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Page 33 of Beneath the Mountain Sky (McBride Brother Lumberjacks #1)

I may have tried to hold on to my secret, tried to prevent her from knowing what I’d done, but coming clean appears to have been what I should have done from the beginning.

And maybe it will be all she needs to help bring her memory back so I can keep her safe.

So I can keep her mine.

* * *

WILLOW

Excruciating pain bands around my abdomen, and I gasp, trying to find my breath through the agony. I wrap my arms around myself, curling inward, seeking any relief from the pain.

It doesn’t come.

Someone tries to grab my shoulder, but I bat the hand away with all the force I can muster up.

Not wanting the touch.

Not wanting it at all.

“Don’t fucking touch me!”

My stomach roils, and I barely manage to get the words out before another scream rents the air, ripped from deep in my chest, filled with my anguish and rage?—

No. No. No.

Not like this…

Panic wells.

Choking me.

Suffocating me.

The agony comes again—stronger, more intense, unyielding.

Blinding.

There is no escaping it, no hiding, no relief.

I bolt upright in the bed.

Soaked in sweat.

Lungs seizing.

Head spinning.

Vision unfocused.

A hand reaches for me, sliding across my bare shoulder, but I slap it away, my body violently shaking as the nightmare, or memory, or whatever it is, still lingers.

It’s there.

That pain.

So real.

So intense.

The touch of the hand on my shoulder that wasn’t Killian’s…

But I sense him beside me in the bed. “Willow?”

“I…I just need…”

I don’t know what I need.

I can’t…

I can’t…

Darkness encroaches on the edges of my vision the longer I struggle to draw air into my lungs.

I can’t breathe.

The vise around my chest refuses to budge.

I throw off the comforter and stumble from the bed, still naked after falling asleep in Killian’s arms.

My feet hit the hand-hewn wood floor, and I stumble slightly, grabbing the nightstand to keep me upright long enough to find my bearings and work my way to the bathroom.

Heavy footsteps come fast behind me, and by the time I grip the counter and look up in the mirror, he’s flipped on the light and is right there behind me, his blue gaze full of panicked concern as he watches me in our reflection. “Willow, tell me what happened.”

I squeeze my eyes closed, unable to look at him as the memory assaults me like a branding iron driven straight into my brain.

“I was in a lot of pain. And…and th-there was someone there. Someone I didn’t want touching me.

Maybe the one who hurt me. I don’t…” I grit my teeth, my head throbbing as I attempt to force the memory to come clearer through sheer will, even though that’s never worked before.

“I don’t understand it. I don’t know. I… ”

Killian steps forward and wraps his arms around me, tugging me back against his naked body tightly, holding me steady, taking my weight, and supporting me fully.

I may not have wanted him to touch me a few moments ago, but he knew that was what I need now, to ground me, to bring me back when I’m unraveling.

His familiar scent wraps around me as he grazes his lips over my neck. “I’ve got you, Honeybee. You’re safe.”

“I can’t”—I struggle to take a breath—“I-I can’t breathe.”

“You can.” He rests his hand flat over my chest, the other across my stomach. “Take a deep breath in.”

I do it slowly, following his command, sucking air in through my nose, my body filling with the much-needed oxygen, pressing out against his hold.

“Good.” His warm breath flutters across my neck. “Now, let it out…slowly.”

Instead of the rush that wants to flow from deep in my chest, I concentrate on doing as I’m told.

Slowly.

Air floats from between my lips, a long flow as his hands move with me.

“Again.”

Another command I have to follow.

Over and over.

Deep.

Slow.

Breaths.

Directed by the man who holds my life in his hands.

Until my heart finally slows.

Until my lungs stop feeling like they’re unyielding stone.

Killian’s even breathing and rough palms on my skin guide me back to finally feeling like I’m here in this moment with him again.

“Come on.” He murmurs the command against my skin, then slides away, dragging me toward the shower, cranking on the hot water. “Shh.”

He holds me as I cry, waiting for it to heat up.

Steam finally starts to fill the room, cocooning us in a wraithlike fog that matches the one that covers McBride Mountain.

He walks me in under the hot spray.

