Updated Apr 11, 2026 • ~8 min read
Chapter 3: Not a Good Man
Jackson
I’m not a good man.
I know this about myself the same way I know the feel of my rifle in my hands or the smell of pine resin in the morning air—it’s a fact, immutable and unchangeable, carved into my bones by four tours in Afghanistan and the things I did there, the things I saw, the things that still wake me up in the middle of the night with my heart pounding and my hands reaching for weapons that aren’t there.
I’m not a good man, which is why I came to these mountains five years ago and built this cabin with my own two hands, fifteen miles from the nearest town, accessible only by trails that disappear under snow for half the year. I came here for solitude. For silence. For the kind of peace that can only exist when there are no people around to shatter it with their needs and their expectations and their constant, endless noise.
And now there’s a woman asleep in my bed.
A chatty, Type-A, corporate lawyer from New York City who’s going to be stuck in my one-room cabin for at least a week, possibly two, and who is going to absolutely destroy the carefully constructed sanctuary I’ve built for myself.
I should have left her in the woods.
The thought is dark and bitter, and I hate myself for even thinking it, but that doesn’t make it any less true. I should have left her there, let nature take its course, avoided this entire disaster. But Bear had found her scent and led me right to her, and when I saw her crumpled against that tree, her lips already turning blue with hypothermia, I didn’t have a choice.
I’m not a good man, but I’m not a monster either.
So I carried her back here, stripped off her wet clothes with clinical efficiency, wrapped her in every fur and blanket I own, and spent the last six hours keeping the fire stoked and monitoring her breathing to make sure she didn’t slip into something worse than unconsciousness.
And now she’s awake, and she’s going to talk.
I can already tell she’s a talker. The kind of person who fills silence with words, who needs to process everything verbally, who probably never shuts up even when there’s nothing worth saying. The kind of person who’s going to ask questions and expect answers and try to turn this forced cohabitation into some kind of bonding experience.
The kind of person I moved to the mountains to get away from.
I stand by the stove, prodding the fire with more force than necessary, and try to figure out how I’m going to survive the next two weeks without completely losing my mind.
“Rules,” I say out loud, my voice rough from disuse. I don’t talk much anymore—there’s no one to talk to except Bear, and he doesn’t require conversation—and the word comes out harsher than I intend. “We need rules.”
From the bed, Sloane Whitmore stirs, her eyes fluttering open with the kind of grogginess that says she’s barely slept despite being unconscious for the last few hours. “What?”
“Rules,” I repeat, turning to face her. “You’re going to be here for a week or two. We need ground rules.”
She blinks at me, and I can see the exact moment her lawyer brain kicks into gear, sharpening her gaze and straightening her spine despite the pain I know she must be in. “Ground rules.”
“Yeah.” I cross my arms over my chest, using my size to establish dominance in a way I’m not proud of but that’s necessary if I’m going to maintain any semblance of control over my own space. “First: I hunt. You stay inside. The mountains are dangerous, especially for someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing, and I’m not going to spend my time tracking you down every time you wander off.”
“I wasn’t planning on wandering—”
“Second,” I continue, cutting her off. “Don’t touch my guns. They’re loaded, they’re dangerous, and they’re not toys.”
Her eyes widen. “I’m not going to touch your guns—”
“Third: Don’t waste water. Everything we have comes from the creek, and in this weather, that means melting snow. It’s a pain in the ass, so we conserve.”
“Okay, but—”
“Fourth: Don’t talk to me before I’ve had coffee.”
That one stops her mid-protest, her mouth falling open in what looks like indignation. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me.” I can feel my jaw tightening, the muscle jumping the way it does when my patience is wearing thin, which happens a lot faster than it used to before Afghanistan. “I’m not a morning person. I don’t do small talk. I don’t do chitchat. You want to survive the next two weeks without me losing my mind, you give me space and silence until I’ve had my first cup of coffee.”
“Are you serious right now?” She’s sitting up fully now, the furs and blankets pooling around her waist, and even though she’s wearing my spare thermal shirt and looking like she’s been through hell, there’s fire in her eyes that makes something twist uncomfortably in my gut. “You’re laying down rules? I’m not a child!”
“No, you’re a guest. An unwanted, unexpected guest who’s alive because of me.” The words come out colder than I mean them to, but I don’t take them back. “My cabin, my rules. Don’t like it? There’s the door. Feel free to take your chances with the blizzard.”
We stare at each other, and I can see the war happening behind her eyes—pride battling with survival instinct, fury battling with the very obvious fact that she can’t walk on that ankle, can’t navigate the mountains, can’t survive without me.
Survival wins.
“Fine,” she spits out, her hands clenching in the blankets. “Your cabin, your rules. But don’t expect me to be grateful about it.”
“Wasn’t expecting gratitude, city girl. Just compliance.”
I turn back to the stove, dismissing her the same way I dismissed her last night, and tell myself that the strange feeling in my chest isn’t guilt. I’m doing what I need to do to maintain boundaries, to protect the peace I’ve built here, to make sure she understands that this isn’t some romantic cabin-in-the-woods scenario where we bond over shared trauma and hot chocolate.
This is survival. Pure and simple.
She’ll be gone in a week or two, back to her corporate law firm and her partnership review and her life in New York City, and I’ll go back to my solitude and my silence and my careful management of the PTSD that still wakes me up screaming sometimes.
That’s the plan.
That’s the only plan.
A wet nose nudges my hand, and I look down to find Bear staring up at me with those yellow eyes that always seem to see too much. He makes a soft sound—not quite a whine, but close—and then turns and pads over to Sloane’s bed, where he settles down on the floor beside her with a contentment that makes my jaw tighten even more.
“Traitor,” I mutter under my breath.
From the bed, I hear a soft, surprised laugh, and when I glance over, Sloane is running her fingers through Bear’s thick fur, and the wolf-dog is leaning into her touch like he’s known her his entire life instead of approximately twelve hours.
“He’s sweet,” she says, and there’s a warmth in her voice that wasn’t there when she was arguing with me. “What’s his name again? Bear?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s fitting. He’s huge.” She scratches behind his ears, and Bear’s tail thumps against the floor. “How long have you had him?”
“Three years.” I don’t elaborate, don’t mention that I got Bear from a rescue organization that specializes in matching veterans with service animals, don’t mention that the wolf-dog hybrid is trained to detect PTSD episodes and ground me when the nightmares get bad.
She doesn’t need to know that.
She doesn’t need to know anything about me beyond the fact that I’m keeping her alive until the weather clears.
“He’s a good boy,” she murmurs, and Bear makes that sound again, practically purring under her attention.
I turn back to the fire, jaw tight, and try to ignore the way the cabin suddenly feels smaller with another person in it, the way the silence I’ve cultivated so carefully is already being filled with her presence, her voice, her soft laughter.
Two weeks.
I can survive two weeks.
I survived four tours in Afghanistan. I survived losing my entire unit in an ambush. I survived the PTSD diagnosis and the medical discharge and the long, painful process of building a new life out here in the wilderness.
I can survive two weeks with a chatty city lawyer.
Probably.
Maybe.
Behind me, Sloane says something else to Bear, her voice warm and gentle, and the wolf-dog’s tail thumps harder against the floor.
God help me.
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