Page 20 of Her Mountain Man Protector

"Uncle A said you were grumpy. He under-sold it."

"Bags on the table," Alden says, stoic as a closed file. He's in flannel, not the good suit, sleeves rolled, looking like a man who has already done three responsible things before breakfast. "Rowe. This isn't a social call."

"It's a little social." She dumps the bags and sticks her hand out at me. "Rowe North. I brought the cranberries. Also I ate one in the truck. Sorry. They're tart enough to start a fight."

I shake her hand and the laugh that comes out of me is real, sudden, almost startling after a night of whispered rules. "Oakley Vega. You can eat two if you help me zest an orange."

"Deal."

Alden looks at Colt. "Hardware guy from yesterday cashed out and left town. Marin thinks he was rented for the morning only. Still no daylight stroll down Main. House stays dark after dusk. I'll have more on the dock name by tonight."

Colt nods once. "Appreciate it."

"Thank the girl who wrote the list. She has opinions about butter." Alden sets a third bag on the counter, then rests a hand on Rowe's bun like he's checking that her head is still attached. "Twenty minutes. Then we're back at the mill. You've got homework."

"I've got muffins to make," Rowe says. "Homework can wait."

Alden almost smiles. It looks expensive on him. He steps back onto the porch with Colt, two large quiet men doing whatever large quiet men do with a driveway and a sightline, and the room becomes ours.

Rowe shoves up her sleeves and starts unpacking with the unearned confidence of a person who has never been told no by a kitchen. Cranberries. Oranges. A stick of butter so cold it could chip a tooth. She holds up a tiny bottle of vanilla like she stole it from a museum.

"Uncle A said you were a photographer. That's cooler than security. Security is just frowning at doors."

"Your uncle frowns at doors so the rest of us get to bake. Give him some credit."

"I give him credit. I also give him a hard time. It's a balanced diet." She glances at the bed again, then at me, then at the window where Colt's shoulder fills the frame. "You're lucky, you know. Being holed up with a gorgeous man like Colt. If I had to pick a mountain to get trapped on, I'd pick this one."

The laugh bursts out of me before I can sand it down. "You're too young to be looking at boys yet."

Rowe plants a hand on her hip, all teenage affront and glittering delight. "I'm sixteen. I have a boyfriend. His name is Eli. He works nights at the landing down by the old boat sheds and he has a motorcycle he isn't supposed to have, which is honestly the most romantic sentence I've ever said out loud."

"Does Alden know about the motorcycle?"

"Alden knows about the boyfriend. The motorcycle is a developing situation."

"You're going to give your uncle gray hair."

"He's already got some. He hides them in the stoic." She tosses me the orange. "Zest. I'll do the dry stuff. And for the record, sixteen is old enough to notice when a man looks at a woman like she's the only door worth guarding. Colt does that with you. You should see your face."

"My face is none of your business."

"Your face is extremely my business. I live in a mill with screens and a range. This is the most interesting morning I've had since school let out."

We work. The bowl is too big. The zest comes off in bright, stubborn curls. She talks the way I used to talk before Chicago taught me to measure every sentence. I listen. I answer. I feel the room loosen around us, that heavy safe-house hush giving way to something almost ordinary.

Is this allowed? Muffins in a house designed to disappear people. A sixteen-year-old with flour on her cheek calling my mountain man gorgeous. I should shut it down. I don't. Instead we let the muffins cook.

Colt comes back in and stops dead at the sight of us, two women occupying his perimeter with citrus and chit-chat. Rowe waves a half-eaten muffin.

"You're lucky she's pretty when she's bossy. A lesser hostage would be insufferable."

"She's not a hostage."

"She's in a gated house with a man who growls at windows. That's hostage-adjacent." Rowe bumps my hip. "I'm keeping her. Uncle A can invoice you."

"Out," Colt says, and there's no real heat in it. "Your uncle's in the truck."

Rowe groans like she's dying, then pulls me into a hug so sudden I have to catch the counter. She's bony and fierce, and the squeeze is quick and certain.