Page 9

"Only with people who don't take care of themselves."

"I take care of myself fine."

"You rinsed a laceration with a garden spigot."

"Ranch spigot. Cleaner water. Gabe had it tested last spring."

"That's not how bacteria works."

His grin softens into something gentler. Then, so quiet I almost miss it: "Nobody's fussed over a scratch of mine in a long time."

Bandage smoothed into place. Edges sealed. His arm drops. My hand is tingling. Pins and needles, like I touched something electric and my body hasn't recalibrated yet.

"There. Don't get it dirty."

"I'm a lumberjack. Everything I do is dirty."

Our eyes meet. His gaze drops to my mouth. Just a heartbeat. A fraction of a second that stretches long enough for my lungs to forget their job. Then back up.

The wind slams outside, hard enough to rattle the front windows and send a feed bag display wobbling. My step backward is too fast, too obvious. His grin comes back softer, like he knows exactly what just happened in this four-second silence and is letting me have my retreat without comment.

"Your cider's getting warm."

"Yes, ma'am."

Sandwiches at the counter, side by side. His stool and my stool. Two feet of space between us that feels like two inches. He talks about the festival while he eats. Milling cedar boards for vendor booths. Hand-building a stage near the pumpkin field. Anna out there every morning planting mums and stringing fairy lights along the fence posts.

"You should see it. The pumpkins came in huge this year. Anna's Korean, grew up spending summers on her grandmother's ranch in Texas. She knows soil like Luke knows cattle. She planted this whole field in August, and Luke walks through every morning pretending he's checking irrigation for operational reasons, but really he's just proud of her. The man can't hide anything when it comes to Anna."

He talks about the ranch with a tenderness that makes it obvious this isn't just a job he shows up to. It's his home. His people.

"Hunter and Gwen are handling the bonfire setup." A pause, careful and respectful, the kind of pause a person makes when they're talking about someone they love and want to represent fairly. "Hunter doesn't talk much. Not yet. He's working on it. But he's the best man with an axe I've ever seen. Silent, precise, stacks a cord of firewood like he's building a cathedral. His wife Gwen's got this pink hair you can spot from half a mile away, and their boy Julian follows Hunter everywhere. Not even two yet, already trying to carry sticks. Hunter pretends it slows him down. Everyone knows it makes his whole day."

These people sound like a family. Real, messy, complicated family. The kind that takes you in and keeps you and argues about cider station placement. I walked away from something like that when I walked away from everything else.

"Come see it." He finishes his sandwich, folds the wrapper. "Saturday. I'm working timber in the morning, but Anna's doing a decorating run in the afternoon. She'd love the help."

"I told you, I'm not..."

"Looking for people. I know." He stands, caps the cider jar, sets it by my hand so I'll drink it after he leaves. "But sometimes people find you anyway. That's not a threat, Selene. That's just how small towns work."

The wind picks up outside, bending the pines across the road. My cottage at the end of the gravel road. The quiet porch. The mountains turning gold. None of it feels boring anymore.

It feels lonely.

"Saturday." My own voice surprises me. The word leaves my mouth before my brain has approved the paperwork. "Just for the afternoon."

His face lights up. Not the grin. Something realer. Something behind the grin that the grin usually covers.

"I'll pick you up at noon."

"I can drive myself."

"Ranch road's a mess right now. Mud, ruts, loose gravel from the timber hauling. My truck's built for it. Yours isn't."

He's right. Hate that.

"Fine. Noon. Don't be late."