She told me about her friend who’d texted her six times to make sure she hadn’t been murdered, about her mother who thought she was working on a ranch and kept sending her articles about agricultural careers.
We ate at the small table, and it should have been awkward. First meal as a married couple. Strangers playing house.
But it didn’t feel like that. And that was the scariest part.
She’d changed nothing about dinner except it felt different from every meal I’d eaten alone in this kitchen for six months. Fuller. Like the silence had texture now instead of just weight.
It didn’t take us long to put the food on the table—and become aware that we were alone in a cabin.
On our wedding night.
“So,” she said, poking at her salad. “This is weird, right? Our wedding night, but... not.”
“It’s our wedding night,” I said, my voice dropping. I watched her tongue dart out to catch a drop of dressing on her lip. My grip on my fork tightened. “Just not the kind people write songs about.”
“Right. Because we’re not... doing the thing.”
“We’re not,” I confirmed, though every cell in my body was screaming for me to change my mind.
“Good. Great. Same page.” She bit her lip—a nervous habit that made me want to reach across the table and thumb her mouth open.
“Same page,” I lied.
We shared a few more tidbits of conversation and then dinner was done. She finished her wine and stood up, gathering up the dishes. I stopped her with a hand on her arms. “I’ve got them.”
“Right.” She looked around as if trying to come up with a reason to stay. She couldn’t find one and I couldn’t bring myself to give her one. Or two or hell, a half dozen.
“I should probably get some sleep. It’s been a long day.” Her smile this time was a very dull version of the ones she had been giving me.
The longest. “Yes, it has.”
“Okay then. Good night, Thorne.”
“Good night.” She headed down the hallway, still in that dress, her hair a dark cascade down her back. “Maddie.”
She stopped, turned. “Yeah?”
I wanted to tell her she was beautiful. I wanted to tell her that I hadn’t felt this alive in years.
“I’m glad you’re here,” I said instead. It was the truest thing I could manage.
Her expression softened. “Thanks, mountain man.”
Then she was gone and I was alone in the kitchen on my wedding night.
CHAPTER FOUR
Maddie
Being a mountain wife was a lot more boring than the movies had led me to believe. There were no musical montages of me picking berries in a sun hat, mostly because Thorne had warned me that the berries currently in season would probably kill me within the hour.
It had been two days since the wedding, and the isolation was starting to itch, even though I said this was exactly what I wanted. Peace. And quiet. I had gotten the quiet, but not the peace.
How could I be peaceful when my body was feeling all sorts of questionable things when my husband-in-name-only kept walking around looking like a lollipop I wanted to lick.
And he was avoiding me. Obviously so. He spent his mornings disappearing into the woods or working in the large shed behind the cabin, emerging only for meals where he’d grunt a few responses to my chatter before retreating back into his broody shell. Or going to bed before the sun set.
I knew the man got up at the butt crack of dawn, but really?