I flinch when it hits me at first, but the warmth starts to seep into my skin, washing away the goosebumps, the tremors, the lingering memory of that pain.

Killian runs his hand up and down my spine gently, letting the water rush over us. The longer he holds me, the more it starts to feel normal, like the way it always used to be when we were like this before .

He drops a kiss to my forehead, then tilts my chin up. “Better?”

I nod and wrap my arms around him, clinging to him tightly, not wanting even an inch of space between us that might allow those dark memories to infiltrate again.

The heat of his body does as much for me as that of the cascading water.

Soaking into my bones.

Solidifying the reality of this moment and the safety Killian provides.

He pulls one arm from around me, then slowly moves the other, then returns with a loofah full of the body wash Raven brought for me. My favorite scent—honey and lavender.

Killian lathers it up and starts washing me slowly, dragging it over every inch of my body he can reach with my arms still looped around him. I close my eyes, my cheek laid on his chest, and let the water pound against my back as he does it.

When he gently pulls on my arms, urging me to let go, I don’t fight it, and as soon as he’s sure I’m steady on my feet, he drops to his knees in front of me and ensures every single inch of me is clean.

Cleansing me of the nightmare.

Of that darkness I can’t seem to escape.

He rises to his feet, keeping his intense gaze locked with mine. “Tip your head back.”

Threading his fingers through my hair, he urges me farther under the spray, fully wetting the long, tangled locks.

Then he grabs the shampoo and begins to work it into my scalp the same way he did when we first returned to the cabin.

Massaging gently. Lulling me into that space where all I can feel is his magical fingers and the brush of his body along mine.

“Mmm. That feels good.”

“Good.”

He wraps his arm around my waist again and pulls me back against him, letting the stream of hot water rinse the lather from my hair.

We remain under the spray for a few moments before he repeats the process with the conditioner, then he holds me to him, brushing his lips across my forehead, running rough palms over me soothingly.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

I shake my head, keeping it pressed into his chest. “No.”

“You know I’ll be here when you do.”

I nod.

Killian isn’t going anywhere.

“You’re going to come to the lumberyard with me tomorrow.”

I finally lift my head, tilting my face to gaze at him still behind me. Water cascades down his sculpted shoulders and chest as he stares down at me with concern. “How come?”

“Because I don’t want to let you out of my sight after tonight.”

The noise outside.

My back stiffens.

I had almost forgotten about it.

“You think a bear would come onto the property while I was here?”

He stiffens behind me, then drags his lips across my collarbone slowly. “I don’t know, but I’m not going to take any chances. And I don’t want you alone with Raven in town. I want you with Liam, Connor, or me at all times.”

The way he says it, the tension in his voice and arms, makes me turn and look up at him. “Why?”

Killian takes my face between his palms and suddenly looks very serious. “Because that was a human in the woods. Someone was watching us by the fire.”

Acid churns in my stomach and starts to crawl up my throat. “Are you”—I swallow—“are you sure?”

He nods. “We’ve suspected for a while that you were not alone on the mountain. Then we went up there to the area where we found you, and suddenly, someone’s in the woods on my property? It isn’t a coincidence, Honeybee.”

“Shit.”

Someone followed us…

I start to tremble again, and he drags me against him fully, until every single inch of our bodies touches.

“It’ll be okay. I promise. We’re going to figure this out.”

“How?”

“I don’t know, but we’ll find a way.” His voice doesn’t waver. It never breaks. The steely determination lives in each word. “I’m not going to let this drag on anymore, not going to leave you to be a victim to these flashes of memory and not knowing what happened to you.”

Over the past couple of weeks, he’s promised me answers, and he hasn’t been able to deliver, but this time, I believe him.

I feel his resolve.

If there really was someone in the woods tonight watching us, if it really was someone who might have answers about where I was and what happened to me over the last year, Killian will burn down the whole fucking mountain to find them.

He will eviscerate anyone who played a role in my missing time.

He will do it all without regard for what it might cost him.

And that’s what terrifies me.

He’ll destroy his home, the only place he’s ever loved, for me.

Anyone on this mountain who gets in his way is going to be collateral damage.

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