"I started working with wood when I was sixteen. The group home I was in had offered a shop class on the weekends. I kept going after I aged out." Neil moved to set up his camera on a tripod. "Turns out I had a talent for making things with my hands."
We both wore cotton gloves that I had in my pack, and we carefully positioned each document for photography, working in a rhythm that felt surprisingly natural.
"You have artist's hands," I said without thinking, then blushed furiously at my own boldness.
Neil looked up from the camera, something dark and interested flickering in his green eyes. "Artist's hands?"
"The way you handle things. Wood, tools, these documents. Like you understand them on some deeper level." I gestured helplessly, trying to explain something I barely understood myself. "It's the same way I handle rare books—like they're alive, like they have stories to tell."
"Maybe they do,” he said. "Everything has stories, if you know how to listen."
The conversation felt like it was about something more than woodworking or historical documents. Standing there in his workshop, surrounded by the evidence of his skill and passion, I felt a connection I'd never experienced with anyone.
"What's your story?" The question slipped out before I could stop it.
"Not much to tell. I was a foster kid who learned to build things because it was the only way to feel in control of anything." Neil adjusted the camera for the next document, but his attention was clearly on me. "What about you? How does a brilliant historian end up lost in my woods?"
"I'm not brilliant," I said.
"You are." He said it like it was simple fact, not opinion. "You have intelligence and passion."
No one had ever described me like that. Thorough, maybe. Competent. Not in the least bit interesting. I liked that he thought I was smart and passionate.
"I loved history as a kid. As an adult, I saw alarming patterns of history repeating itself and I wanted to learn all I could to try to avoid that fate," I said.
“Like I said, intelligence and passion.”
“But in an academic sense. The people who hid these documents and the members of the Underground Railroad were the ones with real intelligence and passion. And bravery boththe escaped slaves and the people who helped them. They all risked so much. The slaves, their very lives and the ordinary people—farmers, business owners, families—who stood up for human rights because it was the right thing to do."
"Exactly. They're heroes whose names we'll never know, whose courage we can only glimpse through the records they left behind." Neil was standing close enough now that I could smell the cedar scent that seemed to be part of his skin. "You're giving them voice. Making sure their stories survive."
"That's what I hope to do." My voice came out breathier than intended, and I saw his eyes drop to my mouth before returning to meet my gaze.
"Kim." The way he said my name made everything else fade away—the workshop, the documents, the outside world. There was only Neil, his eyes dark with an intensity that made my knees weak.
"I've been wanting to do this since I found you on that log," he said, voice rough with barely controlled desire. His large hands came up to frame my face, thumbs brushing my cheekbones with surprising gentleness. "Tell me to stop if you don't want this."
"Don't stop," I whispered, already rising on my toes to meet him.
The first brush of his lips against mine was gentle, testing, but when I gripped his flannel shirt and pulled him closer, something primal unleashed in him.
He growled—actually growled—against my mouth and lifted me effortlessly onto his workbench, stepping between my legs. One hand tangled in my hair while the other splayed possessively across my lower back, pulling me tight against his chest.
"Fuck, you taste sweet," he muttered against my lips before claiming my mouth again, this time with no hesitation. His kisswas thorough, devastating, promising everything I'd been too afraid to want. His beard scraped deliciously against my skin as he angled his head to deepen the kiss, his tongue stroking against mine in a way that made me moan.
"That sound," he groaned, breaking away to trail hot kisses down my throat. "I want to hear you make that sound again. I want to hear all the sounds you make."
His teeth grazed the sensitive spot where my neck met my shoulder, and I gasped, my legs instinctively wrapping around his waist. The position pressed me against the hard evidence of his arousal, and we both froze for a moment at the contact.
"Kim." My name was a prayer and a possession on his lips. His forehead rested against mine, both of us breathing hard. "You have no idea what you do to me. One day in my cabin and I'm ready to keep you here forever."
The intensity of his words, the barely leashed hunger in his eyes, should have terrified me. Instead, it made me feel powerful. Desired. Claimed.
"This is crazy," I whispered, but I didn't pull away. Couldn't pull away. "We just met yesterday."
"Doesn't matter." His hands tightened on my waist, thumbs stroking the strip of skin where my shirt had ridden up. "Knew you were mine the moment I saw you crying on that log. My lost little librarian, needing protection. Needing me."
The possessive words sent heat straight through me. This was nothing like the careful, intellectual attractions I'd felt before. This was raw, primal, overwhelming.
