Page 37 of Stuck with my Mountain Daddies (Men of Medford #4)

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Riley

I didn’t cry when Lucy and I pulled up to the cabin.

I thought I might. I expected that flood of emotion, that cinematic swell in my chest as the trees parted and the familiar outline came into view.

But all I felt was the quiet ache of relief. My body exhaled at long last.

The porch had been repaired, new beams, fresh paint, the railing straight and solid again. Someone had added little touches, too.

A wind chime hung by the door, catching the breeze and humming softly. There was fresh gravel in the driveway, and the front steps no longer groaned when we climbed them.

It wasn’t just fixed. It was better.

I glanced at Lucy, who stood beside me, arms crossed as she took it all in. She didn’t say anything for a long beat.

Then she let out a slow, shaky breath. “Holy shit.”

I laughed, the sound catching in my throat. “That about sums it up.”

She looked at me, eyes glassy but shining. “I thought we were going to have to burn it down and start over.”

“Well, we still might,” I said with a weak grin. “If the heater doesn’t work.”

But it did. Everything did.

The inside smelled of sawdust and clean wood and a hint of vanilla from the candle left burning on the windowsill.

The floors were refinished, the walls patched and painted, and there was a new couch where the old lumpy one had been.

Cozy blankets were folded on the armrests. A “welcome back” note sat on the kitchen counter with Lucy’s name scrawled in blocky, familiar handwriting.

Garrett.

I ran my fingers over it, my chest tightening in that strange way it always did lately. A tangled mess of emotion I didn’t fully understand, gratitude, affection…

“Your home is beautiful, Lucy. I can see why you live here.”

I was starting to really appreciate the mountain life. My time in the brothers’ cabin had shifted everything inside my mind.

Lucy threw herself onto the couch and groaned dramatically. “I know, I love it here. I don’t mind working in the city, but this is home.”

I smiled, walking over to join her, but I didn’t sit. I stood in the middle of the cabin for a second longer, letting myself feel it.

The stillness. The quiet. The safety of something solid beneath my feet.

“This is heaven.”

And for a few days, it really was.

The cabin became a cocoon. Warm, quiet, tucked away from the noise.

Lucy and I fell into a rhythm: coffee in the mornings, blankets and books in the afternoons, lazy dinners we half-cooked and half-ordered from The Foundry.

I loved the silence and steadiness of it all. But of course, silence never lasts forever.

Because the world doesn’t forget. And neither does the internet.

Ava’s livestream hadn’t just gone viral. It had spawned Reddit threads, duets on TikTok, think pieces, fan accounts dissecting my past, my choices, my expressions.

They’d paused my downfall long enough to catch the backlash, and now they were coming for the sequel.

My name was trending again. For all the wrong reasons.

Sure, Ava’s was as well, but she’d brought that on herself, so what was I to do?

And God help me, there was still a part of me that wanted to use it.

I knew how it worked. The algorithm didn’t care why people clicked. Hate could build a platform just as easily as love.

All I had to do was film a tearful, curated apology. Or clap back. Or twist the narrative into something slick and sellable.

I could almost feel the pull in my fingers. The urge to edit. To post. To take back control.

But every time I got close, Medford pulled me back.

If it wasn’t Lila baking me cookies somewhere in her busy schedule, it was Aurora, offering me a paperback that was guaranteed to make me feel better. And I was growing closer to Sadie than ever.

I didn’t mean to build roots in Medford. This was supposed to be a short-term thing, but I wasn’t sure if I would ever be able to pull myself away now.

Especially with them around all the time.

“Uh-oh.” Lucy sighed. “Guess who’s back.”

I didn’t need to guess. Her brothers weren’t exactly being subtle.

I turned to find her leaning against the doorway, coffee mug dangling from her fingers.

“What do you reckon they’re here for this time? They bringing more firewood? Or is this a checking-in-to-make-sure-you-haven’t-emotionally-imploded kind of visit?”

“I don’t know,” I muttered. “Could be anything, right?”

