Page 69 of Beastly Mountain Man

“Good.” Her eyes closed.

I waited a moment.

“You still awake?”

“Completely.”

Less than a minute later, her breathing slowed.

I smiled into her hair.

The morning rounds, brunch, snow, hot shower, and sex had caught up with me too, but sleep took longer.

Caprice was wearing sweatpants I’d ruined in the dryer and one of my shirts. Bear slept at the foot of the bed. Wet winter gear hung in my mudroom. Back at the rental, her suitcase and closed laptop were waiting, along with leftover pasta and the chocolate cake we still hadn’t eaten.

There was nothing temporary-looking about any of it.

That was what got me.

I could picture Caprice here after an ordinary workday, talking through something that had happened on set while I cooked. I could picture her laptop open at my kitchen table because she had work she genuinely wanted to finish, then closed when she was done. I could picture Bear under her feet and her suitcase appearing in the hallway often enough that it eventually stopped feeling like luggage.

None of those pictures required Caprice to become somebody else.

Her career mattered to her. The pace mattered. The work mattered.

So did this.

Four days were going to end. The storm would clear, and she’d go back to the life she’d built.

What I wanted was the chance for her to choose her way back to me.

Chapter Five

The first thing I noticed when I woke was that the room had changed color.

The bright white glare from the snow had softened into a blue-gray wash across Lucky’s bedroom, which meant I had been asleep long enough for the afternoon to move on without consulting me.

The second thing I noticed was his shirt.

Soft charcoal cotton covered me almost to mid-thigh, and the sleeves had bunched around my wrists sometime while I slept. The shrunken sweatpants were still tied securely at my waist, although calling them my size remained generous.

Apparently six-foot-four and five-foot-nothing were not natural wardrobe-sharing partners.

Bear was still on the floor near the foot of the bed, his back against the frame and his breathing deep enough to suggest he had also committed fully to the nap.

Lucky was still beside me on his back, one arm bent beneath the pillow. His dark T-shirt had ridden up slightly above the waistband of his sweats, exposing a narrow strip of skin I appreciated before I started thinking about less pleasant subjects.

My body felt warm, loose, and deeply rested.

I had no idea what time it was.

That realization should have sent me reaching for the nearest clock.

Instead, I stayed where I was.

No alarm had dragged me awake. No notification had worked its way into my sleep. I hadn’t opened my eyes already assembling the next three things that needed to happen.

I had simply slept until I was finished sleeping.