Page 126 of The Lumberjack and the City Slicker

Because I’m not the woman who gets happily ever afters.

I’m not the fairytale ending.

I’m just me.

Unapologetically me.

A product of a happy childhood, raised by parents who had it all. Money. Education. And love.

They loved me too, and oh, but I was pampered and coddled.

My parents adore me, and I adore them still.

I’m too much for some people.

Not enough for others.

Too opinionated. Too emotional. Too curvy. Too ambitious. Too inconvenient.

I’ve tried to sand down my edges before.

Tried to make myself smaller, more agreeable, more digestible.

It never works.

So when Greyson’s eyes open fully and he looks at me—really looks at me, even in the dim light without hesitation, without doubt, without calculation—it undoes me.

“You okay?” he asks softly.

I nod, but my throat is tight.

“Yeah,” I whisper. “Just… couldn’t sleep.”

He brushes his thumb along my cheek, slow and absentminded. Intimate.

“I got you. You’re safe with me,” he says.

Safe.

No one has ever said that to me like it’s a promise.

I pull him to me, and I kiss him then.

Not frantic.

Not desperate.

Just slow.

Exploratory.

Like we’re rediscovering something we’ve already ignited.

He moans into my mouth. Then, he rolls with me.

He’s so careful. Attentive.

His hand is cradling the back of my head like I’m something precious instead of something temporary.