Page 2 of My Obsessive Mountain Man (Summer in the Pines #3)

Three years I've waited. Three years I've kept this place ready.

She stands near the fireplace now, the flames I lit earlier casting a golden glow across her features. Her fingers are wrapped around the mug of tea I made her before the electricity failed. Outside, the storm has only intensified, rain lashing against the windows in sheets.

"The generator should have kicked in automatically," I explain, moving to the kitchen. "The storm must have affected the switch. I'll check it in the morning, but we're fine with the fire tonight."

She turns, and I catch the slight wariness in her expression.

"I should have called the hotel to cancel," she says with a frown.

"No signal during storms like this," I explain. "Landline works, though." I nod toward the old rotary phone mounted on the kitchen wall. "Your grandmother refused to get rid of it. Said it was more reliable than those 'newfangled cell phones.'"

A smile touches Violet's lips—the first real one I've seen—and it transforms her face, softening the professional mask she wears. "That sounds exactly like her."

I light a couple of oil lamps I keep ready for outages, their warm glow complementing the firelight. "Hope you're hungry. I caught fresh trout this morning."

"You fish?" She moves closer, the lamplight catching in her auburn hair.

"Hunt, fish, forage." I shrug, reaching for a cast iron pan. "Mountain living."

"And what exactly do you do up here on this mountain, Mr. Mullins?" Her voice carries a hint of challenge.

"Paul," I correct her. "And I do a bit of everything. Custom woodworking mostly. Some guide work for hikers and hunters when the season's right. Been in these mountains fifteen years now."

"After the military?" she asks.

I glance up, meeting her gaze. "Two tours in Afghanistan. One in Iraq." I don't elaborate. Most people don't really want the details, just the outline. "How'd you know?"

"The way you move," she says simply. "My father was Marine Corps. You never quite lose the bearing."

Something warms in my chest at this evidence that she's been watching me too.

"Your grandmother mentioned your dad was military," I say, setting the pan on the rack I've positioned over the fire. "She was proud of him. Proud of you too."

Violet looks away, and I catch the flash of grief before she masks it. "We weren't as close as we should have been, these last few years." Her voice drops. "I kept meaning to visit, but work always seemed more pressing."

"She understood." I move with deliberate care, not wanting to spook her with sudden movements. "Said you were building something important. That your eye for beauty was a gift."

"My eye for monetary value, you mean," she says with a self-deprecating laugh. "I appraise art for auction houses and private collectors. It's hardly a creative pursuit."

"You see what others miss," I counter, seasoning the fish with herbs I'd picked that morning. "That's its own kind of gift."

Lightning flashes, followed immediately by a crack of thunder that shakes the cabin. Violet flinches, wrapping her arms around herself. I notice the slight tremble in her shoulders. Without the heating system, the cabin holds the mountain chill even in the summer.

"Here." I shrug out of my flannel overshirt, leaving me in my henley, and move behind her to drape it over her shoulders. My fingers brush against the soft skin of her neck, and I feel her small shiver.

"Thank you," she murmurs, pulling it closer around herself.

I move to the hearth with deliberate purpose, balancing the cast iron skillet in one hand.

I position the heavy skillet at the edge of the flames where the heat is most controlled, then lay the ruby-fleshed trout into the pan.

It sizzles immediately, the skin crisping as the rich scent of fresh fish and herbs fills the cabin.

"Cooking this way takes patience," I explain, kneeling to add the foraged chanterelles and fingerling potatoes I'd set aside earlier. "My grandmother taught me. Said food tastes different when it's kissed by real fire."

The mushrooms release their earthy perfume as they brown, mixing with the fragrant thyme and wild garlic I'd rubbed into the fish.

With practiced movements, I flip the trout, revealing perfectly crisped skin. Violet watches from where she stands, my flannel still draped over her shoulders, her eyes reflecting the dancing flames.

When everything is done, I plate our meal on Martha's old blue stoneware—plates I've washed and kept dust-free for three years. The colors are striking: golden-brown fish, caramelized mushrooms, and herbs snipped from the garden just this morning.

We settle at the small oak table I've pulled close to the hearth.

The firelight casts long shadows across the worn wood, highlighting the grain patterns that tell stories of decades of family meals.

Here, in this circle of warmth and light, with the smell of good food between us, the chaos beyond our walls only makes this moment feel more intimate, more protected.

Like we're the only two people left in the world.

"This is delicious," Violet says, surprise evident in her voice.

"Not what you expected from a strange man?" I ask, watching her over the rim of my water glass.

She smiles, more relaxed now. "I think I've stopped expecting anything when it comes to you, Paul."

The way she says my name sends heat through my veins. I set down my glass carefully.

"Your grandmother worried about what would happen to this place," I say, deciding it's time for some truth. "When she got sick, she asked me to look after it until you came."

Violet's fork pauses halfway to her mouth. "What do you mean, 'until I came'? She left it to me in her will. She knew I'd handle the estate."

