Chapter 3
Chapter Three
SHELBY
Aweek in and the man has fixed fourteen fence posts.
I know because I've been watching from the kitchen window while pretending to unpack boxes.
The electricity came back Thursday. The water pressure improved after I replaced the faucet aerator.
And Cade Holloway has shown up every afternoon around two, parked at the fence line, unloaded tools, and worked until the light gave out.
He doesn't knock. Doesn't ask. Just appears on my south border with wire cutters and post-hole diggers.
Today I crack. Not because I want to, but because it's fifty degrees, sunny, and he's been out there for three hours without water.
The sandwiches are stupid. Turkey on wheat with mustard because that's what I have. Wrapped in paper towels. A bottle of water from the case I hauled up from the hardware store, where a woman named Mabel told me the full history of Bear Creek Valley while ringing up my generator parts.
He's crouched at the corner post when I walk down. Hat pushed back, sweat on his neck despite the cool air.
"Brought you lunch." I hold out the sandwich. "Don't make it weird."
He pulls off his gloves. Takes it. Opens the paper towel and takes a bite. "Good mustard."
"It's yellow mustard from a squeeze bottle."
"Didn't say it was fancy."
I sit on the grass a few feet away. The wind moves through the aspens. A hawk circles over the meadow. He eats the sandwich in six bites, drinks half the water in one pull.
"You're good at this," I hear myself say.
"At what?"
"Quiet. Most people can't handle it."
He turns the water bottle in his hands. "Most people talk to fill space. I'd rather leave the space alone."
"My ex talked constantly." The words fall out before I can catch them.
Cade doesn't react. Doesn't lean in, doesn't ask questions, doesn't get that hungry look people get when they smell someone else's damage. He just waits.
"He had an opinion about everything," I continue, because apparently the door is open now. "What I wore. How I loaded the dishwasher. Whether my voice was too loud when I laughed." My fingers pull at the grass. "After a while you stop laughing. Then you stop talking."
Silence from Cade. But he's listening. His whole body angled toward me without moving.
"Sorry. You didn't ask for that."
"Don't apologize for telling the truth."
My throat tightens. Six words, no cushion.
"The fence looks good," I manage.
"Two more sections on the south side." He stands. Reaches a hand down.
I take it.
His palm is rough. Warm. He pulls me to my feet and the momentum carries me a half step too close. Our boots almost touching. His hand still holding mine.
Up close, he smells like grass. His jaw is tight. Those brown eyes drop to my mouth for one second.
My whole body goes hot.
He lets go. Steps back. Picks up the wire cutters. "Corner brace needs resetting before I can run the wire." His voice has a roughness at the edges that wasn't there before.
I walk back to the cabin on unreliable legs. My palm still warm from his grip.
Inside, I lean against the kitchen counter. Breathe.
This is not happening. I did not move to the middle of nowhere to develop a thing for the rancher next door. I came here to be alone. To prove I can trust my own decisions because the last time I trusted my judgment about a man, I lost everything.
Four years of marriage. Four years of being slowly convinced that my instincts were wrong, my feelings were overreactions. Kevin didn't hit me. Never raised a hand. He had a way of making my reality dissolve until his version was the only one left.
Cade is nothing like Kevin. Kevin was polish and strategy. Cade barely speaks. Kevin performed generosity for an audience. Cade stacks firewood at dawn when he thinks I'm asleep.
But Kevin didn't seem like Kevin at first either.
The sound of the post-hole digger hitting rocky ground carries through the open window. Rhythmic. Steady. A man doing work he promised to do without being reminded.
By five, the light is fading. His truck starts. From the window I watch him load tools, tie Buck to the trailer. His movements are easy. Nothing wasted.
He looks toward the cabin. I step back from the window.
The truck pulls out. Gone.
On my porch there's a paper bag. Inside: the missing board for my porch step. Pre-cut. Sanded smooth. Three nails on top, along with a folded note.
Measured the gap Tuesday. This should fit. Nails are galvanized so they won't rust. C
I stare at the note. He measured the gap Tuesday. Three days ago, while I was inside pretending not to watch. He looked at the broken step, went home, cut a board, sanded it, brought it back.
The tears come fast. Standing on my broken porch holding a board that fits exactly right, crying because a man noticed something I didn't mention and fixed it without being asked. The last time someone did that was so long ago I can't remember.
I install it myself. Twenty minutes, a hammer, and some crooked nails. When I'm done, the step is solid. No gap.
His truck comes back at six thirty. Headlights sweeping across my front yard as he turns up his drive across the property line. Going home for the night.
I'm off the porch before I think about it. Walking across the dark yard toward the fence. My feet know where the gate is now because I've been using it to check the pasture he told me to keep an eye on.
He's getting out of the truck when I reach his driveway. Sees me crossing from my side. Stops. Waits.
"You fixed my step."
"Left you the board. You fixed it yourself."
"You measured it three days ago."
He doesn't deny it. Just stands there in the falling dark with his keys in his hand, looking at me with those patient brown eyes.
"Why?" My voice cracks on the word and I hate it.
"Because it needed fixing."
"That's not..." I stop. Swallow. "People don't just fix things."
"Some do."
He's three feet away. Close enough to see the line of sawdust on his collar.
Close enough to watch his jaw work as he looks at me standing in his driveway in the dark with tears drying on my face and no excuse for being here except the truth, which is that a piece of sanded wood broke something open in my chest that I've been holding shut for two years.
I close the distance. Two steps. My hands find the front of his flannel. His whole body goes rigid for one beat. Then his hands come up, slow, settling on my hips. Big palms. Warm through the fabric.
"Shelby."
"Don't talk."
I kiss him.
His mouth is warm. Firm. He doesn't grab, doesn't push. But he doesn't pull back either. One hand slides from my hip to the small of my back. Steadying. His lips open against mine, slow and deliberate. Patient. Thorough. Absolutely certain.
When I pull back, his breath is uneven. His fingers flex against my lower back. Those brown eyes are darker now, the gold in them catching the last light.
"I'm gonna need you to tell me that was okay," he says, voice low. "Because I've been thinking about that for a week and I need to know I'm not the only one."
"It was okay."
"Good." His thumb traces one slow circle at the base of my spine. "Because I'd really like to do it again."
I pull him down by the flannel. This time his hand comes up to cup the side of my face, tilting my head, deepening the angle.
His tongue drags across my bottom lip. My fingers tighten in his shirt.
A sound comes out of me that I'd be embarrassed about if his hand weren't gripping my hip hard enough to tell me he heard it and liked it.
We break apart breathing hard. His forehead drops against mine.
"I can't do this fast," I whisper. "I'm not ready for fast."
"I've been on this mountain five years, Shelby. I don't do anything fast."
A laugh slips out. Real. Unguarded. It surprises both of us.
He pulls back enough to look at me. Recognition in his eyes. A man who just heard something he didn't know he needed.
"Go home," I say. "Before I do something else stupid."
"Kissing me is stupid?"
"Jury's out."
His mouth curves. An actual smile. Small, lopsided, devastating.
"Goodnight, Shelby."
"Goodnight, Cade."
I walk back across the dark yard to my cabin. The porch step holds.