"We should get going.” I step away to gather my things.
Noah nods, respecting the space I've created. He efficiently packs up our makeshift camp, returning the cabin to its original state while I tidy my hair as best I can without a mirror. We work together in companionable silence, the air between us charged but not uncomfortable.
Before we leave, Noah pulls me into a kiss—slow, thorough, his hand curved around the back of my neck like he's memorizing the shape of this moment.
"Just to be clear," he murmurs against my lips, voice low and full of quiet fire, "I'm not hiding this. I'm not ashamed of you. Of us."
"I'm not asking you to be," I whisper. "I just... need time. To figure out what this means. Where it goes."
"Fair." He leans back just enough to look at me. "Come to the cabin tonight. Let me cook for you. Stay with me."
The simplicity of the invitation catches me off guard. No grand declarations. No ultimatums. Just a man asking a woman to have dinner. To stay.
"That sounds dangerously normal," I say, and the corner of his mouth curves.
"Maybe that's what we need. Normal. After everything."
He's right, and the rightness of it settles something in my chest. Not the breathless, edge-of-a-cliff feeling from when we were young. Something warmer. Steadier. Like finding solid ground after years of treading water.
"Okay," I say. "I'll be there."
Something lights behind his eyes—not triumph, not hunger. Relief.
He kisses my forehead, lets his lips linger there, and I feel the words he doesn't say pressed into my skin.
"Ready to face civilization?" he asks, stepping back.
"Not in the slightest."
He laughs—a real one, warm and surprised—and threads his fingers through mine.
"I don't want slow," I tell him as we reach the door. "I wantright. And this... this is right."
He doesn't kiss me.
Not yet.
Instead, he pulls me down the narrow trail with purposeful strides, our fingers still laced together. Neither of us speaks. We don't need to. The tension crackling between us says everything, and I match his pace without hesitation, my heart hammering so hard I can feel it in my fingertips.
By the time we reach his cabin, dusk has bled fully into night. He opens the door and ushers me inside, then closes it behind us. The click of the latch sounds like a held breath finally released.
We stand in the fire-warmed room, facing each other. The space between us feels electric, loaded with ten years and everything we just promised on that mountainside.
Noah reaches for me first—his hand finding my jaw, tilting my face up. But he doesn't kiss me. Not yet. He just looks at me, and the raw wanting in his expression makes my chest ache.
"Hi," he says softly, almost laughing. Like he can't believe we're here.
"Hi." My voice shakes, and I don't care.
I reach for the hem of his shirt. My fingers are trembling—actually trembling—and he notices. His hand covers mine, steadying it.
"We've got time," he murmurs.
"I've waited ten years. I don't want time." I pull the shirt over his head, and then he's standing in the firelight, and my breath stops.
He's broader than I remember. Harder. The lean boy I knew has been replaced by someone carved from years of physical labor, of hauling hose and breaking through walls. A scar I don't recognize curves along his left rib. I trace it with my fingertip, and he shivers.
"House fire," he says. "Three years ago."
