She looked down at the gravel beneath her feet, shame and anger battling for dominance. The shame was winning.
How could she have been so stupid?
A few handwritten letters, and she’d built an entire relationship in her head. Projected every quality she wanted onto a man she’d never even seen.
The couple stood now at the base of the porch steps, waiting for her. The man’s face was unreadable, but the woman smiled.
She pasted something approximating a polite smile on her face and took a step toward them. She’d make some excuse, get back in her truck, and get the hell out of Solace before anyone else saw her. Before she humiliated herself further.
The woman touched the man’s arm and whispered something to him. He nodded, dropping his hand from her shoulder but keeping close.
“Heard a lot about you,” the man called, his voice carrying across the yard. “Anson’s been waiting.”
Anson.
Waiting.
She blinked, the words not quite computing.
If this wasn’t Anson...
Across the yard, a door creaked open. She turned toward the sound. The bunkhouse door swung wide, and a large dog bounded out. Huge, shaggy, silver-gray.
Bramble.
She’d know that dog anywhere. The wolfhound that slept by the door of his forge, that collected pinecones and sticks like it was his job and was suspicious of snow, that still flinched at the lonely howl of a wolf, but never let Anson out of his sight, no matter how scared he was.
Which meant...
She lifted her gaze from the dog to the man behind him. Tall—God, he was tall—with the kind of shoulders that came from swinging hammers and shoeing horses, not from a gym. Dark hair fell past his collar, catching the afternoon light. His beard was thick but neatly trimmed, framing a mouth she couldn’t quite see but had spent six years wondering about. Even in worn jeans, a dark Henley, and a flannel that had seen better days, he looked... solid. Capable. Exactly like someone who could shape metal with his bare hands.
And he was wearing the red scarf she sent him five years ago.
Relief crashed through her so hard she almost staggered.
Thatwas Anson.
She let out a breath and looked back at the older man, who must be Walker Nash, the ranch’s owner. The woman would be Dr. Johanna Perrin, then. The therapist who worked with the veterans here and Walker’s long-time girlfriend.
Anson didn’t look happy to see her. In fact, he wouldn’t even look at her. His gaze skipped over her face, landed somewhere near her shoulder, then dropped to the ground.
What had she been expecting? That they’d fall into each other’s arms like some romantic movie? That all of those letters would translate seamlessly to real life?
She’d been naive. Again.
But Bramble bounded ahead of Anson, tail swishing. The dog, at least, seemed glad to see her.
Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. She blinked them back furiously—she wasnotgoing to cry in front of two strangers and the man she’d been desperate to meet—and stepped forward, trying to arrange her features into something resembling normal.
God, her face felt stiff, like she’d forgotten how to smile naturally.
She’d rehearsed this moment a hundred times in her mind during the long drive, imagining what she’d say, how he’d respond. None of those imagined scenarios included him staring fixedly at the ground like he wished it would swallow him whole.
“Hi,” she managed, the word catching in her throat.
Anson’s gaze flickered up, met hers for a fraction of a second, then skittered off somewhere over her left shoulder. “Hi.” His voice was deeper than she’d imagined, rougher around the edges. He cleared his throat. “You, uh, found the place okay.”
“Yeah. Someone at the café gave me directions.” She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, acutely aware of Walker and Johanna watching from a respectful distance, probably wondering why two people who’d written each other for six years were acting like awkward strangers.
