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SIXTEEN
LANA
The sunset lit up the sky like a fire as the storm passed overhead. Clouds parted, and the lightning flashed in the distance with thunder following far behind.
My body was sore, but in the best of ways. My legs ached, back hurt, and I expected a sex hangover tomorrow, but I regretted nothing of every moment.
I leaned back against the cold glass covered in the bedsheets, keeping myself warm as I watched the storm fade into the distance. The brief flashes of lightning were suddenly less horrible when they looked like thin cracks across the sky and I barely heard thunder.
Just as fast as the storm rolled in, it was gone.
Almost our first meeting. This time, though, as I watched him work at the small gas stove on the other side of the cabin, I would not let him go. I would never make that mistake again.
“Here.” Hayden said, handing me a steaming mug. “Hot chocolate.”
I took the mug from his hands, feeling the heat between my palms. “Oh, luxury.” The smell of sugar and spice drifted to my nose and I let out a sigh and a groan of pleasure. One hot sip later and, “My god, this is almost as good as our sex.”
Hayden laughed, “Then you have two reasons to stay with me. The sex and the chocolate.”
“Mm hmm,” I agreed, my mouth full of the warm liquid. The sweetness warmed me to my very core.
He sat close, towel wrapped around his waist. “Maybe I could drip warm chocolate on your nipples and lick it off.” He said into his mug, eyes watching mine.
I almost spit out chocolate all over the sheets before swallowing hard.
“Is that a no?” He asked with one eyebrow cocked high on his forehead, biting his lip and teasing me.
“What? No, it’s not a no!”
Hayden laughed, deep and warm as the hot chocolate in my mug. “Maybe...” He started, holding out a palm. I reached out and set my hand on his, letting his strong fingers press over my knuckles with soft strokes. “I can take you on a date this week?”
“I would really like that.”
Static and a voice startled me, my hand jolting, sloshing a bit of hot chocolate across my bare chest. “Ah, ah!”
“Starting already?” Hayden said with a chuckle. He stood and grabbed the pack he discarded across the floor, one strap dangling at the side where I cut it. Pulling back the top flap and unzipping the side, he produced a radio.
“Hayden Storme, you alive?”
“Hey Bucks. We are safe at the fire lookout tower.”
A stretch of static then, “Thank fuck. James found what remained of your truck when he went out looking on the ATV. We thought you were dead.”
“Alive.” He looked at me, a grin on his face lit by the setting sun. I felt a blush rise to my neck and ears. Good god, this man was going to burn me up from the inside out at this rate. “Better than ever. Storm has passed, and no signs of smoke right now.” Hayden paused, looking out over the valley with a pair of binoculars. “You coming to get us?”
“Eventually. We arrested some prick named Marshall Langley, who Adrian plucked from the valley, all hypothermic and with a liter flask of gasoline and matches.”
A slight shock rocked through me. Marsh? Trying to start a fire?
Hayden looked back to me, recognizing the name and seeing the shock on my face. “Trying to start a wildfire, you think?”
“Trying to? Jerk actually started one, but the rain got to it first. Barely noticed it because of the cloud cover. Storm actually did us a favor this time.”
I breathed a sigh of relief, but felt a small twinge of guilt in my chest. I had nothing to do with him, but his anger and mindset of revenge gave me some sense of responsibility - but there was none, and I knew that. Marsh was on his own, and it was the federal government that would dig up all his dirty laundry. But I felt guilty, like I had some piece of responsibility for his actions. That was what a toxic relationship would do to someone.
I shook my head, letting the thoughts pass and huddled deeper into my blankets, taking a big sip of the warm hot chocolate. “You fucked yourself, Butterbuns.” I softly sang just out of Hayden’s earshot.
The voice of Bucks over the radio continued. “We will hand him over to local law enforcement. He’ll be put away for a while soon enough. Anyway, we can’t pass until the fallen tree and damaged truck are cleared and the mud has dried for someone to walk up there.”
