Wifed By The Mountain Man: A Modern Mail-Order Bride Romance (5 page)

I
wake
to Hope screeching through the baby monitor.

Damn it. I tossed and turned for hours, imaging Amelia a few doors down with her perfect tits and perfect ass, wishing she was grinding against me. After I finally went and showered—jacking off in the peace and quiet of the running water like a fucking teenage horn-dog—I fell asleep.

Looking at the clock, I see it’s just after three a.m. Too late—and too early—for anything good.

I walk sleepily down the hall in a pair of sweats and pick up a wailing Hope from her crib. She’s learned to stand, and has started this thing where she just hangs on to the edge and can’t remember how to sit back down.

With her in my arms, still wailing, I get her a bottle, which she refuses. Then I try a pacifier, which she spits out. The swing pisses her off, the lullabies are a no-go, and the biscuit I offer her gets chucked across the room.

Precious.

My eyes burn from exhaustion, and when I realize I’ve been pacing for an hour with a crying baby, I consider getting her in the truck and driving around until she falls asleep.

“Reed?” Amelia whispers my name, and I turn to see the woman who’s here to be my bride. She’s in a see-through tank top and tiny little shorts that leave nothing to the imagination, and her face … she’s gorgeous even in the dead of the night. Her tousled hair and sleepy eyes look sexy as fuck. “Can I hold her?”

I noticed earlier that Amelia didn’t once offer or reach for Hope all night. And I understand, I really do. It’s kind of an awkward spot: me watching her, and maybe she thinks I’ll be judging anything or everything she does right or wrong. But I’m not that guy.

The truth is, maybe I’d be a more judgmental parent if I wasn’t so damn tired of doing this on my own.

Her hands reach for Hope, and she looks at me for affirmation that it’s okay. I nod, my eyes closing as I stand there, leaning against the wall of the hallway. She pats Hope’s back, whispering soft words that soothe me more than my daughter.

“Oh, sweet one,” she coos in a singsong voice. “I’ve got you. You’re okay. It’s gonna be okay. Close your eyes, you’re allowed to go to sleep, baby girl. Shhh, you’re allowed to rest.”

Hope’s crying stops, fades to a whimper. Soon it’s heavy breathing, and I open my eyes, noticing the tight hold Hope has on Amelia’s hair. Her little fist is wrapped tight around a strand, but her eyes are closed, her head resting on Amelia’s shoulder. I swallow the lump that’s formed in my throat.

I’m not some fucking romantic, but the sound of Hope no longer crying is fucking glorious. It also makes me want to thank Amelia in a million different ways.

She walks to the nursery and lays a now-sleeping Hope back in her crib.

We tiptoe out, and once the door is closed, I pull Amelia into a hug.

“That was amazing,” I tell her, then kissing her forehead. “Seriously. That was the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.”

She laughs softly, “Reed, you’ve been alone far too long if a woman putting a baby to sleep is the thing that gets you hard.”

“Oh, honey,” I tell her, pulling her closer. “Plenty gets me hard.”

“Show me,” she whispers. “Show me how hard you can get.”

* * *

L
eading
her into my dark bedroom, I feel her body move against mine in the blackness of the night. It’s only dark a few hours a day this time of year in Alaska, and the dark has found us.

“Let’s not talk about what happens next—with you, with Hope, with me,” I tell Amelia, pulling her into my arms at the foot of the bed. I want to fall into the sheets with her, and I want to disappear, and forget, and pretend for just one night that my life is as simple as it was before Hope showed up.

I’m so tired.

“Okay,” she murmurs, her hands running across my chest. Her fingers brush against my skin, waking something that’s bigger than lust and deeper than desire. Her body pressed against mine doesn’t feel like someone is pressing me into a corner. Amelia next to me gives me space to breathe.

And damn, it’s been three months since I took a deep breath.

“Let me feel you, Reed. Let me feel you in me.”

“Oh, fuck, woman,” I exhale, lifting her chin with a finger, pressing my mouth on hers. All the air, the air I just found, escapes my lungs. It’s gone in that kiss, because she fucking takes my breath away.

Which is a problem. I don’t have space in my life to start having real feelings for another person. Hope takes all that I have, and it’s hard enough to find the strength to be her father. I can’t imagine carrying the burden of another person, too.

Kissing Amelia, I resolve to enjoy her body, but nothing else. I resolve to take her in my arms, but not in my heart.

And damn, I’ll be taking her in my bed too. Her legs wrap around me as I lift her ass up, wanting to get the tiny shorts off. Her arms wind around my neck, and our kissing leaves us panting and desperate for more. For everything.

