Oh, heaven help her. She shoved the towels at him. “Morrie will be here at six. You can help him assess the damage, figure out what we can salvage.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
She turned to go, but his voice stopped her at the doorway.
“Sierra?”
“Yeah?”
“I know you don’t trust me. I know I don’t have the right to ask for anything from you. But I’m glad I was here tonight. Glad I could help.”
She nodded without turning around. Because the truth was, she was glad too. Grateful and terrified and overwhelmed by how right it felt to have him here, helping with Huck, moving through her home like he’d never left.
But he had left. And he would leave again, eventually.
In fact, sooner would be better. Before either of them got too attached to this temporary arrangement. Before her son started thinking of Rowan as something more than a helpful stranger.
Before she started believing in dreams she’d buried ten years ago.
She made it to her bedroom and closed the door before the tears came. Silent tears for the barn and the sense of security that had burned away with the hay. Tears for the exhaustion that made her want to lean on someone else for just five minutes.
Tomorrow, she would probably have to start figuring out how to tell the truth. Tonight, she would just have to survive having him under her roof without finding herself tiptoeing back downstairs and watching him sleep, those dark lashes on his handsome face.
Rowan Wallace, the renegade who’d stolen her heart, wasn’t dead.
And yet, it just might kill her.
He’d woken up in a lot of places over the past ten years—tents, safe houses, hotels that smelled like old socks. But none of them felt like home.
The sound of Sierra singing “Amazing Grace” in the kitchen drifted through the guest room door, and for one blessed moment, Rowan forgot he was supposed to be dead. Her voice carried the familiar melody with a sweetness that made his chest ache, soft and clear in the morning stillness.
For three heartbeats, he lay still in the double bed, eyes closed, letting himself believe he was eighteen again and this was just another Saturday morning in the life they’d planned together.
Then reality crashed back. The smell of smoke still clinging to his clothes. The charred skeleton of the barn visible through the guest room window. Ten years of separation stretching between him and the woman whose voice had once been his favorite sound in the world.
Rowan sat up, running a hand through his hair. The clock on the nightstand read 7:23 a.m. Early, even for ranch people, but the smell of bacon frying suggested Sierra had been up for a while.
He pulled on yesterday’s shirt and padded barefoot toward the kitchen, following the scent of coffee.
She stood at the six-burner stove with her back to him, and for a moment, he could only stare.
Her dark hair fell in waves just past her shoulders, catching the morning light that streamed through the window. She wore a blue flannel shirt and worn jeans. At five foot five, she’d always been petite, but ranch work had kept her lean and strong, her movements graceful and economical as she worked at the stove. Even doing something as mundane as frying bacon, she projected the quiet competence that had always drawn him to her.
For a broken kid, a girl who believed in herself, in him, had magnetic power.
The kitchen island held evidence of her morning routine—coffee grounds scattered on the granite, a carton of eggs, strips of bacon laid out on a cutting board. Pendant lights hung over the island, casting warm pools of light that made the space feel intimate despite its size. Fresh flowers sat on the windowsill next to the sink, probably picked from the garden behind the house.
“Morning,” he said quietly, not wanting to startle her.
She turned, spatula in hand, and smiled. The expression transformed her face, softening the high cheekbones that gave her such striking beauty and lighting up the dark-brown eyes that had always seemed to see straight through to his soul. “Coffee’s fresh. Mugs are in the cabinet above the pot.”
“Thanks.” He moved to pour himself a cup.
The coffee maker sat tucked into a corner near the professional-grade stove, surrounded by the kind of well-organized chaos that spoke of a kitchen actually used for cooking rather than for show. Mason jars filled with utensils, a ceramic canister set that looked handmade, dish towels draped over the oven handle—all of it practical and lived-in.
“Sugar?”
“Yeah.” His fingers brushed hers as she handed him the sugar bowl. The brief contact rippled through him.
