Hawke
Get in there, Bella. Go give our girl a big, wet kiss.” I smacked the dog’s rump and followed her inside.
Bella and I had done a good hard run, romping together in the snow for the past forty-five minutes, chasing the wind through the ponderosa pines out back. It was cold as balls out there, but hey—nothing like letting my wolf run in the crisp, clean mountain air to clear my fucked-up human head.
The fresh air and exercise made me realize I’d been over-thinking the whole situation. Maddie and I were healthy, consenting adults—no reason we couldn’t have a little fun passing the time until the storm broke. She wasn’t looking for a damn marriage proposal or the key to all my deep, dark secrets. All that fairy tale crap was in my head, and I’d let it screw with me so badly I’d taken all my bullshit out on her—a thing I’d been trying to avoid since she’d first shown up on my doorstep.
Girl was right—Iwasthe O.G. Grinch. But that ended now. For however much time we had left, I’d give that ginger the best goddamn Christmas I could offer.
Starting with stripping her bare and carrying her right up to my bed for a thorough ravishing. It was Christmas Eve, visions of her sweet sugarplum ass were dancing in my head, and it waslongpast time I made her come again.
But first—I owed her an apology. A big one.
Back inside, all the candles had been blown out, the lantern turned off too. The fire in the living room had burned down to embers, and a chill filled the whole damn cabin. Shit just felt… empty.
“Maddie?” I skimmed my fingers across the kitchen table that would now live on in infamy, peering through the darkness for signs of my feisty redhead. “Where you at, Cupcake?”
Nothing.
The tattered lace panties were still on the counter where I’d chucked them, but when I glanced at the hooks on the wall where she’d hung her green scarf and sparkly white hat to dry earlier, I found them empty.
Bella whimpered beside me, and something in my gut twisted into a big-ass knot.
No. No fucking way.
Would she really just bail like that? It was still snowing like a bitch out there. Where the fuck could she possibly go?
No—it made no sense. Shehadto be in the cabin. Upstairs, maybe. After the way I’d acted, it was too much to hope that I’d find her naked and curled up in my bed, eagerly awaiting my return, but maybe she’d passed out in the spare bedroom. I’d told her to make herself at home, after all. Maybe she’d done just that.
“Maddie?” I called out, not caring if I woke her up. “I got something to say to you.” With Bella on my heels, I grabbed a flashlight from the kitchen junk drawer and headed upstairs. “Maddie, look. I know I fucked up. I’m sorry. Come on out and let me apologize properly.”
No response.
The girl was just… just gone. Her luggage. Her pink bubblegum coat. Her bright red curls. All she’d left behind was a whiff of that sweet vanilla-nutmeg scent, the ruined panties, and—there on the floor just outside the bathroom, dropped in her haste to leave—the small green toiletry bag she’d been so desperate for me to fetch.
For some fucked-up reason I didnotwant to admit, the sight of it made my heart hurt.
“What’ll you do without your special conditioner, Cupcake?” I scooped it up and yanked open the zipper, wondering just what was so special about it, anyway.
But what I found inside wasn’t conditioner at all. It was a whole mess of prescription bottles, each one printed with her name and precise directions.Take twice daily with water. Take once daily before bed. Do not take on an empty stomach.I didn’t recognize the names of the drugs, but I was pretty damn sure they weren’t just for the low blood sugar thing she’d mentioned.
What the hell?
Her rental car was still D.O.A. at the bottom of the driveway, and Bella and I hadn’t seen or heard any other cars or a tow truck pull up; even out back in the woods, one of us would’ve sensed something.
Which meant Maddie had likely taken off on foot.
And she’d forgotten her damn meds.
Worry kicked into overdrive.
Fucking hell.One stupid argument, and now I was in for a search-and-rescue.
Bella barked at me, eyeing me up from the hallway like,What are you gonna do now, you stupid prick?
Right. Like I had all the fucking answers.
I used to think so—used to think I knew it all. I’d been all over the globe, had seen the best and worst humanity had to offer. I’d even survived this fucked-up mutant bullshit military experiment and, as far as I could tell, still had a lot of years left in me, assuming I didn’t cash in my chips first.
But in the handful of hours since that crazy girl had crash-landed in my driveway, I was starting to realize I didn’t knowjackaboutshitaboutsquat.
I sighed and palmed Bella’s head. “Hold the fort down for me, Bells. I gotta go track down that pain-in-the-ass redhead and drag her back here for another good spanking.”
