold. From something else.
"Hey." He crossed to her, tilted her chin up with two fingers. "We don't have to do anything. We can just sleep. I'll take the couch."
"I don't want you to take the couch."
"Okay."
"I don't want to sleep, either."
His pulse kicked up. "Okay."
She reached up and laid her palm flat against his chest, right over his heart. He wondered if she could feel how fast it was beating.
"I've been running for so long," she said quietly. "From Chicago. From the hospital. From everything that happened. And then I came here, and I thought I'd keep running. But I don't want to run from this." Her eyes met his. "From you."
Brian covered her hand with his, pressing it harder against his chest. "I'm not going anywhere."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
She rose up on her toes and kissed him.
This kiss was different from the ones in the truck. Slower. More deliberate. She traced the seam of his lips with her tongue, and he opened for her, tasting coffee and something sweet. His hands found her waist, fingers sliding under the hem of her shirt to touch warm skin.
She inhaled sharply at the contact.
"Okay?" he murmured against her mouth.
"Don't stop."
He walked her backward toward the bedroom, one slow step at a time. His mouth found the curve of her neck, and she tilted her head to give him better access, her fingers threading through his hair. Her nails scraped lightly against his scalp, and heat pooled low in his belly.
The back of her knees hit the bed. She sat down on the edge, looking up at him with those green eyes that had undone him from the very first moment.
"You're still dressed," she said.
