“Can I tell you about them?” I asked suddenly, my voice low. Hunter just nodded, steady as ever.
I drew in a breath. “The night it happened; I didn’t even get a choice. They found out, there was shouting, and then it was just—‘get out.’ I packed two cases, shoved what I could into my car, and left. That was it. No goodbye, no chance to explain, nothing. Just the sound of the door shutting behind me and knowing I couldn’t go back.”
I remembered shoving clothes in at random, my precious stack of books crammed in until the zipper strained, and the troll-shaped mug Ru had made in art class that for some reason I had to bring with me. Two cases, all I could carry, everything else left behind. That was what I drove away with—my whole life whittled down to fabric, pages, and one chipped mug.
“I was okay, though, you know. I was fierce and running on temper. I had my car to sell, and I had savings, and all I could think was fuck them all.”
Hunter’s jaw tightened, and for a second, anger flashed in his eyes. “They threw you out like that?” His voice was rough, incredulous. “Christ, Wes… I can’t even wrap my head around it. Any parent who could do that doesn’t deserve you.” The heat of his fury stole my breath because it was for me, for Ru, for what we’d lost. He leaned closer. “You deserved love. Safety. Not a slammed door.”
Tears blurred my vision again, and I ducked my head. “I keep replaying it, wondering if I’d begged harder, if I’d tried one more time to get them to understand who I was…”
Hunter shook his head firmly. “No. Don’t youdaretake that blame. They failed you, Wes. You did what you had to do. And look at you—you built a life anyway. And now Ru’s here. You’re not alone in this anymore.”
Before I could answer, Hunter moved and pulled me into his arms. The hug was fierce, as if he could hold my pieces together with sheer strength, his hand sliding up to cradle the back of my head. I let myself sink into it, hearing the steady thud of his heart against my cheek. For the first time in years, I let someone else carry some of the weight, and the relief cracked me open. I sobbed once, quiet and raw, and he held me tighter.
My tears soaked into his shirt, damp patches spreading as I clung tighter, my hands trembling with the force of everything I’d held back for years. Hunter didn’t flinch—if anything, he held me closer, as if my breaking was something he could shoulder without question. His hand slid down to brush away the wetness on my cheek, his touch unbearably gentle. “Come here,” he murmured, tugging me until I buried my face in his neck, inhaling the steady warmth of him,clutching his shoulders as if he were the one solid thing in the world.
After a long moment, he tipped his head, his lips brushing my temple. “How about we move this to the sofa up here? Grab some blankets, take the cookies, and put on a Christmas movie? Just you and me, keeping watch over Ru?”
A laugh broke through my tears, shaky but real. “That sounds perfect.”
We carried freshly filled mugs and a plate of lopsided angels through to the small front room with its views over the square below, curled together on the sofa with every blanket I could find, with the flicker of Christmas lights painting the walls.
The movie played, some predictable holiday classic—big-city professional finding love in a small town at Christmas with a flannel-wearing toy shop owner. I found myself rambling for half an hour about Santa granting wishes hidden in the plot, and Hunter chuckled, low and warm, and shifted me closer. The heroine decides to stay right at the end as she falls in love.
Of course she did.
“Like anyone in their right mind would give up real life for small-town love,” I chuckled as sleep pulled at me. My last thought before everything went dark was a whisper inside:I wish Hunter’s choice to stay was at the ending of our story.
Chapter 19
Hunter
...Like anyonein their right mind would give up real life for small-town love...
Wes’s soft dismissal of the whole point of the movie was the only thought running through my head as the movie credits rolled and Wes drifted against me, warm and heavy with sleep. The truth of it twisted something in my chest.
Would anyone ever do that for me? For us? Leave behind everything they thought they wanted, all for a chance at something real. I wasn’t sure I believed it outside of movies, and yet with Wes pressed to me, murmuring about Santa and then collapsing into dreams, it didn’t feel impossible.
I wouldn’t be giving up anything to be with Wes—not really. I had the offer of a role at North Hollow College waiting for me, a chance to pick up the career Ithought I’d lost. But emotionally? I wasn’t sure I could ever leave him. So, what did that mean? That my dreams weren’t the job or the prestige, but the man sleeping with me, the quiet hum of this town, the possibility of something lasting.
I thought I’d been in love before—with Mark. But that had been convenient, smoke and mirrors, nothing deep. Comfortable, maybe, but not all-consuming. Wes was different. He was under my skin, wrapped around my heart, had been part of me since the very first day we’d met under that balloon arch—Wesley dressed as Cupid on a freezing February fourteenth, and me licking my wounds, pretending I wasn’t broken. From that moment, he’d been stitched into my story whether I admitted it or not.
Every story Wes had ever spun, every ridiculous tangent, every joke—I’d stored them all like treasures. His smile could undo me, the way it lit up a room and somehow made everything inside me feel lighter. And his eyes—God, the way they held me—all that dark brown shot through with gold that seemed to see straight past the defenses I’d built. Being around him wasn’t comfortable convenience; it was terrifying, exhilarating, like standing at the edge of something vast and knowing if I fell, I’d fall forever. That was love,reallove, and for the first time in my life I knew I was already too far gone to step back.
I tightened the blanket around us, staring past the glow of the Christmas lights to the snow falling outside. Small-town love. Maybe it wasn’t the joke we all pretended it was. Maybe it was exactly what I wanted, though admitting that—even in my own head—felt dangerous.
I must have dozed, because the next thing I knew Wes stirred in my arms, blinking awake. I opened my eyes and froze. Ru was perched on the coffee table right in front of us. His expression gentle, and he smiled at us as though we were the most ordinary thing in the world.
“Hi,” he said.
He’d showered, clearly—his damp hair curling around his face—and he sat there in a borrowed sweatshirt and flannel pants I recognized as Wes’s. There was color in his cheeks now, a fragile bloom of health returning, but his voice carried quiet vulnerability. “I, uh, Wes, I’m sorry, but I borrowed some of your clothes,” he added, eyes darting from Wes to me.
Before I could even think about what to say, Wes was fierce. “Don’t you ever apologize for being here, or borrowing anything, Ru. This is your home as much as mine. That bed is yours until you don’t want it anymore.”
Ru’s eyes went wet, his mouth trembling. “Butwhat do I do until I’m thirty?” The question was a weird one, because it wasn’t what I expected. Thirty seemed oddly specific.
Wes leaned forward, steady and sure. “You stay here in Wishing Tree, okay. You work with me if you want, or you find your dream if you don’t. You’re not doing this alone anymore.”
