Page 9 of Unwrapped

“Sign the offer,” he says. “Come to dinner on Sunday. Lea’s making that thing with the potatoes you like.” He opens the office door. “And fix whatever’s going on with the candy shop girl. You look like hell.”

I walk across the courtyard at 4:15.

The candy shop light is on. Through the window, I can see her building the autumn display—the one we started together two nights ago. Candied apples on the rack I assembled, caramel corn in harvest bags arranged on the shelf I leveled, the window coming together in golds and reds and deep amber. She’s arranged everything with the same attention she gives her brackets, her batches, her bench scraper lines. Every piece placed with intention.

I push the door open. The bell chimes. She looks up from the display, and the smile arrives—bright, warm, automatic.

“Hey,” she says. “The display is looking great. I think the rack might need one more⁠—”

“Don’t,” I say.

The smile holds for a second. Then it folds.

“Don’t do that,” I say. “Don’t put on the bright version because it’s easier. I’ve seen you without it. I’m not going to unsee it.”

She stands in her shop with an apple in one hand and a twist tie in the other, and the brightness drains from her face. What’s underneath is the same thing I saw through the smoke the first night. The version of Millie Davis that nobody stays long enough to meet because the sweet version is so convincing, they never think to look for anything else.

“You’re leaving,” she says. Her voice is steady, but her hands aren’t.

“I’m transferring to a team in the same station. I’m not moving. I’m not going anywhere.”

“You’re walking into fire. That’s going somewhere.”

“Yeah.” I cross the shop and stop at the counter, the marble slab between us. “And I’m coming back from it. Every time. To this shop, to this town, to you.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know that I’ve been invisible my entire life. I know that I stood in this courtyard for years and nobody looked at me. I know that two nights ago I walked through a door because of smoke and found a woman swearing at a copper pot, and I haven’t had a single thought since then that wasn’t about her.” I set my hands on the marble. “You’re not the last one standing, Millie. You’re the first person I’ve ever wanted badly enough to be terrified of losing.”

Her eyes are bright. She sets the apple down on the counter. The twist tie drops. Her hands are shaking, and she doesn’t hide them, doesn’t tuck them behind her back or grip her apron to steady them. She lets me see.

“I’ve been the easy one my whole life,” she says. “The sweet girl, the one who smiles, the one who never needs anything hard. And loving a man who walks into wildfire is the hardest thing I can think of.” She looks at me across the marble, across the space where caramel and sugar and everything else happened last night. “I want it anyway.”

I come around the counter. She meets me halfway—no slab between us, no armor. I kiss her with my hands in her hair, and she tastes like caramel again.

We finish the display together. She hands me apples, and I hang them on the rack. She arranges the harvest bags, and I adjust the shelf. The window fills with amber and gold and the deep reds of a season that’s arriving whether Copper Peak is ready or not.

The candy shop is ready for fall. So am I.

I pull the offer from my back pocket, unfold it on the marble slab, and sign my name.

EPILOGUE

MILLIE: 5 YEARS LATER

The bay doors are open onto Prospect Street, the September sun is pouring in, and my tray of caramels is almost empty.

Both crews fill the station—structural on one side, wildland on the other, kids running between them, folding tables covered in food nobody remembers who brought. The annual end-of-summer BBQ. Five years of this tradition, and every year the table gets longer.

Holt is at the grill because nobody else is allowed near it. The salt-and-pepper at his temples has spread past distinguished into something Lea calls “the full captain.” Ace is two weeks old, asleep against Holt’s chest in a carrier, unbothered by the smoke and the noise and the fact that his father is flipping burgers one-handed. Lea is beside him with a coffee, dark circles under her eyes, radiant in a way that has nothing to do with rest and everything to do with the man holding their son against his heartbeat. She catches me looking and raises her mug.

Drew is in a camp chair with Jani on his lap. She’s three, dark auburn hair already in a braid, bossing our Hudson around from her father’s knee with Kendall’s absolute certainty that she’s in charge. Kendall is beside him, eight months pregnant with their second—a boy, Jett, due in six weeks. Drew’s hand rests on her belly, and he’s watching her talk to Lea with the same expression he had the day he walked into the outfitter and couldn’t look away.

Mack is telling a story—he’s always telling a story—and Scarlett is on his shoulders, three years old, slapping the top of his head every time he pauses for dramatic effect. Luna is asleep on Ellie’s chest on the bench, one year old, fist curled in the collar of Ellie’s shirt. Ellie has a paperback open in one hand, reading over the baby’s head. Mack finishes the story and turns to her for a reaction. She doesn’t look up. She’s smiling.

Dean is standing near the engine with perfect posture, cutting Leilani’s hot dog into precise, even pieces. She’s three and waiting in his arms with the patience of a daughter who already knows her father does things right or not at all. Laurelle is beside him with Max on her hip—one year old, asleep against her shoulder, unbothered by the noise. Laurelle arranged the wildflowers on the table, the same glass jar, same spot every week. Dean hasn’t stopped resting a hand on his son’s back since they brought him home, which on Dean looks like a very slight softening around the jaw.

Graham is against the engine bay wall with his arms crossed, tracking the room. Old habits. His gaze sweeps the bay every thirty seconds—exits, kids, hazards. Neve is cross-legged on the concrete with Ember in her lap, three years old, pulling at a ball of beeswax with chubby fingers. The candlemaker’s daughter. Graham’s gaze lands on Neve and holds. Five seconds. She doesn’t look up. She never has to. She always knows when he’s looking.