Page 20 of Surrendering To The Forbidden Mountain Man

"The only real thing I've ever felt."

The doorframe is under my hand. The threshold is under my feet. Two steps forward would put me against his chest, and two steps back would close the door.

Forward. Obviously forward.

My arms are around his neck before my brain finishes the calculation. His arms wrap around my waist, lift me off the ground, and my face is in his neck and his face is in my hair and we're standing in a hallway that smells like old wood and cold air and neither of us is letting go.

"I love you," I say into his skin. "I've loved you since I was old enough to understand what it meant, and I will never let you call it anything less than that again."

His arms tighten. A shudder runs through his shoulders. Reid Holloway, Special Forces, twenty years of combat, doesn't cry. But his chest shakes against mine, and his breath is ragged, and when he sets me down and cups my face in both hands, his eyes are wet.

"Twelve years," he says.

"Worth it."

He kisses me. Slow, deep, thorough. His hands on my face, my hands on his wrists, standing in my doorway while the late afternoon sun turns the hallway gold.

"Come inside," I say against his mouth.

He comes inside. The door closes. His boots come off by the door next to mine. His flannel is still on the desk chair, and he looks at it, and the smallest smile crosses his face before he pulls me back against him.

"I'm not going anywhere." His forehead on mine. "I brought an overnight bag. It's in the truck."

"An overnight bag."

"And two boxes of stuff from my house. Clothes, books, my shaving kit." He pulls back enough to look at me. "You said there was room on the top shelf. If the offer still stands."

The top shelf. The one he was checking when he found my box. The one she offered him Thursday, casual, folding laundry.

"The offer stands."

"Mira." His hands on my hips, thumbs tracing circles through my shirt. "I want to be clear about something. I'm not doing this halfway. Not a bag for the weekend, not a drawer for convenience. If I put my stuff on that shelf, I'm staying. Here. With you. In this apartment that's too small for both of us, with your clinic charts on the couch and my boots by your door. I'm staying."

Twelve years. And the man I've wanted since I was too young to understand what wanting meant is standing in my kitchen telling me he's unpacking his life for the first time in twenty years.

"Okay," I say. Because every dramatic speech, every long-held declaration, every rehearsed moment I imagined during twelve years of waiting... none of them come close to the simple reality of Reid Holloway choosing to stay.

"Okay." He exhales. Pulls me closer. His chin on top of my head, arms locked around me. "And for the record, your father is going to have questions."

"My father has had questions for three years. He's been very patient."

"Ben?"

"Ben will ask if you're going to help him fix the culvert on Highway 6. That's his love language."

That almost-smile. Except this time it finishes. A full smile, rare, devastating, aimed at me with both eyes soft in a way I've never seen from a man who built his whole identity around hard edges.

"Your box and my letter," he says. "In the same closet."

"Where they belong."

His mouth finds mine again. My back meets the kitchen counter. His hands span my waist, lift me onto the edge, and we're right back where we were a week ago, my legs around him, his body between my thighs, except now there's no fear behind his eyes. No restraint. No list of reasons it's wrong.

The kiss deepens. His hand slides up my back under my shirt, warm palm flat against my spine. My fingers work the buttons of his shirt because I'm done waiting for every version of this.

"Stay for dinner," I say between kisses. "Then stay for breakfast. Then stay for everything after that."

"Yes, ma'am."