“But that was up there.” I grab her upper arms gently, not wanting to hurt her or aggravate her healing wounds. “It’s why I’m going back.”
A tear slips past her lashes and trails down her cheek, and I can stop myself from reaching up and brushing it away.
She leans into the touch, pressing her cheek into my palm, and the feel of her familiar smooth, warm skin under makes my entire body remember every single time we touched like this.
“But you’ll be alone, Connor, where you’re going to sit and think about all the ways you believe you failed everyone, the way you believe you failed me when you didn’t.” She slides her hand up from my chest to cup my face the same way I am hers, preventing me from looking away. “You saved my life. Multiple times. You can work through all these feelings instead of drowning in them. If you stay here with us. I’ll help you.”
I wish I could believe her.
I wish her words didn’t instill a deeper fear than I’ve ever felt before, even worse than the night of the attack on the homestead or when I knew she was in trouble or what we found when we came back to McBride Mountain.
The fear that this might be real.
“Why would you do that?”
The corners of her lips curl up. “Because I want to sleep again.”
“You’re just using me to get a good night’s sleep?”
Her slender shoulders rise and fall, and she drags her nails through my beard. “So what if I am? Are you going to object to it?”
Fuck.
I swallow thickly, my blood heating at the look in her gaze and the intimate touch I’ve missed so much. “I don’t know. What about the arguing?”
She grins. “I do love arguing with you. You can be as stubborn and bullheaded as you want as long as we get to make up like that. The way we did that night in the rain…”
Fuck.
She’s really serious.
“I’m asking you to stay, Connor. Not for your brothers, or Willow, or Lucky, or Niall. I’m asking you to stay for me.” Her voice breaks slightly. “If you believe you owe me something, which I don’t agree with, then this is my demand for reparations. That you stay here with me. That we talk, that we argue, that we scream at each other if we have to. As long as it always ends up with you over me or under me in bed.” She trails her fingers across my lips. “And with your mouth on me in all the right places.”
Fuck.
There are so many apologies I owe her. So many things I can never make amends for. So much I wish I could take back.
But this woman has seen me at my literal worst.
And she wasn’t afraid.
She didn’t back away from me. She never ran. She stood her ground and then some, invading not only my personal sanctuary but making it into something even more powerful.
A home.
Even if it was only for a short time, and even if it was under the literal worst of circumstances, it was real.
I tug her up against me fully, burying my face against her neck. “God, I’ve missed your smell.”
She laughs, pressing her lips to my collar bone. “I hate to say this, Connor McBride. You know how much it pains me to. But I’ve missed just about everything about you. So please, don’t shut me out like that again.”
“I can’t promise you I won’t.”
The mountain calls to me. That place does. I can’t stay away from it.
“I’ll know where to find you if you do, right?”
“Right.”
