“Not a nickname problem. Don’t want to call you what everyone else does.”
I take a sip, savoring the warmth of the perfectly creamed liquid. He’s got me figured out. “Mmm, thank you.”
“Sunshine,” he says.
I arch an eyebrow.
“Anyone else call you that?”
“Not a living soul,” I answer, amused by the grumpy man’s question.
“Mine, then.”
My throat tightens, skin thrumming with the one syllable word.Mine. I like it. “Then, what’ll I call you?”
He shrugs.
“Eeyore? Grumpy cat?”
He rolls his eyes, clueless about the meme I’m referencing.
“Hero?”
Denver shakes his head, face going stony.
But that’s what he is to me. No other way to look at it. “Hero, it is.”
“Hope I can live up to that name,” he murmurs, eyes resting on mine for too long to be reasonable. I like their heat.
“Already have.”
“Good.”
After breakfast, we head over to my cabin, making our way through the brush and saplings, holding the vegetation back for Bear and the cart where it thickens. I raise my phone, snap even more pictures of the pooch. No one back home is going to believe any of this. My thumb hovers over the red photo button, tempted to get Denver’s picture, too.
I won’t use it in social media or anything. Not that he’d ever know anyway. But I need something to remember him by. To remember this experience, thisfeeling. I stop myself, though, unwilling to break his trust.
At the Wheeler House, Denver halts, puts his hands on his hips, like he’s sizing up the place. “Ready for this, Sunshine?”
“Yes, Hero.”
He nods, and a thrill runs through me. Something like pride. This big, rustic man sees me as an equal, despite all I have yet to learn about life up here.
As we unload tools and head inside, I steel myself. “Seattle girl or not, I can learn this.” I may be Denver’s guest, but I refuse to act that way. I want to be a partner in fixing the damage I caused, in cleaning up the messes I created.
Denver lines up the tools on the floor, names them for me. Then, he crawls under the kitchen sink to have a look. He groans. “Pipe wrench.”
I hesitate for a moment, eyeing the shiny collection of items, then hand him one. He looks down, grunts his approval, and grabs it. Our fingers touch again, sparking, flaring. My throat tightens, heart pounding against my ribs.
“Pliers.”
My eyes dart down the line. I pass him another, letting my touch linger longer this time. I can’t get enough of his warmth, his strength and steady masculinity.
“Cutters.”
I scrunch my face. “Which ones?”
“Hacksaw.”
