Page 4

CHAPTER

FOUR

EVEREST

I’ve got the bacon sizzling, the pancakes are golden, and the cabin smells like butter and maple syrup. I haven’t cooked for anyone but myself in… hell, I don’t even know how long. Years. But it feels natural, moving around the kitchen with her in the other room. Knowing she’s here. Safe.

She’s called off the paramedics and I’ve never been so happy to hear that help is not on the way. If she feels even a tenth of nerves I feel right now, then I may just have a shot.

When I carry the plates to the table, she’s laying on the couch, color finally coming back to her face. She looks soft and sleepy, her hair a little messy, eyes heavy but bright. And damn if she doesn’t smile when I set down the plate like I just gave her the world.

“This smells amazing,” she says.

I shrug, suddenly feeling a little self-conscious. “It’s just bacon and pancakes.”

“Yeah, but you made it for me, ” she says, her voice warm, almost teasing.

I clear my throat and gesture to the table. “You hungry enough to sit up?”

She nods and gets to her feet slowly, holding onto the arm of the couch for balance. I hover without meaning to, just in case she sways again. But she doesn’t. She walks to the table and sits across from me, curling her legs under the chair.

She’s got a forkful of pancake in her mouth, eyes closed like she’s tasting a memory. I watch her, a strange warmth growing in my chest, one I haven’t felt in a long time. Not just attraction—something deeper. Something tethered to the soul.

She swallows and looks up at me with a smile that’s soft around the edges. “These are amazing,” she says. “Like... dangerous-level good. You could open a diner if the whole mountain-man thing doesn’t work out.”

I laugh under my breath, surprised by how good it feels to hear her tease me like that. “Glad you like them.”

“They’re kind of... comfort food for me,” she adds after a pause, spinning her fork between her fingers.

“My mom used to make pancakes for me when I was a kid. Whenever I had a bad day or couldn’t sleep, she’d sneak down to the kitchen and make a stack just like these.

Extra crispy on the edges. Drowned in syrup. ”

I feel something tighten in my chest. That hits closer than she could know.

“My mom did the same thing,” I say, quieter now. “Pancakes on Sunday mornings. Always with too much butter and too much syrup. She said that’s how her mother made them. Kind of a... tradition, I guess.”

Her eyes search mine, and I know she feels it too—that quiet echo of commonality, deeper than coincidence.

“When I was little, my mom and I had a dream we used to talk about,” she continues.

“She used to say that if she ever won the lottery, she’d buy a little bed and breakfast for the two of us.

Somewhere quiet, in the mountains or by a lake.

We’d wake up early, make pancakes for the guests, drink coffee on the porch before the sun came up. That was her version of heaven.”

She smiles a little, but there’s sadness tugging at the corners of her mouth. Like she’s trying not to let it show how much that dream still means to her.

“I believed her,” she says. “Not about the lottery—but the rest of it. I thought we’d do it one day. We’d make it happen.” Her voice drops. “But then she got sick. And… everything changed. I went the practical route.” She laughs nervously.

“What about your family?” She changes the subject. “Does your mom live nearby?”

I shake my head. “She used to. We lived not far from here, actually—on the other side of the ridge, in a little green-roofed cabin.” I pause, clearing my throat. “She passed away when I was fifteen. Cancer.”

Sierra’s face shifts, her smile fading into something soft and solemn. “I’m so sorry,” she says. “Mine died when I was ten. Cancer, too. One day she was there and then... she wasn’t.”

It’s weird but the ache in her voice when she talks to me is so sharp, and so familiar.

We don’t need to talk about the pain. She gets it.

I’m not a talker. I don’t like to lay my feelings out on a platter for others to play with as they choose.

But with her, it feels like I don’t even have to speak about my greatest pain in life…

she just gets it because she’s been there too.

It’s the emotional connection I’ve been craving for years in an odd sort of way.

I break the tension, “It’s nice having someone here. You’re welcome to stay as long as you need to recover.”

She looks up at me, and that smile again—soft, almost shy—spreads across her face. It hits me in the chest like a hammer.

“Thank you, Everest,” she says. “That’s… really kind.”

She slices into her pancake and says, “You ever get lonely or wish you had neighbors out here?”

“Sometimes,” I admit. “But it’s better than the alternative. People can be… messy.”

“Yeah,” she says, and her smile dims a little. “They really can.”

She looks at me, curiosity flickering behind her eyes. “So…” she says gently, “how did you end up here? Living in this cabin, I mean.”

I smile a little and lean back in the armchair, stretching my legs out. I glance around the room—these old wooden beams, the stone fireplace, the photos that line the mantel. It’s all so familiar, so mine , but it didn’t start with me.

“It was a gift,” I say. “My dad bought this place for my mom a long time ago.”

She perks up, clearly surprised. “Really?”

I nod, my gaze drifting to the window. “They used to hike up here before the cabin was ever built. Just the two of them. Said it felt like their own private piece of the world. There’s a small waterfall about a half mile behind the cabin—hidden unless you know where to look.”

Sierra leans in slightly, listening, eyes wide with interest.

“My dad proposed to her there,” I say, voice softening. “Said she was the only thing in his life that ever made sense, and he wanted to anchor that feeling to something real. So when they got married, he bought the land and built this cabin for her. A place where they could always come back to.”

Sierra smiles, her eyes misty. “That’s… beautiful.”

“Yeah.” I nod, slowly. “It is. It was. After she passed, my dad never came back. Said it was too painful without her. He offered to sell it. But I couldn’t let him. So I took it over.”

I pause, glancing at the stone hearth. “It’s not much, I know.

It’s old and creaky and too far from everything, but…

it feels like them. Like home. And I don’t think I’ll ever leave.

Hell the only person who even comes up here to visit me is my Aunt Caroline.

She’s really the only family I have now. ”

She’s quiet for a moment, her fingers tightening slightly around the mug.

“I get it,” she says finally, voice barely above a whisper. “Sometimes the places we hold on to are the only ways we know how to hold on to the people we’ve lost.”

Our eyes meet.I feel something shift in me—quiet, but powerful. A thread pulled tighter between us.

We continue talking. Well more like she’s talking—something about the first time she ever saw snow, how she made a snow angel and ended up soaking wet and freezing but refused to go inside because it felt like magic.

I should be listening to her words. Instead, I’m watching her mouth.

Soft, full, moving gently with every syllable. Every now and then, she bites her lip when she’s trying to remember a detail. It’s like watching a storm roll in—quiet and electric and impossible to look away from.

And it hits me, sharp and deep— I can’t let her leave.

I don’t just mean I don’t want her to—I mean I won’t . I can’t. Something inside me won’t allow it. The thought of her walking out of this forest, out of my life—it makes my chest tighten with something primal. Possessive. Like a fuse has been lit inside me that I can’t snuff out.

She laughs again, eyes crinkling as she tells me about her brother daring her to eat a snowball, and that’s it. I’m gone.

Completely and utterly.

I lean forward, resting my arms on the table, close enough to reach out and touch her—though I don’t. Not yet. Not until I’m sure she won’t flinch. Not until I’m sure she wants it too. But my eyes are locked on her like she’s already mine.

And in a way, she is .

Because something changed the moment she stepped onto my porch—collapsed into my arms like she belonged there. Fate sent her to me. I don’t care what the world thinks about that. I don’t need logic or timing or permission. I just know what I know.

I can’t let her leave. Not tonight. Not ever.