Page 10 of Grumpy Lumberjack’s Secret

“I’m sorry if I caused trouble,” I said, and I meant it. Sort of. Mostly. “I didn’t mean to make things weird at your work.”

“Weird?” Josh let out a short laugh. “That wasn’t weird. That was historic. Nobody has ever spoken to Sawyer like that. Ever. The guys in the mill are still talking about it.”

“Don’t take it personal,” he added, his voice softening. “Sawyer’s always like that. Grumpy is his default setting. He’s been that way since… well, for a long time.”

“Since what?” I asked, because I couldn’t help it. Because the memory of a man on a sidewalk, crying out for someone named Jimmy, was still sitting heavy in my chest.

Josh hesitated. He glanced at Dollie, then back at me, and his expression shifted into something more careful. “No one exactly knows the full story. Something happened to his brother. Overseas, I think. He’s not the kind of guy who shares details about his life. I’ve worked with him for three years and I probably know less about him than I know about my mailman.”

“His brother died?” I asked quietly.

“That’s the general understanding. He doesn’t talk about it. Doesn’t talk about much, really. He shows up, works harder than anyone I’ve ever met, goes home. That’s his life. The sawmill and the cabin and nothing in between.”

I thought about the spare room in my apartment. The water glass on the nightstand. The way he’d said “thank you” at the door like the words were made of something heavy.

“That’s sad,” I said.

Josh shrugged, but gently. “It’s Sawyer.”

When Dollie and I were leaving, I couldn’t help myself. We had to walk past the main yard to get back to the car, and I could see him there, bent over a piece of machinery with his back to us. His shoulders were tense, his movements sharp and focused, a man channeling everything he didn’t want to feel into physical labor.

I cupped my hands around my mouth.

“See you next time, grumpy!” I called out.

He didn’t turn around. But I saw his shoulders stiffen, and I saw his hand pause on whatever wrench he was holding, and I could have sworn, could have absolutely sworn, that the tips of his ears went red.

Dollie pulled me toward the car, laughing.

“You are going to be the death of that man,” she said.

“Or the making of him,” I said, grinning.

I didn’t mean it. Not really. It was just something to say, something light and breezy to match the afternoon air and the way the sunlight turned the sawdust into gold.

But I thought about his eyes all the way home.

4

SAWYER

She came back.

Of course she came back. Because the universe, in its infinite and highly specific cruelty, had decided that my life needed a five-foot-five complication with blue eyes and zero respect for personal boundaries.

I saw her before she saw me. It was the end of the day, the sun dropping behind the tree line and painting everything in shades of amber, and I was checking the blade alignment on the secondary saw when Josh’s voice carried across the yard, bright and stupid with that tone he only used for one person.

“Babe! You brought more?”

I didn’t look up. I didn’t need to. I could hear the other voice, the friend, Dollie, laughing and saying something about how she’d tried a new recipe. And then, underneath that, a different voice. Warmer. Louder. Closer.

“We are right on time, grumpy.”

I looked up.

She was walking toward me across the yard with the kind of purpose that most people reserved for things they were actually invited to. Her hair was down today, falling past her shoulders in waves that caught the last of the daylight, and she was wearing a jacket over one of those soft sweaters that looked like they’d been designed specifically for someone who hugged children for a living. She was smiling, and the smile was aimed directly at me like a weapon she had no intention of putting down.

“Don’t you dare touch me again, woman,” I said.