“I said that ages ago.”
“I know.” He turned her to face him, his hands on her shoulders. “Ally, I spent months in New York, going to every event and meeting I thought I was supposed to care about. And the whole time, I kept thinking about you. About what you’d say if you could see me there, pretending to enjoy it. About what I’d rather be doing instead.”
“And what would you rather be doing?”
“This.” He gestured at the coop, the house, the mountains rising behind them. “I want to feed chickens with you. Every day. For as long as you’ll have me.”
The words hit her like a physical blow—so simple, so ordinary, so exactly what she’d stopped letting herself hope for. She thought about all the months of convincing herself he’d never choose this life, never choose her over the glitter and noise of the world he came from.
“You built me a chicken coop,” she said, her voice breaking.
“I built us a chicken coop.” He brushed a strand of hair from her face. “And a garden. And a place for your bees, if you want to expand. There’s plenty of land.”
“Colton—”
“I love you.” The words were steady, certain. “I’ve loved you since you refused to be impressed by anything about me except whether I could help stack hay bales. I’m done pretending I don’t know exactly what I want.”
Ally looked at him—really looked. The lines around his eyes that hadn’t been there a year ago. The flannel shirt dusted with what she now realized was sawdust from working on this place. The calluses on his hands that came from building something real.
“I never stopped loving you,” she said. “Even when I wanted to. Even when it would have been easier.”
“Then why do you look like you’re about to cry?”
“Because I thought—” She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “I thought you loved that life too much to give it up. I thought I’d have to choose between losing you and losing myself. And now you’re standing here showing me a chicken coop you built, and I don’t?—”
He kissed her.
His mouth was warm and tasted like apple cider and hope, and Ally forgot everything she’d been about to say. She forgot the months of loneliness and the fear that had kept her awake at night. Her hands found his shoulders, then the back of his neck, and she kissed him back with everything she’d been holding in.
Around them, the chickens clucked, and the October wind sent leaves spiraling down from the maples. The mountains rose blue and gold in the distance. When they finally pulled apart, Ally was breathless and laughing.
“We should probably go inside,” she said. “Before I scandalize your chickens.”
“They’re our chickens now.” Colton kept his arm around her waist. “If you want them to be.”
Ally leaned into him, breathing in the scent of clean cotton and something underneath that was just him. The fear wasn’t entirely gone—it probably wouldn’t be for a while. But standing here in front of the ridiculous, beautiful chicken coop he’d built, surrounded by the mountains and lake she loved, she felt something she hadn’t allowed herself to feel in a long time.
Hope that might actually be warranted.
“I want to see the rest of the house,” she said. “And the garden. And wherever you’re planning to put the bees.”
“I have blueprints.” His grin was the old Colton charm surfacing beneath the new steadiness. “I may have gotten a little carried away.”
“How carried away?”
“There might be a honey house designed into the barn renovation.”
Ally pulled back to stare at him. “A honey house?”
“Climate controlled. Proper extraction room, bottling station, storage for the cured frames.” He was trying to look casual about it and failing. “I did some research.”
“You did research on honey production.”
“I did research on everything you do.” He touched her face, his expression softening. “I wanted to understand your world. The one I want to be part of.”
Ally didn’t trust herself to speak. She just took his hand and led him toward the house, past the chicken coop and through a gate in a white picket fence that surrounded what would clearly become a kitchen garden. Raised beds waited for spring planting, the soil dark and rich. Lavender bordered the path, the late-season blooms filling the air with their scent.
“The bees would love this,” she said.
