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51
Chandler had had his fair share of meals at that table. The couch and chair-basic and brown leather-faced a small TV on an equally small console table because when Paul was home, he was outdoors.
His property was probably more than five acres of heavily wooded forests, and the entire square footage of his cabin couldn’t have been more than five hundred. The soaring ceilings of the main room is what made it feel bigger than it was. The old-fashioned wood-burning stove set into the back corner gave it a warm, inviting feeling, which would get even better once he had it lit.
“Bedroom upstairs?” she asked.
Chandler nodded. “The loft.”
Elena eyed the staircase warily.
“Don’t worry,” he told her. “I have a long history crashing on that couch, and I’ve had much worse nights of sleep than that.”
Elena turned and faced the part of the cabin that was all windows. It was Paul’s, and Chandler’s, favorite part of the cabin. Yeah, it was small, but one whole side showed the beauty of this place they lived. Right now, it looked cold and a little savage with nothing to block it from their view.
She shivered. “I feel like we’re being swallowed whole by that storm.”
He tilted his head. “You okay, Love?”
She was quiet, slowly rubbing her hands up and down along her upper arms. “I think, in my head, I imagined that the drive would be the worst part. But there is something terribly disconcerting about being stuck inside a stranger’s home for who knows how long and just praying we don’t, I don’t know, freeze to death or something.”
Approaching her carefully, Chandler set his hands on her shoulders, “We won’t freeze to death. Even if his propane runs out, there’s plenty of firewood for the stove, and it gets pretty toasty in here.”
Her eyes were so big and trusting. Trusting that he could help them through this. Instead of making him feel panicked or trapped, like he might normally, his chest warmed at how quickly she believed him. His hands gently tightened, and he felt the muscles relax under his palms.
Elena nodded. “Okay, so we won’t freeze, but is there food?”
“Oh, yeah.” He squeezed her shoulders again and went to investigate the kitchen. “One thing I know about Paul is that his freezer is always full of terrible bachelor meals.” He pulled the small door open and wasn’t disappointed. “See?” he told her, pulling one black and red carton out. “We might hit a week’s worth of sodium in one meal, but we have plenty to eat. And that pantry will be good and stocked too. He doesn’t run to the store much, so we won’t have much in the way of fresh food.”
She sighed in relief, and Chandler felt her come up behind him, close enough that her body heat warmed his back. “He likes chicken pot pies, I see.” She said,
“Who doesn’t?” he glanced at her over his shoulder. “Hopefully you do too because that’s what you get for dinner if I’m cooking.”
Elena smiled. “I’ll check the pantry for other options. Maybe I can whip something else together.”
A flash of movement caught his eye, and Chandler turned, hands propped on his hips. “There’s the little asshole herself.”
Elena clucked her tongue. “She can’t be that bad.”
Agnes poked her head out from behind the couch, bared her fangs, and hissed at him. “Look at those green eyes,” he murmured. “So much violence hidden in those depths.”
Elena laughed, then crouched down and held her hand out. “Hey, pretty girl.”NôvelDrama.Org owns this.
Agnes gave her a disdainful look and disappeared back behind the couch. Chandler shook his head. “I’m telling you. She’s awful.”
“You shouldn’t talk about her like that. Pets understand your tone, even if you don’t think they do.”
He laughed. “Oh, she understands all right. All evil things can understand the mayhem they leave in their wake.”
Elena straightened. “Where does Paul keep her food? I can make sure she’s got enough.”
After explaining to her what Paul had said on the phone, he ducked back out to the car and got their bags along with the small pillow Elena had left in the back seat. Did he tuck it close to his face so he could smell her shampoo on the walk back into the cabin? Too fucking right, he did. If he had to be trapped in a small space with a woman he really, really wanted to sleep with, then he would take the moments where he could get them. Including random pillow sniffing to catch just a little whiff of whatever fruity concoction she used.
More lights were on when he got back inside, and Elena was coming down the narrow staircase that led up to the loft, tucking her phone into the waistband of her leggings. “He doesn’t go crazy living in such a small space?” she asked,
Chandler shook his head before he tugged his jacket off and hung it on the coat tree next to the door. “He’s a simple guy. Give him outdoors to explore and a mountain to descend at a rapid pace on a small piece of fiberglass, and he’s happy.”
She smiled. “Does that describe you too?”
“Not really.” He shrugged. “But I do like some simple things too,”
Elena stopped and stared at the wall next to the stairs. A small framed picture hung crookedly of Chandler and Paul. He was almost a foot shorter than Chandler, tufts of hair sticking out from underneath his lucky black hat, but his grin was so big, so proud, it was almost hard to look at now. His arm was around Chandler’s shoulders, and Chandler had a giant-ass grin on his face and goggle marks lining his wind-whipped cheeks.
“You love him,” Elena observed.
Chandler found himself answering honestly. “He’s my best friend. The only person who’s ever … believed I could make something of my life.”
Elena didn’t look at him, just kept her eyes on the photo. He wanted to do something, anything, to shock her. Because for some reason, all of this felt too intimate, and she felt too intriguing, too fascinating for him to even contemplate.
“One time we got arrested because we’d wrecked the hell out of the side of someone’s garage.” He kept his voice even as her shoulders tensed visibly. “It wasn’t hard for the cops to find me because the blue spray paint we’d used on the side of the house was on my hands. I got caught and implicated the both of us,”