“That’s a lot of Flint Sparks.”
“I’m a thorough woman.”
“I noticed.”
Her thumb moved over the back of my hand. “What about you?”
I pulled up in front of the cabin and cut the engine.
The porch stood in the last light, simple and rough and mine. The firepit was cold. The windows caught a faint reflection of the sky. I had one chair by the stove, one stack of firewood by the door, and hooks on the wall for one man’s gear.
Then Sunny sat beside me with flour on her cuff and smoke in her hair, and I wanted another chair, another hook, and space for her in every corner of the cabin.
“Every version I’ve seen,” I said. “The ones I haven’t met yet too.”
Sunny’s eyes filled, but she smiled like she was determined to make it a problem for both of us. “That was dangerously close to a line from a man who claims he isn’t marketable.”
“I’m not saying it for the camera.”
“I know.”
I got out and came around for her because I needed to move before I said too much through a truck console. She took my hand and stepped down into the dirt. Her boots hit the ground steady.
The sight of them did something strange to my chest.
Sunny caught me watching. “Please tell me you’re admiring the tread.”
“I’m admiring the woman standing in them.”
Her mouth softened.
Her hand tightened in mine.
I unlocked the cabin, pushed the door open, and let her go in first.
The room was dim and warm from the day’s heat. The bed waited in the loft under the pitched roof. The table still had two coffee mugs from morning, washed and turned upside down beside the sink. My spare flannel hung over the back of the chair where Sunny had left it before going back to the meadow.
She saw it too.
Her fingers brushed the sleeve.
“I thought this place would feel different tonight,” she said.
“How?”
“I don’t know.” She looked around at the stove, the shelves, the fire tools by the wall, the boots by the door. “Less like I borrowed it.”
I set the biscuits on the counter. “You’re not borrowing anything.”
Sunny turned to me.
The cabin went quiet enough for the ridge insects to come through the screen.
I crossed the room and stopped in front of her. “I kept picturing you here last night. This morning too. Now you’re here.”
Her hands curled in my henley. “Say that again.”
“You belong here if you choose it.”
