Page 18 of The Lumberjack and the City Slicker

Greyson

She can pay?

Well, what the hell am I supposed to do with that?

I stand there in the middle of my own damn road, rain and mud soaking into my clothes, flashlight beam cutting a shaky tunnel through the storm, and she’s blinking up at me like I’m customer service.

Like I’m a problem she can solve with a credit card.

Her teeth chatter hard enough I can hear it over the wind.

Mascara—maybe?—has smudged at the corners of her eyes, and her hair is plastered to her cheek in wet, dark strands.

She’s shivering so violently it makes my own shoulders tighten in reflex.

And still she tries to bargain.

“I can pay,” she says again, voice wobbly but stubborn. “I have cash—well, not cash cash. I mean, who carries cash anymore? But I can Venmo. Zelle. Whatever you?—”

I stare at her.

I’m not sure what annoys me more—the assumption that I’m for hire, or the fact that even half-frozen on a mountain road, she’s still trying to control the situation like she’s at a marketplace.

I drag in a breath, cold air burning my lungs.

“Lady,” I say, because I’m not giving her my name, “I don’t need your money.”

Her eyes flash.

Big and dark and way too expressive for someone who’s supposedly built for the city.

“Well, I don’t need your attitude,” she snaps back, then immediately winces like she just realized she’s arguing with the only person standing between her and hypothermia.

Thunder rolls overhead, deep and angry, making the trees shudder like they’re flinching.

She glances up at the sky and the bravado slips for half a second.

That half-second is enough for me to see it.

Fear.

Real fear, tucked beneath the gloss and the sharp tongue.

She takes a shaky breath.

“Look, my car died,” she says, softer now. “It’s… it’s out of battery. I can’t get a signal. I—” Her throat bobs. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

I shouldn’t care.

I don’t do rescue missions.

I don’t do strangers.

I don’t do anything that brings chaos up my mountain.

And she is chaos in an expensive coat.

My gaze drops, because my brain is stupid and I can’t not notice details when they’re shoved in my face.