Page 9 of Mountain Man Bodyguard (Mountain Men of Pineville #4)

NINE

KANE

Waking up with Chassie snuggled up naked against my chest and my dick at full attention made me think, how had it only been four days? Our time together felt longer. We’d barely left the bed since the previous night, leaving only when necessity or hunger pains called.

And how lucky was I? The thought kept running through my head even as the storm had picked up again right before dawn. The weather had kept us locked away from the world, and more importantly, Chassie’s brother.

Everything we talked about from the mundane to sharing of secrets seemed so natural it should have scared me, had me falling back on my typical jackass or meathead routine I pulled out whenever I wanted to scare a woman off who wanted more from me than I wanted to give.

Instead, the connection I felt with Chassie fueled me to keep her with me longer. And always. To give her the real me buried so deep, I’d almost forgotten what it felt like to be seen beyond my outward appearance.

And I wanted her with me not only to keep her safe from whoever was sending her threatening texts, but to erase the memory of our first meeting, and show her how much she’s come to mean to me in such a short time.

Was it the mountain air? Something in Pineville’s water system? Whatever it was that made my buddies open their equally stubborn hearts to their now spouses, I wanted more of.

Not only had my childhood trauma but the years serving my country had propelled me into stunt work.

Adrenaline I could handle. I’d been forced fed it as I’d listened to my parents scream at each other before my dad died when I was in the first grade.

I’d trained for it, lived and breathed it until I’d turned into a junkie.

My entire adult life seemed to be foreplay for what I was living now with Chassie tucked next to me in the bed I’d made with my own hands.

Well, with some help from Lars, but it’d been the first piece of furniture I’d ever attempted to craft, and I was damn proud of it.

And proud of how Chassie admired it before she even knew I made it.

And now I’d found a woman who I wanted to stay. Needed to stay.

Since Chassie stormed into my life and held up an imaginary mirror in front of me, igniting a desire, a connection so swift, so deep, I felt I was now living in technicolor for the first time in my life.