“Should we offer snacks or hide?”

By then, the truck doors had opened, and the guys were climbing out. Beckett gave a short wave, Garrett offered a quiet smile, and Asher’s sunglasses remained exactly where they were, like armor.

“Morning,” Beckett said as he approached, a box in his hands. “Just dropping off a few things.”

Lucy squinted. “Is that my dog-eared copy of The Secret History ?”

Garrett held up another book. “And your annotated Wuthering Heights . You left a Post-it in here that says ‘Heathcliff is a disaster, not a dreamboat.’”

“Accurate,” Lucy said, plucking the book from his hand and flipping through it as if it might betray her further. “So this is a book drop-off. Sure. And that’s why the whole cavalry showed up?”

Beckett didn’t miss a beat. “We were in the area.”

“You live in the area,” Lucy shot back. “Like ten minutes away.”

Asher grinned. “Exactly. Super convenient.”

Lucy raised an eyebrow. “Uh-huh. Super convenient. And here I thought you guys had lives.” She turned to me with mock seriousness. “I’m starting to feel like I’m being supervised. What about you?”

I damn near choked on my coffee.

Garrett scratched the back of his neck. “I wanted to make sure everything was working okay. Heater. Pipes. Stuff like that.”

“Right,” Lucy said slowly, clearly enjoying herself. “Because you’re all so passionate about plumbing.”

Asher leaned against the porch railing and gave her a lazy smile. “I’m passionate about a lot of things. Pipes included.”

“Gross,” Lucy muttered, but she was laughing as she headed inside with the books. “I swear, if you’re still here in an hour, I’m putting you to work chopping vegetables.”

As soon as she disappeared inside, the air shifted. The secondhand tension had been dialed up a notch.

Garrett stood near the steps, not quite meeting my eyes. “You doing okay?” he asked softly.

I nodded. “Yeah. Getting there.”

Beckett’s arms were crossed, jaw tight. “If anything breaks, if the heater makes weird noises or you run out of propane, call. Don’t wait.”

“I know,” I said, and it came out quiet.

This wasn’t really about the heater, was it? It was about what we still needed to do.

Asher didn’t say anything at first. He looked at me for a long second, then glanced toward the door. “She doesn’t know?”

I shook my head. “Not yet.”

His mouth curved, barely. “You’re a better actor than me.”

There was a long silence.

Then Lucy’s voice called from inside, bright and amused: “If you’re whispering dramatic secrets out there, I swear to God?—”

“We’re coming,” Beckett barked back, but there was a smile tucked under it.

Inside, Lucy appeared with a bowl of tortilla chips and plopped onto the armrest of the couch. Asher had somehow made it into the kitchen and was poking around, while Beckett leaned against the back of the couch, arms crossed, calculating the structural integrity of the ceiling beams for fun.

Garrett stood near the fireplace, quiet, like he didn’t quite know where to go. And I perched on the edge of the armchair, hyperaware of every glance, every shift in tone.

“So,” Lucy said suddenly, as if she’d had a revelation. “You guys are coming tonight, right?”

Three sets of eyes turned toward her.

Beckett blinked. “Coming where?”

“The Christmas tree lighting in town,” she said, like it was obvious. “It’s tradition.”

Asher squinted. “Since when?”

“Since now,” she said cheerfully, grabbing a chip. “Hot cider, twinkly lights, a fifteen-foot pine that gets turned into a glowing forest monster for a month. You know. Festive things. Medford is great at festive things.”

Beckett hesitated. “Thought you weren’t into that stuff anymore.”

Lucy shrugged. “Yeah, well, I’m allowed to change my mind. Also, Riley’s never been.”

Three more sets of eyes turned to me now.

I froze mid-sip of coffee.

“It sounds nice,” I said cautiously.

“You’ll love it,” Lucy assured me. “It’s corny and chaotic and perfect. Plus, we can get those ridiculous cinnamon donuts from Kai. The Foundry boys are doing booths.”

Garrett smiled slightly. “The ones that taste like warm sugar and regret?”

