"Are you going to help her?" I ask, studying his face. "After what she wrote about you?"
He falls silent for a moment, considering. "She never reported anything that wasn't true," he says at last. "The details were twisted, the context missing, but the core facts ... she wasn't wrong about my past."
A quiet resolve settles across his features. "Maybe the best way to win someone over isn't to defend yourself. Maybe it's to show them who you truly are."
The simple honesty of it takes my breath away. Here's a man who could hold grudges, who has every right to be bitter about Mrs. Patterson's public slaying. Instead, he's choosing grace. Choosing to be better.
"I'm proud of you," I say softly. "For all of this. The clinics, the festival, choosing to fight instead of running."
He looks at me for a long moment, an intensity in his expression that's unreadable. "I couldn't run. Not from this. Not from you."
The words hit, stealing my breath and making my knees feel unsteady. The air between us crackles with electricity, and every rational thought I've ever had dissolves under the heat in his eyes.
"You want to show people who you are?" I whisper, stepping closer until only a breath separates us. My heart pounds so hard I'm sure he can hear it. "Then take me upstairs to that bear rug and show me, Counselor."
His breath catches, eyes darkening with desire and a depth that feels heavier than want.
"Maddy"
"I'm done waiting," I interrupt, my voice stronger now, certain. "I'm done pretending this isn't happening, that I don't want this. Want you."
For a moment, he stares at me, like he's memorizing every detail of my face. Then the tension in his expression breaks, hesitation gone, certainty settling in its place.
"Are you sure?" he asks, his voice rough with restrained need.
Instead of answering with words, I reach up and trace the line of his jaw, letting my fingers trail down to the pulse point at his throat. His skin is warm, and I can feel his heartbeat racing under my touch.
"Lock the barn," I whisper.
He doesn't hesitate. Moving with purpose, he strides to the main doors, turning the heavy locks with decisive clicks. When he returns to me, there's a predatory edge to his approach, the kind that makes my knees weak and my pulse skip.
"Come here," he says, his voice low and commanding.
I take a step toward him, then another, until I'm close enough to feel the heat radiating from his body. His hands come up to frame my face, thumbs stroking across my cheekbones with infinite tenderness.
"Last chance to change your mind," he breathes against my lips.
"Not a chance in hell," I breathe back.
And then he's kissing me, deep and desperate and consuming, like he's trying to pour everything he feels into this one perfect moment. When we break apart, we're both breathing hard.
Without a word, he sweeps me up into his arms, carrying me toward the loft stairs like I weigh nothing at all. I wrap my arms around his neck, pressing kisses to his throat, tasting salt anddesire and the culmination of everything we've been building toward.
"Mason," I whisper against his skin, and his name carries all the want I've been holding back.
"I know," he says, his voice rough with emotion. "I know, sweetheart. I've got you."
As he carries me up the stairs to the loft, to the ridiculous bear rug that somehow became the symbol of everything we could be together, I know we're crossing a line we can never uncross. And I've never wanted anything more in my life.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
MASON
The moment I set Maddy down, the rest of the world evaporates. Late afternoon light spills across her like honey, catching in her hair, gilding her skin in a way that makes her look unreal, like a dream I'm afraid to wake from. My hands still tremble, not from carrying her, but from the gravity of this moment. The threshold we've crossed. The line we didn't toe, we leapt over it, hearts first.
"Second thoughts?" she asks, her voice low, threaded with mischief.
"Not one," I say.