“Oh, girl, you are so damn sexy,” I moan, laying her on the bed, tugging those little shorts off, finding her pussy bare and ready. I can’t resist slipping my hand between her legs, letting her wet juice cover my fingers. I run my hand up and down the length of her glorious opening.

She writhes beneath me, and her legs fall, spread apart, telling me she’s ready and willing. I lift her thin shirt over her head, running my hands over her naked body. I palm her tits, but they are so round and big, and for a moment I imagine her breasts full of milk, ready to give to a baby, and I have to shake my head to erase the erotic thought.

And since when did tits full of milk make my cock stiff and ready? Maybe it’s just Amelia: her womanly figure, curvy hips genetically predisposed to bear a child. Maybe it’s her natural way with Hope at bedtime, the way she effortlessly took her from my arms and put her to bed. I don’t know, but everything about this woman underneath me gets my cock hard as rock.

Hard and ready.

“I need you now, Reed. Don’t make me wait.”

“You don’t want me to touch you first?”

“Not now. Now I just need your cock. It’s like....”

“Like what?” I ask, my fingers caressing her pussy folds.

“It sounds weird, but ... it’s like some animalistic instinct has kicked in. Like, all I can think about is having your cock in me, filling me with your hot come.”

“Damn woman, you are trouble.”

I drop my sweats, stepping out of them, and lean over her body, easing my cock toward her. She says she wants it now, and fast? I can do that. I can fill her with my cock and release my seed in her lush pussy.

I enter her tightness, and she whimpers, grabbing my shoulders as I fill her.

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

“The pain will pass. And it’s worth it.”

“Pleasure borne from pain?”

“Exactly.”

I thrust into her, and a slight break of light slips through the blackout curtains. Soft light crosses her face, and I see her eyes closed, mouth dropped in an
O
, as she receives me in her.

“Oh, Reed, this is everything.”

I lace my fingers through hers, raise her hands over her head. Our bodies pulse together as I rock in her, deeper and deeper, my cock taking her until she screams. She cries out as she comes, but clamps a hand over her mouth instinctively.

“Fuck,” she moans. “I don’t want to wake your baby.”

“We’re good, I got you,” I tell her, pressing my mouth against hers, blocking any cry as our tongues circle each other.

She whimpers into my mouth as the orgasm crashes through her, and when she stops, I kiss her softly again, before shooting my come in her just the way she wanted.

We fall asleep, sweat draped on us, arms holding each other, like we’ve slept this way a thousand times.

But I know that isn’t the truth. The truth is, tomorrow is going to be a new day. A day where Amelia might leave me right where I started.

Here, with Hope, alone.

T
he next morning
, the blasted baby monitor is our alarm. Apparently Hope lets you know the moment she’s awake.

“No,” I groan, sitting up in bed. Reed is already walking down the hall to grab Hope from the crib. I hear him greeting his daughter and, as I cover a yawn, I can’t help but think he’s pretty incredible with his kid.

“Hey there, girl,” he says to her. “Let’s change you and get you a bottle, okay?” He talks her through the diaper change, and then after a few minutes they leave the room, headed downstairs.

I slide my shorts and tee shirt back on, and find them in the kitchen.

“Hey, guys,” I say. Reed is holding Hope, and simultaneously filling a bottle with formula. At the same time, a coffee carafe is under the faucet, filling with cold water. “You need some help?”

“Every morning it’s a fucking debate. Which is more urgent. Coffee for me, or a bottle for her.”

“The struggle is real.” I turn off the faucet, filling the coffeemaker with the water and adding ground beans to the filter. “And hey, you can swear in front of the baby now?”

He shrugs, twisting his lips, knowing he’s been caught. “I was just being a dick. Sorry.”

He screws the cap on the bottle and offers it to Hope. She grabs it from him, guzzling with a slurp.

“Wow, she’s thirsty,” I say, taking down two coffee cups and looking in the fridge for creamer. He has French vanilla. If he was trying to win me over to be his wife, he’s starting the day off pretty damn good. Besides having excellent taste in coffee, he’s also bare-chested in those low-slung sweats, a few feet away. And hello, he is ripped.

“I know, right?” He buckles her into a high chair. Then he slices a banana and tosses a handful of Cheerios on the tray in front of her. “So, the thing with Hope is, she’s happy as long as she gets every single thing she needs.”

I smirk. “Sounds just like her father.”

He takes the steaming coffee from me. “Ha. So you’re hot
and
funny.”

“Honestly, though, it doesn’t seem that hard.”

Reed’s mouth presses into a frown, and shrugs. “Why don’t you take her today and let me know how it goes?”

“You wanna turn it into a bet?” I ask, peeling a banana for myself.

