Braving the Storm (Crimson Ridge #2)

Chapter 44

T he gravel scrapes beneath my tires as I pull up in front of the cabin with a skid. If there’s any chance in hell of me making it to the airport to catch this fucking plane, I’m gonna need to haul ass.

I don’t bother removing the keys, hurling myself out the door, and refuse to pause, not even for the extra second it might take to shut it behind me. All I gotta find is a clean set of clothes and I’ll figure everything else out later.

Except, as I jump down, there’s a flicker of flames visible through the window that catches my eye. Smoke fills the air, hanging low and heavy with the cold dragging it down to ground level.

Fuck.

The cabin.

Instinct drives me as I race up the couple of steps, my heart in my mouth. Did I leave something on? Could the electrics have sparked?

Jesus. Please, no. I can’t lose this cabin. This is her home. What the fuck am I going to do if I lose this place, with all the best parts of my goddamn life all contained within these walls .

I can’t handle losing Briar, and all the memories of being with her.

As I get closer to the door, I don’t even think twice about barging in blind to try and put it out myself. Waiting while I get on the radio and send a call out for the fucking mountain rescue, all the while watching this place go up in flames like a tinder box, is going to be a living nightmare I have no interest in enduring.

Busting through the door, I’m already halfway to the kitchen to start running the faucet and finding something to smother the flames with, when my brain catches up with the scene in front of me.

Brown eyes meet mine from across the room.

She’s crouched in front of the fire, with a couple of pieces of kindling ready to add to the building flicker of orange painting her skin in a soft glow.

Holy fuck.

Right there, that moment is when I nearly hit my goddamn knees.

I don’t know which one of us moves first. We collide somewhere in the middle of the room, and as Briar launches forward, I catch her mid-leap, wrapping her arms and legs around me.

“I thought you’d left—that you gave up on waiting. You weren’t here, and the place felt so cold.” Her voice and body shake, interspersed with sniffled sobs, as dampness and flowing tears meet my neck.

I’m left speechless, holding her so tight there is every chance my girl can’t even breathe, because I don’t think I fucking can.

“Darlin’...” My voice cracks. My mind is spinning. “That’s no way to go about begging for my cock… creepin’ in here after dark.” The words croak out of me.

Briar’s sweet little body goes still for a second, her face still buried in the crook of my neck, before she starts shaking… this time with silent laughter.

“God, I’ve missed you.” Her lips are plush and warm, tucked against my racing pulse. “So much.” Feeling her warmth and scent wrap around me tighter, to match the way her fingers curl into the hair at my nape beneath the brim of my hat is the best fucking gift I could ever receive in this life.

“You’re back.” I breathe the words into her hair. Part of me doesn’t want that to be a question. Every part of me, in fact. I’m saying it like a prayer, hoping that the fact she’s here in my arms, in our home, means that she’s here for good and that I don’t have to face the prospect of figuring out how the hell I’m supposed to do life without her.

“I never really left. This whole time, I’ve been dreaming of being here with you.” She whispers the words that set something bright and hopeful alive inside my chest.

Turning us around, I gently set her down on the kitchen counter. As much as I want to march straight into that bedroom and not resurface for an entire month—to make up for every single soul-destroying day she’s been gone—I’ve got too many words flying around my brain. They’re horribly jumbled and tangled and ineloquent, but I’m hoping like hell they’ll form something worthy of telling her all the things she deserves to hear from me.

“I’m sor—” She starts speaking as I pull back, and I immediately cut her off, cupping her jaw and resting my thumb over her lips.

“Just give me a second.” I stay there, between her knees, seeing brief flashes and glimpses of the memories of us being here in this very spot together—fragments and shards of little scenes that I’ve replayed in my mind’s eye thousands of times over the past few weeks.

Her cheeks are tinged with pink, damp with all those tears I felt a moment ago, and her eyes glisten with a little redness to them from that outpouring of emotion. I have to swallow back the lump forming in my own throat, as I bring my other hand up to her face.

Using both hands now, I glide the pads of my thumbs over her cheeks to wipe away any remaining wetness there, inhaling the way she softens and starts to breathe slower beneath my touch .

Briar’s lashes flutter a little as I flex my fingers against the side of her neck, taking my time exploring the elegant curve of her cheeks, and brush some of the loose strands of hair off her forehead.

I reach up to drag my hat off and toss it onto the counter, then lean forward to let my lips meet her forehead. As I do so, she exhales a shaky breath, the puff of air gusting against my Adam’s apple.

“In case it wasn’t obvious.” With voice dropping low, I pull back and fix her with a look that I hope to god conveys how much this moment means to me. “Doing life without you is miserable.” I brush my lips over her cheek, and Briar makes a soft noise.

“Please stay with me.” Kiss. “Let me be part of your life.” Kiss. “I love you so fucking much, and I’ll be in love with you forever, darlin’.”

This time, I let my lips finally touch hers. She’s as soft as I remember, as delicate as one of those flower petals sitting in the vase by the window, sweet as the scent that gently fills this cabin each day, and against all hope, Briar kisses me back.

I feel her fingers close around my arms, holding on with the same kind of reassuring touch that lets my chest expand fully.

Our mouths move together in a slow, exploring connection, and right here feels like the type of first kiss we maybe should have had. The kind of romantic, gentle glide of wet, pillowy, soft lips of two lovers finally getting to close that distance and feel the electricity crackle in the space between our bodies. Except, I wouldn’t change a thing from any of the moments I’ve been blessed with the opportunity to taste this girl’s sweetness before now.

She hums against my mouth, and I drink down the utter miracle that this moment feels like.

