Page 12 of Resisting the Lumberjack

Back to work. Cedar smells like patience.

That evening, posted up on the main house porch with Luke and Hunter. Three beers, three men, sunset turning the ridge into a painting. Anna's laugh drifting from somewhere inside, and Gwen's voice answering it. Julian babbling.

"You're smiling." Luke says it without looking at me. Beer on his knee, eyes on the mountains.

"I'm always smiling."

"Not like that." He takes a long pull. "That's a different one."

Hunter makes a sound in his chest. Not a word. Not yet. Gwen's been coaxing them out of him one whisper at a time, and he's getting there, but tonight it's just the low rumble that serves as punctuation. Amusement. Agreement.

"Don't start. Either of you."

Luke almost grins. For a man carved from granite and silence, that's a standing ovation. "Just saying. I know that look."

"What look?"

His beer sets down on the porch rail. Turns toward me. Real eye contact, which from Luke means he's about to say something he considers important. "The one where a man gets hit by something he didn't see coming and he's trying to figure out if it's gonna kill him or save him." A beat. The sunset turning his face gold. "It's both, kid. Always both."

Hunter puts his hand over his chest. Over his heart. Holds it there for a second. Then goes back to his beer and his silence and the sunset turning the mountains into something sacred.

Both. Yeah. That sounds right.

Chapter Six

Selene

Three weeks since Saturday at the ranch. And I have a confession that would make Richard's head explode with I-told-you-so satisfaction.

I went back.

Not because Kidd asked. He did ask. Every Tuesday and Thursday with the sandwich and the grin and the counter conversations that have quietly become the best part of my week. But I went back because Anna texted me. Because Gwen cornered me at Sal's picking up Julian's favorite cookies and said, in the pleasantly threatening way only a woman with pink hair and zero filter can manage, that if I didn't come help with bonfire decorations she'd send Hunter, and did I want a six-foot-three silent man standing on my porch at dawn until I caved.

Because this town swallowed me the way mountains swallow fog. Slowly. Without permission. Without asking whether I was ready.

And because every night in my quiet cottage, my eyes close and I feel a palm on a heartbeat and wind pushing me forward and brown eyes looking at me like I'm the answer to a question he's been carrying his whole life.

Last Saturday of October. One week until the festival. The whole ranch is controlled chaos. People hauling lumber and stringing lights and testing sound equipment and arguing about cider station placement with the passion of generals planning a campaign. Luke running operations with military precision, walking the site with a clipboard and the focused expression of a man who's decided this will go perfectly. Anna undoing half his layout with creative visions that make him shake his head and smile like he already knows she's right and just needs a minute to accept it.

Hunter stacking firewood in the bonfire ring, silent and steady and perfect in his rhythm. Julian on his hip, not even two yet and chatty enough for both of them, pointing at everything.

"Dada, fire!" Hunter signing back to him, one-handed, something that makes Julian giggle and grab his ear. Gwen up a ladder hanging lanterns from the stage frame, calling instructions to nobody in particular and not caring if anyone's listening.

And Jake. Everywhere. Loading lumber from his truck, adjusting booth frames with a level and a handful of cedar shims, helping Anna carry pumpkins from the field to the display tables. Crouching down to hand Julian a stick and pretending to be amazed when the kid waves it like a sword. Checking with Luke about stage decking, hauling cedar boards from the mill stack and sliding them into place with the easy precision of a man who knows exactly how a board fits.

I'm arranging mason jar candles along the main path when Gabe walks out of the main house with Madison beside him. She's blonde, dressed in a way that says Portland and not in a way that says ranch, and she catches my eye across the field and gives a nod that reads perfectly: I've been the city woman in this valley too. You get used to it.

"You staring at him again?"

Anna at my elbow. Corn stalks in her arms. Knowing smile on her face.

"I'm not staring."

"Honey, you've been watching that man split cedar for twenty minutes. Your candle's in the same spot it was when I left."

Down at the mason jar. She's right. Hasn't moved an inch. Jake at the splitting maul thirty yards away, stripped to a thermal. The axe coming down in clean arcs that use his whole body, shoulders rolling through the stroke, cedar halves flying apart. Muscles shifting under the fabric with each swing. Dark curls damp with sweat. He pauses, drinks water, and his throat moves.

Stopped breathing. Great. Real professional.