I choose my words carefully. "Martha believed you'd come back someday. Not just to sell it, but to see it. To remember."

"You make it sound like she expected me to keep it." Violet sets down her fork, her brow furrowing.

"I think she hoped you might." I meet her gaze steadily. "This place meant everything to her. And you meant everything to her."

Violet looks away, emotion flickering across her face. "I can't keep a cabin in the mountains. My life is in Chicago."

"Is it?" I ask quietly.

Outside, the wind howls through the pines.

"There are things you should see," I say finally, standing. "Things she wanted preserved."

Violet watches me with wary curiosity as I move to the far corner of the main room, near the old oak bookcase. I push aside the handwoven rug to reveal the faint outline of a trapdoor set into the floorboards.

"What is this?" she asks, moving to stand beside me.

"Your grandmother's secret," I explain, lifting the hidden door to reveal a cedar-lined compartment beneath. "She called it her treasure chest."

Inside lies a collection of carefully preserved items: leather-bound journals, old photographs in silver frames, small wooden boxes, and an antique jewelry case.

Violet kneels beside the opening, her expression stunned. "I had no idea this was here."

"She added to it over the years," I explain, watching her closely. "Said some things were too precious to risk being overlooked in an estate sale."

Carefully, reverently, Violet lifts out a framed photograph—herself as a child, sitting on the cabin's porch steps with paint-smudged hands and a serious expression as she works on a watercolor.

"I remember this day," she whispers. "I was trying to capture the exact color of the lake at sunset. I was so frustrated because I couldn't get it right."

"Did you ever manage it?" I ask.

She shakes her head, a sad smile touching her lips. "No. Some beauty defies capture."

Thunder crashes directly overhead, making her jump. Without thinking, I place my hand on her shoulder to steady her. She doesn't pull away.

"There's more," I tell her, reaching past to lift out one of the wooden boxes. "Your early sketches. She kept everything you ever sent her."

Violet opens the box with trembling fingers, revealing dozens of drawings—landscapes, still lifes, portraits—spanning what must be years of her development as an artist.

"I thought these were lost," she says, her voice thick with emotion. "I didn't know she kept them."

"She treasured them," I say simply. "She treasured you."

A single tear slips down Violet's cheek before she can catch it. The professional mask is cracking, revealing the woman beneath—the one who remembers this place, who belongs here more than she knows.

"I'm sorry," she says, brushing the tear away quickly. "It's been a long day. The storm, this place..."

"Me?" I suggest, only half-joking.

Her eyes meet mine, and in the firelight, I see something shift in them—wariness giving way to something warmer, more curious.

"Yes," she admits quietly. "You too. You're..." She searches for words. "Not what I expected to find here."

"What did you expect to find?" I ask, still kneeling beside her, close enough to catch the faint scent of her perfume—something floral and clean.

"An empty cabin," she says. "Dusty furniture. Faded memories." Her gaze travels over my face, lingering. "Not someone who seems to know me better than I know myself."

"I don't know you," I correct her gently. "I know about you. It's not the same thing."

"And yet you've been waiting for me," she says. It's not a question.

I don't deny it. There's no point in pretending this is normal, that my dedication to this place—to her—is simply neighborly kindness.

"Yes," I admit. "I have."

The fire pops and shifts, sending sparks up the chimney. In the golden light, Violet looks like she belongs here, surrounded by the memories her grandmother preserved, wrapped in my shirt, her defenses lowering by the minute.

"Why?" she asks, the single word heavy with genuine confusion.

I could give her the simple answer—that I promised Martha.

"Because some things are meant to be protected," I say instead. "Some connections don't end just because someone's gone."

Violet's gaze drops to my mouth for a fleeting second before returning to my eyes. The air between us thickens, charged with something neither of us is ready to name.

"It's getting late," she says finally, carefully returning the sketches to their box. "I should probably turn in."

I nod, standing and offering my hand to help her up. She takes it, her fingers small and cool against my palm. When she rises, we're standing closer than necessary, her face tilted up to mine, my shirt still draped around her shoulders.

"I'll be on the couch if you need anything," I tell her, reluctantly releasing her hand. "Bathroom's stocked with everything you might need. Extra blankets in the chest at the foot of the bed."

"You've thought of everything," she says, a question in her tone.

"That's my job," I answer simply. What I don't say is that I've thought of her, specifically, in every detail—imagined what would make her comfortable, what would make her feel at home.

"Goodnight, Paul," she says softly, gathering the precious box of sketches to take with her.

"Goodnight, Violet."

I watch her walk down the hallway to the bedroom, my shirt still around her shoulders, her silhouette outlined by the firelight. When she closes the door behind her, I return to the fire, adding another log to keep the cabin warm through the night.

She may have come here to sell this place, to shed her past and return to Chicago. But now that she's here, now that I've seen the way she looks at her grandmother's treasures, the way she fits so perfectly in this space I've kept for her—I know the truth.

Violet Carson belongs here. With her memories. With this cabin.

With me.

She just doesn't know it yet.