“You want me to bet on my kid?”

“Is that bad?”

“Yeah,” Reed laughs. “It’s kind of weird.”

“Well, I’m weird. That’s something you should know.”

“You don’t really come off as super weird, Amelia. More high maintenance.”

“Wow, Reed, all these compliments. It’s like, wow, how could I resist staying here with you forever?”

“With
Hope
forever, you mean,” he clarifies.

“Is there a difference?”

“A big one. Told you yesterday, I want a bride so Hope will have a mother.”

“Oh.” I nod, setting down my cup of coffee, hating that I let myself get swept up in this family-unit-I-never-had fantasy in, like, fifteen minutes flat. “You want a mother for her, but not a wife for yourself.”

“Exactly.”

I hate it—how hot he is, and how he can manage to make me forget why this whole mail order bride gig is such a bad idea. I hate that he isn’t hiding his agenda or his desire. He’s just straight-up telling me that this is about Hope, and nothing else.

“Look,” he says. “What the fuck do I know about babies? Maybe it’ll be easy for you. Maybe I just suck at it. But dammit, I’m fucking tired, Amelia. I haven’t had a break in months. And maybe I’m a little defensive—because, shit, what does that say about me then, as a dad, if you could waltz in here and do this with your eyes shut?”

I listen to him, watching Hope, who’s squishing banana in her fingers. She’s a mess, gummy cereal all over her face and bare tummy. She babbling nonsense and the two little teeth sticking through her pink gums remind me that teething was probably a pain in the ass, too. I know I said taking care of her seemed easy, but Reed knows better than me. And he’s exhausted.

“How about you go do something for yourself today, Reed? Go play. Let me deal with her. Just write down how often she needs a nap, and then go in the woods and build a fort or whatever you do out there.”

“I don’t build forts.”

“Well maybe you should. Go shoot a gun or catch a fish or something that will make you feel like a person.”

“Really?” His eyes question me, but I also see a twinge of hope behind the question. He knows how badly he needs this.

“Really. Let me try this.”

“Thank you, Amelia.”

“Oh, I know you’ll make it up to me.”

“Oh, yeah?” He gives me a sidelong glance that would make my panties wet if I were wearing any.

“Yeah. Tonight you can let me sleep in your room, all night.”

“Wow, already planning your night here, huh? Sounds like you wanna stay awhile?”

I swallow. I want to give this guy a break, but I can’t commit to forever with him and his daughter. “No promises, but tonight after Hope goes to bed, we have a date.”

* * *

R
eed leaves me with instructions
, and I realize I should probably dress myself and Hope. After wiping her up with a washcloth in her high chair, I pull her into my arms and head upstairs to the bedrooms.

This is where things get tricky. I mean, she’s still filthy, and now I have banana and Cheerios stuck to me. I can’t set her down because I don’t want her to touch anything. Realizing that a shower—or even a teeth brushing—for myself is gonna have to wait, I take her into the bathroom to give her a bath. I watched Reed do this last night, so I get the concept. Minimum water, maximum speed, and—most importantly—eyes on the baby the whole time.

But she doesn’t like it. In fact, saying she hates it might be most accurate.

She isn’t just crying, she’s full-on
wailing
. Which is insane, because who doesn’t like a bath?

Not a single woman, ever.

“Hope, it’s okay,” I promise her, knowing the last thing she wants to do is listen to me. Come to think of it, she seemed to hate Lottie yesterday, too. Maybe she just wants her dad.

Well, he isn’t here right now.

The rest of the day goes equally fantastic. When I put her in a jumpy-chair thing attached to the door, so I can I fling on clothing, scrub my teeth, and comb my hair, I think
Great, we found a solution, this must be what all the mothers do
. That is, until she begins to red-face scream at me because apparently she hates this device.

So.

Naptime is a joke; the pacifier is a no-go, and the only thing she likes is me pacing up and down singing to her. That gets her to sleep briefly, but then she needs a diaper change and that wakes her up full-throttle. I get her into the swing, and scramble around the house tossing laundry in a basket, wiping her high chair down, and loading the dishwasher—only to abandon the project halfway through, because Hope decides the swing is the anti-Christ and attempts to exorcise herself out of it.

It’s really just one long sob-fest, and at one point she and I are both lying on the couch exhausted from one another.

“How does your daddy get anything done?” I ask, leaning back on the couch with her in my lap. We both have cheeks streaked with tears, both look like complete train wrecks.

She looks at me with her little pouty mouth and says, clear as day: “Dada?”

“You can talk?” I ask.

She smiles, all toothy and cute.

“Your daddy will be back soon,” I promise her. “And he was right, Hope, big time. You are a lot of work.”

