Page 74 of The Rancher Who Swore Off Love
“Hush, you.” She shook her head. “If it makes me a fool for sayin’ it the first night you kissed me, fine. I’ve been worse things.”
Logan’s forehead dropped to hers. His hand cupped the back of her neck, threading into her hair.
“You ain’t no fool. You’re the bravest person I ever met.”
“I screamed at my brother over a shawl.”
“You fought for what mattered.” He pulled back enough to look at her. “Grace, I buildcribswhen I can’t say what I mean. I carved roses into a headboard because I couldn’t figure out how to tell you…”
“Tell me what?”
He kissed her. “That I’m done bein’ scared.”
Grace kissed him back.
Softer this time. Slower. The kind of kiss that didn’t rush because it didn’t need to. No baby down the hall. No family in the next room. Just his mouth and hers. They had all the time in the world to learn the shape of this… whatever they were now.
Then they pulled apart, and she tucked herself against his side, nesting her head in the hollow below his collarbone. Logan pulled the blanket edges up over both of them and settled his chin on her hair.
“You know, back in New York, the hut by the docks had walls so thin I heard the neighbors arguing in three languages.”
“Three?”
“Italian, Yiddish, and whatever Mr. Kowalski spoke when he got into the vodka. Could’ve been… Polish? Hard to say at that volume.”
“And you just... listened?”
“Didn’t have a choice.” She laughed. “I knew more about Mrs. Benedetto’s opinions on her son-in-law than I knew about my own family.”
He laughed.
“What about you?” She tilted her chin up. “What’s the worst thing about growin’ up out here?”
“The silence.”
“You’re jokin’.”
“I ain’t. You grow up with nothin’ but wind and cattle for miles, you start talkin’ to the horses just to hear a voice.”
“You talked to the horses.”
“Every mornin’.”
“What’d you say to ’em?”
“Mostly complaints about my brothers.”
She snorted. “I used to talk to my basil plants.”
“No way.”
“Yes way.” She raised her chin. “Ma said plants grew better if you talked to ’em. So, every mornin’, I’d sit on the fire escape with a coffee tin full of dirt and tell the basil about my day.”
“What’d you tell it?”
“Gossip, mostly. The basil kneweverythingabout the neighborhood. It was a very well-informed herb.”
“Did it grow?”
