And it was terrifying.
And maybe—
Worth stepping into anyway.
Chapter 35
Logan
The line hadn’t moved in six minutes.
I knew that because I’d checked the clock twice and the digital screen above the soda fountain once. Same three guys in front of me. Same smell of fryer oil and burnt coffee hanging heavy in the air. Same fluorescent lights buzzing overhead like they had something personal against everyone in the room. Lunch rush at a strip-mall deli in Tampa wasn’t supposed to feel like a battlefield, but standing there, shifting my weight from one boot to the other, staring at the back of some guy’s polo shirt, it sure as hell felt like one. And the truth was, I wasn’t here for the food. I was here because sitting alone in the truck with my thoughts had gotten dangerous. The second I’d killed the engine, Dani’s face had filled the silence.
Not the kiss. Not the heat. Not even the way her body had arched into mine.
It was the way she’d looked at me after; like she wasn’t afraid of wanting me.
That was the part that stuck.
I’d been good at compartmentalizing my entire adult life. Marine training drilled it in first: mission, objective, execute. Feelings were background noise, dangerous if they got in theway. Then fatherhood reinforced it. Harper needed stability, not a man caught in his own head. Grief had become its own compartment somewhere along the line. Neatly boxed, labeled, shut tight. I hadn’t opened it. Didn’t need to. Didn’t want to. But Dani didn’t knock on that door—she leaned against it like she wasn’t afraid of what might fall out.
I scrubbed a hand down my face as the line finally shifted, my body following automatically. I hadn’t meant to kiss her like that.
No—that was a lie. I’d meant to kiss her. I just hadn’t meant to lose control. There’s a difference. I’d told myself it was simple: attraction, proximity, tension, a couple of drinks. Easy. Manageable. But I’d kissed women before. After Elena. Not many, but enough to know the difference. Enough to know when something wasn’t going to change anything.
That kiss hadn’t changed anything.
It had exposed something.
By the time I reached the counter, my thoughts were too crowded to care about lunch. I stared at the chalkboard menu without seeing it, my stomach tight in a way that had nothing to do with hunger. I hadn’t eaten since early morning, since walking out of the house before dawn and leaving her asleep on the couch. That image had followed me all the way to Florida—Dani curled under the blanket, fitting herself into our home.
That was the dangerous part. Not the kiss. The way she came in and belonged without even trying.
I’d stood there longer than I should have, watching her sleep like some damn teenager, even caught myself brushing my thumb over her temple like I had a right to that kind of softness. I didn’t. Softness came with terms. Permanent ones. The kind I’d spent six years building my life to avoid. Then she walked in with sunlight and opinions and that stubborn, fearless way of pushing back on me like I wasn’t made of glass.
I’d held my wife’s hand in a hospital room and felt it go still. Nothing teaches you fragility faster than that. Nothing teaches you how quickly a future can disappear. And letting Dani in, loving her, the word hit before I could stop it. I straightened, catching myself. Wanting wasn’t loving. Attraction wasn’t commitment. A kiss wasn’t a vow. But it hadn’t felt casual. It had felt like something I’d been holding back for months, finally snapping loose.
“Turkey club. Black coffee,” I said when the girl behind the register called me forward, my voice automatic as I paid and moved aside. Waiting. That’s what I was doing with Dani, too. Waiting to see if it faded. Waiting for the distance to cool it. Waiting for something outside of me to make the decision. But distance hadn’t cooled anything. If anything, it sharpened it. Every text hit harder. Every picture of Harper without Dani in it felt… incomplete. I’d even caught myself zooming in once, looking for her in the background.
That’s when I knew it wasn’t just physical.
You don’t miss someone’s presence if it’s just physical. You miss their body. I missed her voice. Her arguments. The way she didn’t treat me like a widower first and a man second. She looked at me like I was still allowed to want things.
I took my food to a table near the window and sat down, elbows braced on my knees, the world outside moving like everything was normal. I took a bite of the sandwich and didn’t taste it. You can still walk this back, the thought came easily. Call it a mistake. Blame the beer. Blame timing. Blame grief. Tell her you need space. Tell yourself you’re protecting her. It would be clean. Responsible. Safe. And she’d accept it, because Dani respected honesty even when it hurt.
But then what?
Go back to the distance? Go back to watching her laugh with someone else and pretending that was better?
My grip tightened around the wrapper before I forced myself to loosen it. Not everything ends in disaster. Her voice, not mine—but it echoed anyway. Maybe not everything did. But enough had. Enough that I knew how to survive it.
Survival isn’t the same as living.
That part was mine.
I leaned back, staring at the ceiling as the noise around me faded. If I stepped toward Dani; not halfway, not “we’ll see”, it would mean letting her see everything. The grief I still carried. The anxiety I didn’t talk about. The nights I woke up, I was convinced I was one mistake away from losing everything again. It meant letting Harper see it, too. Letting her attach. Letting her trust. Letting her love someone who wasn’t guaranteed to stay.
That was the part that mattered most.