“The very same,” Lucy confirmed.

Asher leaned against the fridge, giving me a sly little smirk. “Are we going for the holiday charm or because you secretly want to watch carolers butcher Mariah Carey again?”

“Can’t it be both?” She grinned. “Besides, it’s not Christmas until someone hits a whistle note and breaks the mic.”

Beckett looked between her and me, then gave a resigned sigh. “Fine. We’ll come.”

Lucy clapped her hands. “Excellent. It’s a date. Kind of.”

Asher raised an eyebrow. “A group, non-romantic, family-and-friends-oriented excursion?”

“Exactly,” Lucy said, smirking as she stood. “Now get out of my cabin so we can get cute.”

They took the hint. Slowly. With too-long glances and little comments that felt loaded.

Garrett met my eyes once more before he left, and I saw something there, warmth, maybe. Worry. The pull of everything unresolved.

But then the door closed behind them, and Lucy’s eyes lit up like she was the Christmas tree herself.

“Okay. Operation Get Cute is officially underway.”

I blinked. “Is that a real operation?”

“It is now.” She grabbed my wrist and tugged me down the hallway as if we were late for a heist. “Come on. We’ve got like, two hours before the event, and your current vibe screams depressed college freshman in finals week.”

“I am depressed,” I muttered. “And finals week was traumatic, remember?”

“Exactly why this is a full transformation moment,” she said over her shoulder. “It’s going to be so much fun!”

She shoved open the door to her bedroom, which now doubled as our temporary shared closet-slash-chaos-zone, and flung open every drawer in a heartbeat.

“Let’s see,” she said, rooting around, a raccoon on a mission. “Something festive, but not too festive. Cozy, but hot. This is your reinvention, right?”

“Is it?”

“What?” she said innocently. “Tell me I’m wrong.”

I threw a pillow at her.

She dodged it and popped up with a triumphant gasp, holding a thick cream-colored knit sweater with little pearl buttons down the back. “This. With your dark jeans. And those boots you brought that make your legs look like sin.”

“Too dramatic,” I said, already losing the argument.

“You’re in denial,” she sang, tossing it at me. “Try it on.”

I groaned but pulled my sweatshirt over my head, tossing it onto the bed. Lucy turned away dramatically to give me “privacy,” which mostly meant she was rifling through a makeup bag like a beauty witch preparing a spell.

“You’re lucky you’re naturally hot,” she said. “But tonight we’re doing effort hot. We’re going full Hallmark protagonist. You’re going to glow like fresh snow and heartbreak recovery.”

“I swear, you come up with this stuff in your sleep.”

“I do, actually. It’s a gift.”

When I emerged in the sweater, Lucy did an actual slow clap. “See? If Ava could see you now, she’d choke on her jealousy.”

“Perfect,” I said. “Let’s mail her a postcard.”

She sat me down on the edge of the bed and got to work. Brushing, fluffing, dabbing things on my cheeks with a speed and precision that suggested this was not her first makeover montage.

“I’ve always wanted to do this,” she confessed, lining my eyes with a soft bronze shimmer.

“Like in movies, where the sad girl becomes the sparkly girl and everyone falls in love with her. Only, you know, without the need to change who you are or whatever. You’re already great. We’re just enhancing .”

I smiled. “Do I at least get a dramatic entrance later?”

“Oh, absolutely. We’ll be fashionably late and glowing like hearth goddesses.”

When she finished, she spun me toward the mirror and did jazz hands.

“Ta-da!”

I barely recognized myself, but in a good way. My hair was soft and loose around my shoulders, not how I’d do it in my makeover videos at all.

My cheeks were dusted with a glow that looked like healthy self-esteem. The sweater clung in the right places, and the boots really did make my legs look like sin. But more than that, I looked happy.

Or at least like I could be.

I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. “Okay. Wow.”

“Hot, right?” Lucy said proudly. “You’re welcome.”

“So, tonight is going to be interesting.”

She smirked. “It sure is.”