Buried Curves
(2026)(The third book in the Mountain Men of Wolfjaw Falls series)
A Story by Julie Scarlet
I broke into the wrong cabin.
Three weeks on the run, half-starved and bleeding, and the first door I picked belongs to a ghost. He's all beard and scars and frostbite eyes, a knife in one hand and a voice like gravel telling me I won't last an hour out there in the storm. He's right. So I stay.
He doesn't ask my name. Doesn't give his. Just patches me up with rough, careful hands and watches me like he's deciding what I'm worth. I'm a reporter — I notice things. The way he flinches when I mention my brother. The way his jaw locks when I say the word Brotherhood. The way he looks at the soft curves I stopped apologizing for years ago, then makes himself look away.
I came up this mountain chasing the truth about Cole's death.
I didn't know I'd find it sleeping six feet from me, sharpening a hunting knife by the fire.
Seven years ago, this town buried a boy and a monster.
Only one of them stayed dead.
Tropes & Archetypes: mountain man romance, curvy heroine, plus size heroine, presumed dead hero, hidden identity, enemies to lovers, brother's killer, reporter heroine, woman on the run, forced proximity, snowed-in cabin, morally grey hero, scarred hero, grumpy/sunshine, slow burn, romantic suspense, small town conspiracy, brotherhood/MC adjacent, hero with a past, secrets and lies, age gap, HEA, third book in series
Genre: General Fiction
Three weeks on the run, half-starved and bleeding, and the first door I picked belongs to a ghost. He's all beard and scars and frostbite eyes, a knife in one hand and a voice like gravel telling me I won't last an hour out there in the storm. He's right. So I stay.
He doesn't ask my name. Doesn't give his. Just patches me up with rough, careful hands and watches me like he's deciding what I'm worth. I'm a reporter — I notice things. The way he flinches when I mention my brother. The way his jaw locks when I say the word Brotherhood. The way he looks at the soft curves I stopped apologizing for years ago, then makes himself look away.
I came up this mountain chasing the truth about Cole's death.
I didn't know I'd find it sleeping six feet from me, sharpening a hunting knife by the fire.
Seven years ago, this town buried a boy and a monster.
Only one of them stayed dead.
Tropes & Archetypes: mountain man romance, curvy heroine, plus size heroine, presumed dead hero, hidden identity, enemies to lovers, brother's killer, reporter heroine, woman on the run, forced proximity, snowed-in cabin, morally grey hero, scarred hero, grumpy/sunshine, slow burn, romantic suspense, small town conspiracy, brotherhood/MC adjacent, hero with a past, secrets and lies, age gap, HEA, third book in series
Genre: General Fiction
Used availability for Julie Scarlet's Buried Curves