Total pages in book: 33
Estimated words: 35133 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 176(@200wpm)___ 141(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 35133 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 176(@200wpm)___ 141(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
Something in my chest tightens, but I hold his gaze. I don’t move. I don’t give him that.
“Why?” I challenge. “So you can check for weapons or something?”
“Because I want to see if you were followed.”
That lands harder than I expect.
I feel it before I can stop it, the slight shift in my posture, the tension that tightens just a fraction too much.
“Happy?” I mutter, even as I turn.
I hear him move behind me, feel it, the awareness of him circling, looking, assessing. It should make me uncomfortable.
It does.
But not in the way I expect.
“Anyone see you leave?” he asks.
“No.”
“Anyone know you came here?”
I hesitate.
Just for a second.
That is all it takes.
He is closer now. I can feel the heat of him at my back, close enough that if I lean even slightly, I will hit him.
“Answer the question, Maddie.”
My breath catches before I can stop it. “No.”
He doesn’t say anything right away, and somehow that is worse.
When I turn back to face him, he is right there again, closer than before, the air between us thick and charged in a way that makes it hard to think clearly.
“You’re being tracked,” he says.
I let out a short, disbelieving breath. “You don’t know that.”
“I do.”
“Based on what?” I snap.
He nods toward my bag. “Show me the photos.”
I hesitate, then yank the strap forward, digging through it with more force than necessary. My fingers close around the print, and I shove it at him.
He takes it, glancing down, and something in his expression shifts. Tightens.
“This wasn’t taken by accident,” he says.
“I figured that much,” I bite out.
His eyes lift to mine.
“Who is he?”
The question hits harder than everything else.
My instinct is immediate. Deflect. Deny.
“I don’t know.”
He steps closer.
“Try again.”
“I don’t know,” I repeat, sharper this time.
Silence stretches between us, thick and uncomfortable. He is watching me like he already knows the answer, like he is waiting for me to catch up to it.
“You do,” he says.
My eyes flare. “You don’t get to—”
“I get to because you came here,” he cuts in, his voice dropping just enough to make the words feel heavier.
That stops me.
I step forward without thinking, closing the last bit of space between us, lifting my chin. “I came here for help, not an interrogation.”
“And I’m helping,” he says evenly. “You just don’t like how.”
My breath brushes his jaw now. I can feel it. I can feel him.
“Maybe I don’t like you,” I fire back.
His smile is slow and dangerous. “That’s not the problem.”
My lips part before I can stop them.
“Then what is?” I ask.
He leans in just enough that I feel it, the shift, the pull, without quite touching me.
“That you’re already here,” he murmurs. “On my land. Asking me to keep you safe.”
My pulse jumps hard enough that I know he sees it.
“And you think that gives you control?” I ask, but my voice is thinner now.
He studies me for a second before answering.
“It gives me responsibility,” he says. “And I take that seriously.”
I swallow, my throat suddenly too tight. “And what does that mean for me?”
He glances toward the trees, then back at me.
“It means you don’t leave this property without me.”
My eyes flash. “That’s not happening.”
“It is.”
“No,” I snap, stepping back, putting space between us because I need it. “I didn’t come here to trade one problem for another.”
“Then you shouldn’t have come at all,” he says.
Silence crashes down between us.
I stare at him, my chest rising and falling too fast, something twisting inside me that feels a lot like fear and a lot like something else I do not want to name.
“Say I stay,” I say slowly. “What then?”
He closes the distance again like I never stepped back.
“We get married,” he says. “And I find him.”
I blink. “And if you don’t?”
“I will.”
He says it like it is a fact.
Like there is no version of reality where that is not true.
“Why do you care?” I ask.
He does not answer right away.
And that is the part that unsettles me the most.
Finally, he steps closer again, until there is no space left to pretend there is distance between us.
“You showed up on my land scared and alone, willing to be my bride in exchange for protection,” he says quietly. “That makes you my problem.”
My breath catches.
“And you always this intense?” I murmur.
His gaze drops, just for a second, to my mouth, then back up.
“Only when it matters.”
Something in my chest tightens, something I do not understand yet.
“Where do I stay?” I ask finally.
He turns toward the cabin. “With me.”
My brows shoot up. “Absolutely not.”
He glances back over his shoulder. “Then you can go.”
I stiffen. “You’re unbelievable.”
“You’re still here,” he says.
That lands.
Hard.
Because he is right.
Because I have not left.
“Fine,” I snap. “Temporary.”
“Everything is,” he says.
He starts toward the cabin without checking if I follow.
And I hate that I do.
I hate it more that he knows I will.