Now that I’ve had the chance to kiss her, to properly show her what this moment means to me, it’s like the words finally slot into place, and they’re right there, ready to tumble out.

Drawing back a fraction, I let our eyes reconnect and tilt her chin ever so slightly with my forefinger. The rich brown of her irises has cleared from the weight of emotion moments ago. Now they’re shining and brilliant, and her pupils dilate a little more as my thumb brushes over her lips again because I’m fucking addicted to touching her, feeling her warmth, having that sensation of Briar Lane being back in my arms.

“This is the first time I’ve fallen, truly fallen,” I murmur. “I’ve been thrown from the back of a bull and tossed into the dirt countless times, but this right here is where I’ve crash-landed. This will be the only time I’ll ever fall in love, darlin’. It’s you . You’re it for me. Most likely, it has always been you, and I never truly knew who I was looking for in the stands all that time.”

Her chest rises and falls as her lips hang parted, staring back at me.

“Can I say something now?” Her whisper is matched with the tiniest curve of a smile, and that look fucking seals my fate because if I didn’t already want to give her the entire world, I’d do anything to have her smile like that at me every single day for eternity.

“Depends.” I’m grumbling, but not really at her, more at the agony of not knowing how these next few moments are going to go. “Maybe, but then again, I’m just an idiot who’s standing here terrified you’re gonna break my heart, little thorn. So be gentle with me, ok?”

I slide my hand down to take hers beneath my palm, tucking it against my chest.

“Storm…” Her face softens as she meets my gaze, and just before she goes to say whatever it was that she had planned, I see it.

There’s a flicker of her eyes down to where I’m clutching her fist inside mine, clinging to her like I’m about to drown at sea. Briar does a double-take, and her eyebrows scrunch together.

“Wait—what is this?” Her hand wrestles free from my own, despite my grunt of protest, and she twists her head to one side, reading the evidence laid out for the world to see.

“It’s you, darlin’.” The words rumble out of me as her eyes dart across my knuckles, back and forth with disbelief at what she’s seeing inked there.

The letters that I’ve had set there, indelibly so, just for her, to keep her close.

Even if my girl never came back to me.

B.R.I.A.R.

“When did you do this?” Her wide eyes flick back up to mine, and she twists my hand back around to face me so that I can see the tattooed letters that I know fully well are there.

“About five minutes after you left.” Shrugging, I steal her hand back so that I can clasp it to my chest again, the one enclosed beneath her name that now rests right above my thudding heart. “Little did I know why I’d always kept that space free. I didn’t know it was meant to bear your name, but now I know the exact reason there was never anything that felt right to be permanently marked there. I’d do anything you ask me to, darlin’... I’d give you the entire fucking world if I could… and even if you never came back to me, at least I’d always be able to keep you close.” My other hand, the one tattooed with my own name, comes up to cup her jaw.

“I love you.” Briar lets the words drift between us, that she can’t possibly know how much they mean, coming from her.

“This right here… this cabin, this life, it’s all I’ve got to give you, Briar.” My throat works as I focus on detecting any flicker of indication she might regret any of this. “You know I can’t offer you a family of your own if that’s what you were wanting…”

Her lips curve and she’s already shaking her head before I finish speaking.

“None of that matters. I’d never wanted anything but happiness, and this right here is exactly that for me. It’s so much more than I ever dreamed might be possible.”

Lifting her hand to my mouth, I kiss her fingertips. “No one’s ever said those words to me before,” I admit.

“Good. Wait—” Her eyes widen a little as if she’s startled herself with the force of her own admission. “Sorry, is that messed up? Is that weird for me to say out loud? I fucking love you, so much, and I don’t know if I could handle knowing there had been someone who got that part of your heart before I did.” The brightest damn smile eases across her face like a beam of early morning sunlight.

“Be selfish all you like… we both know I am when it comes to you.” My mouth twitches at the corners as I watch her tongue poke out and wet her bottom lip.

We both linger there, staring at each other as the crackle of the fire and my thudding pulse punctuate the quiet. I know for me, this certainly feels like a dream that I’m hoping like hell isn’t going to disappear in a cloud of smoke.

“The cuff is on,” she says it so quietly, almost hesitantly, while biting down on that plump curve. Those beautiful dark eyes stray to my own mouth. It’s as if she doesn’t think I’ve been about two seconds from losing the battle with my self-restraint this entire time.

“You look beautiful in anything, Briar.” I hum, letting my hand slip down to sit over her throat. “But you look especially gorgeous wearing my cuff and my ink.”

“Can we add the hat?” Her eyes flash as I squeeze ever so gently.

“You want to wear my hat?”

She nods quickly. “Your hat, your cuff, it’s all yours, baby.”

My pulse triples.

“Holy fuck. You got it straight in that pretty head of yours that I love you, right?” My voice is practically a growl.

Briar nods again, pupils blooming. “You like hearing me call you baby?”

If I wasn’t already feral for this girl, she just sealed our fate. “I love you… remember that for about the next twenty minutes or so, ok?”

“Please. Yes .” Her breath hitches, and she’s already squirming.

Reaching over, I grab my hat off the bench and set it over her glossy curls and this right here is everything . I take a moment to let it all settle in my veins, rich and nourishing, as I drink her in from head to toe.

My girl, who I’m never fucking letting go as long as there’s breath in my lungs. Scooping her up, it feels like I could float across this damn cabin with how good it is to have her curled into my body.

My lips find her ear, and the shudder roaming through her beneath my hold sets the spark blazing that has been waiting to ignite this whole time.

“Ready to learn something, darlin’?”