She giggles, clapping her hands.

I can’t even respond with a smile, I lean my head back on the couch, wondering what the hell I’m doing with my life.

Last night, in Reed’s arms, I felt like I’d died and gone to heaven. I’ve never had a man touch me that way, make me feel so gorgeous, so wanted. It was like he needed me as much as I needed him.

And this morning, watching him with Hope, it wasn’t too difficult to imagine playing house here, for reals ... except that a day with Hope reminded me this isn’t some game. This is real.

And I don’t see how I’m cut out for it. Hope’s been miserable all day. I’ve been miserable all day. The clock reads six p.m., but it feels like its midnight.

Just then, Reed walks in the front door, his face softer than this morning.

“Good evening, ladies,” he says, smiling like a little boy—well, smiling like a freaking hot man. He looks one hundred and eighty degrees different than he did yesterday when I met him.

He was so firm and fierce, nothing warm or gentle. But after last night with me, and then today by himself, it’s like there’s a light about him. His smile reaches his eyes, and beyond. He looks happy, relaxed. He’s recharged.

“You have a good day?” I ask, covering a yawn. He takes Hope from my arms, and she immediately starts jumping in his arms, happier than she’s been all day. Which doesn’t take much, I suppose.

“So good,” Reed says. “I caught a massive trout, gonna grill it for dinner. You hungry?”

“I haven’t eaten all day.”

Reed pauses, looks around the great room at the discarded laundry basket on the coffee table, the door of the dishwasher flung open, and a handful of near-empty baby bottles lying on the counter.

“You doing okay, Amelia?” he asks, stepping toward me.

“Oh, I’m totally fine.” I shrug, not wanting to admit defeat. I guess I want Reed to think I can handle this, even though I don’t even know if
I
want to be able to handle this.

“You look like a mess, honey.” He looks at me and I know he sees spit-up on my tank top, my hair still in a beyond-messy bun, and my fingernail polish chipping.

“It’s fine. I just didn’t know where to put Hope while I showered. What do you do?”

“I put her in the Pack ’n Play in my bedroom, with a few toys.”

“Oh.” I purse my lips. That makes sense. I didn’t go in Reed’s room, and the guest room didn’t have a Pack ’n Play. “What do you do when she needs a diaper change but is asleep?”

He cracks a smile, setting Hope down on a blanket that’s laid out on the floor with a pile of toys and board books.

“Sweetheart, you never ever change the diaper of a sleeping baby.”

“Really?” I shudder. “That’s not very sanitary.”

“Did she sleep for longer than twenty minutes all day?” he asks.

“No.

“Well, sleep is more important. Always.”

“You know your stuff, Dad.”

“Eh, I’m learning. Anyone can learn if they want to.”

Want to
. Those are the operative words here. The words that will make this or break it.

The room has gotten really quiet, and we turn, seeing that Hope has rolled onto her tummy. The blanket is tucked under her, and she’s sound asleep.

“Hey, Amelia,” Reed says quietly. “Go grab a shower. I’ll put Hope to bed and get dinner going.”

“Is she gonna be up all night if she sleeps now?”

“No, babies can go down early if they miss their naps.”

“Right. Of course.” I stand, smiling awkwardly, and head upstairs to the shower, trying to hold myself together until the door is locked and the water is running over my bare shoulders.

I’ve never in my life felt so torn. I’ve never been forced to look at what I want—what I
really want
—so hard. And maybe I should have done that before I signed up to be a mail order bride, but I already feel like a different person than I was two days ago.

I’ve been this flighty person whose priorities were all effed up. I really thought a pair of heels and a push-up bra would be enough to give my life meaning—that if I had a man, then I would be happy.

I feel so freaking stupid. The hot water runs over my face, and I want to disappear down the drain, too.

I wish I never signed up for this as a way to prove that I was someone desirable. After the breakup with Derrick, all I could think was that I wasn’t enough, so I flung myself at the first choice that wouldn’t end in rejection. Being a mail order bride offered a guaranteed relationship.

But maybe it doesn’t. Maybe this time I’ll be the one walking away.

Because even though Reed is undeniably sexy in a rugged, take-me-now sort of way, he’s also responsible and mature and grounded. Like a real adult. Things don’t scare him, don’t make him run. He’s a single dad, catches trout in his own freaking lake like a man, and somehow manages it all.

I can’t even get a baby down for a nap.

Stepping out of the shower, I can’t help but wonder why a man like that would want a woman like me.

And then the worst realization washes over me: Reed never hinted at wanting me. No, he was clear about what he was looking for. A mother for Hope, not a wife for himself.