Page 18 of Frosty Mountain Man

“Why?”

“Because I’ve spent ten years being the man who lets people go and doesn’t chase. It’s worked out fine for me. It’s easier. Nobody gets to leave a mark if you never let them stay long enough to leave one.” I stopped, my hands still at her collar, not moving away. “Then you actually walked out and I found out real fast that theory doesn’t survive with you meaning something to me. So I chased you.”

Her breath caught, and I watched her decide, in real time, whether to keep fighting or let this actually land. “You chased after me without a shirt. Or shoes.”

“That I did.”

“You were mad—”

“At the situation. Not at you.”

“That’s not an apology.”

“I know. I’m not good at those either. Give me time.”

“Do we have time?”

“Yes, Elle. We do. Because you’re not going anywhere. Not even when the snow melts.”

She wound her arms around my neck. “I’m not?”

“No. You’re not.”

I reached up, brushed melting snow out of her hair. “Here’s what I actually know. I don’t need anyone, Elle. Haven’t in ten years, and I was fine with that. But not needing someone and not wanting them aren’t the same thing. I want you the way I haven’t wanted anything since before that wedding that didn’t happen. Stay. Not because your car’s dead. Because I’m asking.”

She looked at me for a long moment.

“Okay,” she said. “But we’re still talking about your grandfather.”

“We’re still talking about my grandfather.”

“Now how about we go back to bed where you can warm me up for my heroic rescue of you.”

She stood on her tiptoes and pressed a kiss to the corner of my mouth. “How about you make good on the promise to spank me. I think I’m about to be a very, very bad girl.”

EPILOGUE

Harrison

The delivery truck came up the mountain twice a week now, which was twice a week more than it ever had.

“Another one?” Elle stood in the doorway in my flannel shirt and nothing else, watching the driver haul a box up the porch steps like it might be radioactive. “Harrison, that’s the third package this week.”

“Yesterday was a coincidence.”

“You ordered me a coffee grinder shaped like a bear.”

“That was practical. You complained about the old one.”

“I complained about the noise it made. Once. Eight months ago. You’re going to bankrupt yourself buying me things I didn’t ask for.”

“That’s what money’s for.”

“That’s not what money’s for.”

“It is now.” I walked outside and brought the box in. Even though she tried to hide it, I knew she was excited to see what was inside. She’d told me more about her childhood, and I’d shared more about mine. They hadn’t been that different in a fundamental way. Our parents hadn’t really been hands-on parents.

She hadn’t let me buy her a car. Hadn’t let me pay off the last of her student loans, though I’d offered twice and gotten shot down both times with a look that redefined the word stubborn. But a coffee grinder shaped like a bear, apparently, was a battle she wasn’t willing to die on, which told me everything about where her actual lines were and where they weren’t.