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“You can’t wear that,” he informs me flatly, gaze sharp.
“Why not?”
“Because you’re going to freeze, Boston. This isn’t a cozy New England winter, where you can pop into a Starbucks when your cheeks turn pink. We’re in the wilderness. I need you in layers.”
His unprecedented concern makes me scoff. “Thought you preferred me naked.”
“Shockingly, I prefer you alive and not frostbitten. Here.” He dips into his room and returns with a heavy flannel shirt. “Put that over.”
“I am not wearing your clothes,” I protest, holding the shirt at arm’s length.
“And yet you’ve spent hours with my cum on you.”
“Ugh, you’re disgusting.” But I put the shirt on anyway. Immediately, his smell consumes me: masculine and piney like the rest of the cabin, but clean and comforting all at once.
I hate how inexplicably safe the smell makes me feel.
We stop to put on our boots, jackets, hats, etcetera before Gus leads me out to the back of the property where forest meets cabin. Sure enough, there’s a trailhead that leads into the tree line.
The hike starts out easy enough. There’s snow on the trail, but the dense tree cover has caught most of it.
We’re silent, the cold too pronounced for us to make conversation. We don’t need it though. Even in silence, there’s an inexplicable comfort between us—like we both needed a walk after our fight. The frigid, fresh air erases tension like a pressure release. Briefly, animosity and annoyance fade from the space between us. The sound of crunching snow and morning birds replaces quips and insults.
Gus stays a step ahead of me, but glances back every few minutes. The movement is subtle, like he doesn’t want me to notice he’s watching. I see him though. It’s impossible to be in Gus Winter’s presence without fixating on the man. His presence commands attention, the kind of gravitas I would expect from a CEO of his caliber. I wonder if this is the person he was before he became a billionaire.
He'll surely never tell me.
I’m starting to get hot from hiking in so many layers when Gus stops and raps his knuckles on a tree trunk. There are two neat paint markings on the bark, white cutting a jarring interruption amid the trees. “See this,” Gus comments, raising his chin in my direction. “It’s a paint blaze. It means we need to turn right up here.”
So the man reads trails signs. Huh. I’ve met dozens of billionaires in my life, and I’m willing to wager none of the rest knows trail signs.
“You must hike a lot.”
He raises his shoulder. “I spend a lot of time on this trail. I used to hike it when I was a kid.”
“With your grandfather?”
“And grandmother. Back then, the land belonged to a family that owned a timber mill few miles from here. They used to let us on the property.”
“Wow. What are the chances that the land would go up for sale in your lifetime? I would imagine a family property would have stayed in their family.”
“Yeah, they wanted to pass it down,” he acknowledges. “But then I cut them a check for ten million dollars and they happily sold it to me.”
I stop in my tracks, but he keeps going, leaving me frowning in bewilderment before I rejoin him. When I’m by his side, he glances at me, thinking he’s slick. I see him grin, but only slightly. And I know that I—of all people—shouldn’t be impressed by a man with unlimited means spending enormous amounts of money on whatever he wants. Ten million dollars is a drop in a bucket for a billionaire. But a hiking trail, of all things? A hiking trail that he frequented with his grandparents? I hate to admit it…but it’s pretty cute.
Stop. Get your shit together.
I vow to focus on the walk and nothing more. Absolutely nothing more.
The trail takes us uphill as the line of trees dips lower into a gorge. Crisp blue-sky blankets us overhead now that the trees are clear. I breathe in, wondering if air has ever tasted so good before.
Rocky outcrops line one side of the trail, opposite the gorge. We continue until we emerge into another clearing. Here, Gus stops and pulls his backpack off his shoulder. “This is it,” he announces.
He motions for me to join him at the edge of the slope, and when I stand next to him I can see why he brought me here. We’re overlooking a vast expanse of green and white, grander than anything I’ve ever seen before.
“I like this spot,” he mentions, his breath fogging. “I think out here.”
“What do you think about?”
