"Not if you are offering something better."
He stood, lifting me with him, my legs wrapped around his waist. I laughed as he carried me toward the bedroom, my arms around his neck, my heart so full it ached.
He laid me on the bed and stood over me, stripping off his shirt.
"I'll never get tired of looking at you," I said.
"Good." He crawled over me, caging me with his arms. "Because you're stuck with me." He kissed my neck, my collarbone, the swell of my breast through my shirt. "Forever, if you'll have me."
"Forever sounds good." I pulled his mouth to mine. "Now stop talking and show me."
He showed me. Slowly. Thoroughly. Taking his time to worship every inch of my body until I was shaking and begging and calling out his name.
When we finally came together, it was different from the desperate urgency of before. This was slow.
"I love you," he breathed against my lips as he moved inside me. "I love you. I love you."
"I love you too." I held his face in my hands, watching his eyes as the pleasure built.
We fell over the edge together, tangled in each other, breathing the same air.
Afterward, we lay in the darkness, my head on his chest, his fingers tracing patterns on my back.
"Move in with me," he said.
I lifted my head to look at him. "What?"
"Here. Now. Don't go back to Cal's cabin. Stay with me. We can live here until the house is finished, and then we can move into that together."
"Knox, that's..."
"Fast?" He grinned. "We've been in love for eight years. That's not fast. That's overdue."
I laughed, my heart swelling. "You make a good argument."
"Is that a yes?"
I thought about it. About Cal's cabin, where I'd been healing. About Knox's cabin, where I'd found home. About the house on the mountain, waiting to be finished.
"Yes," I said. "It's a yes."
He kissed me, long and deep, and I felt the future stretch out before us. Solid. Built on a foundation that had taken eight years to lay.
We were finally ready.
Epilogue
Six Months Later
Daisy
The house was finally finished. I stood on the wraparound porch, coffee cup in hand, watching the sun rise over the valley. Hollow Peak glittered below, still sleeping, the mountains turning pink and gold in the early light.
Our house. Our view. Our life.
We'd moved in two weeks ago, after months of working on it together. Knox had done the heavy construction, but I'd been there every step of the way.
It wasn't perfect. The master bathroom still needed tile, and we were missing half the furniture. But it was ours, and waking up here every morning felt like a dream I kept expecting to end.