Chapter 27 Hunter
Hunter
I wake up in the cab of my tractor with a crick in my neck and my mouth tasting like morning breath and regret.
I must’ve dozed off sometime around three, after wrapping up the south field.
I told myself I’d rest my eyes for just a minute, let the engine idle while I mustered up the energy to climb out and drive home, but that was three hours ago, and the only thing that cooled was my body to the point I can’t feel my damn fingers.
I rub my eyes, kick the engine back to life, use the wipers to scrape the dew off the glass, and ease the planter into position for the last twenty-acre stretch. If the rain holds off, I’ll be done by noon. Should’ve been done two weeks ago. Late is better than never.
The cab still smells like coffee, sweat, and the apple-scented air freshener Truitt stuck in here last month. Said the place “smelled like dead animals and armpits,” and he wasn’t wrong.
I pull up my audiobook app and cue another Wren book. I finished the last one yesterday, and now the only thing I want are her words in my head. They’re soothing. Calming. They make me think. Make me feel a lot of things I haven’t felt in ages. This one’s called One Last First Kiss.
I started it last night when I was half-delirious from the dark, the solitude, and the sound of my own head echoing too loud. Thought I’d listen to a chapter, maybe two, and then switch to music when I got bored—but five chapters in, I couldn’t turn it off.
The woman writes like she sees things nobody else does.
The way people work. The way they want. She’s clever about it, sharp in her observations, but not in a way that feels smug or showy.
She’s soft and strong in equal measure. Even in the words she writes, there’s this push-pull, like she wants to carry the whole damn world on her back but is quietly waiting for someone to offer to carry her for once.
I get that.
I’ve been the same way my whole life. Never needed anyone. Told myself I was better for it. Stronger. Smarter. Wore it like a badge of honor. But lately I’m starting to think that’s just something lonely people say to make themselves feel better about being alone.
I’d never admit it out loud, but I’m starting to think it’d be nice to be needed . . .
. . . by her.
And not for fence repairs or tractor rides.
Not for country life lessons or heavy lifting.
But for her. The real her. The messy, complicated, contradicting, maddeningly beautiful woman behind those sparkly indigo eyes, her contagious grin, and that stubborn pride.
The woman who writes love stories for a living but pretends like she’s not looking for love herself.
Sometimes I think we’re two sides of the same coin.
I click the play button, the narrator’s voice coming through my AirPods, filling my head and wrapping around me like morning fog.
Wish I could bottle every last one of her words and carry them with me everywhere I go.
If I can’t have her—yet—this is almost the next best thing.