Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 68716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Her throat works. “Where would I stay?”
“With me,” I answer easily. “Got space. Couch, bed, whatever you’re comfortable with. The club’s got a compound on the outside of town. I’ve got a room there. It’s not a cabin, but it’s home.”
She lets out a shaky laugh. “You’re inviting me to your biker clubhouse. Do you realize how insane that sounds?”
“You’ve slept in your car in the mountain winter,” I retort dryly. “I think your risk tolerance is already questionable.”
“Touché.” She smiles. “Can I…” She hesitates. “Can I really come any time?”
“Any time,” I confirm. “You text me, you call me, I make sure someone’s there to let you in if I’m on a run. You need to get out of that town for a bit? Those doors are open.”
Her eyes flood, but this time one tear escapes, sliding down her cheek before she can catch it. I thumb it away gently.
“Hey,” I murmur. “This isn’t goodbye like that.”
“What kind of goodbye is it then?” she whispers.
“The kind where you know I’m not disappearing,” I explain. “I’m just changing locations. This is until I see you again, because trouble, I want to see you again.”
She chokes out a laugh and a sob in the same breath. It guts me.
“Will you text me?” she asks, voice small. “Or call?”
“Yeah,” I say simply. “Not every hour. Not every day even. But yeah. I’ll text. I’ll call. You can text me too, you know. You don’t have to wait for me to start it.”
“I don’t want to be a bother,” she says.
“You won’t be.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do,” I say, firm. “Because if you ever start to be, I’ll tell you. That’s part of this deal. No pretending. No slow fade because someone’s scared to hurt feelings.”
She exhales, relieved by the clarity instead of wounded by it. That’s one of the things I like most about her—she’s done with half-truths and polite non-answers. She wants the real thing, even if it stings.
I finish packing, zip the bag, and sling it over my shoulder. The cabin feels different instantly. Less like a suspended moment in time, more like a place again. Four walls. A roof. A temporary stop.
Outside, the air bites my face. The snow on the ground is still deep, but the top layer is slushy, sun hitting it with weak winter light. My breath fogs in front of me as I pull the cover off the bike. Holley stands on the porch, arms wrapped around herself, watching me.
“You’re really riding in this?” she calls.
“Rode in worse,” I answer. “Got gear in the saddlebag. I’ll be fine.”
She doesn’t move until I’ve checked everything twice, until the bike is ready, until I swing my leg over the seat. Then she steps down off the porch and comes toward me, boots crunching in the snow.
“Helmet?” she asks.
I grin and tap the one on the handlebar. “Always, sweetheart.”
“Good,” she says, like she has any say over my level of self-preservation. I kind of like that she thinks she does.
I plant my boots, steady the bike, and lean down as she comes close. She looks up at me, cheeks pink from the cold, eyes too bright.
“This is the part where I’m supposed to be cool and casual, right?” she says.
“Only if you want to be.”
She laughs once, shaky. “I don’t want to be.”
“Then don’t.”
She steps closer until her knees bump mine. Her hands rest lightly on my thighs, like she’s grounding herself there.
“Thank you,” she says.
“For what?”
“For the chili. For the hot shower. For the bed and the blankets and the fire and the way you didn’t treat me like I was broken even when I felt like I was. For telling me the truth, even when it wasn’t… what romance novels would have written.”
I smile, crooked. “I’m not much of a romance novel, Holley.”
Her eyes flick over my face, that same soft affection shining through. “You’d be surprised.”
The slow burn that’s been simmering all week spikes one more time. I reach out, sliding a hand behind her neck, thumb brushing the warm, delicate skin there.
“Come here,” I murmur.
She leans in, and I kiss her.
It’s not frantic. Not claiming. Not goodbye-forever. It’s slow—like everything good between us has been. My mouth moves over hers with all the heat I can’t put into promises, all the care I can’t turn into commitments.
She kisses me back like she understands that language better than any other.
When I finally pull back, her forehead rests against mine for a second, both of us breathing a little harder.
“Visit me,” I say again, voice low, earnest. “Don’t overthink it. Just… come.”
“Okay,” she whispers. “I will.”
“I’ll check on you,” I add. “Don’t disappear on me.”
“I won’t.”
I search her eyes one last time, making sure she believes me when I say this isn’t a vanishing act. That I will be, in my own way, consistent.