3. Where There’s Smoke, There’s Fire

WHERE THERE’S SMOKE, THERE’S FIRE

T he unseasonably cold weather continues; I've spent very little time outside of downtown Atlanta, so I have no clue if the twenty-eight-degree weather and snow flurries are common here in the mountains, if it's unusual for the densely-packed trees around the lake to be dusted with snow, or if the lake usually has the thin crust of ice on it like it does now.

Regardless, it's gorgeous. Even more peaceful than I remember. The road passes behind the cabins, separated by a couple hundred feet of dense forest; the driveway is a narrow lane through a dark tunnel of trees going between the cabins and dead-ending in a wide gravel circle.

As you face the lake, the main cabin is on the left, and the workshop is on the right. The main home is a classic log cabin made from hand-hewn pine trees with a forest-green metal roof and a chimney of large river stones and small boulders. There's a deep front porch of weathered and recently-restained pine planks with a mismatched pair of antique wooden rocking chairs and a short, wide section of tree stump denuded of bark and lacquered against the elements. The two steps up to the porch are wide, deep, and sturdy, without a creak as I ascend them. The railings are a double layer of tree limbs, complete with bark, crooked and imperfect.

The front door is another antique, roughly hewn thick pine boards secured with black wrought-iron straps—one across the top and one across the bottom, with another board running diagonally from top left to bottom right. The doorknob is tarnished and key-scratched brass. Old, bubbly panes of glass in a four-square pattern near the top allow light in but afford a measure of privacy.

I refer to the text message from Nathan:

There's a spare key on the front porch inside a fake rock in the pot by the front door. The kitchen is fully stocked, so make yourself at home. There's a grocery store twenty minutes away—go out to the main road, turn left, and keep going until you come to the little village. The store will be on the left. There's also a post office, two small bars that both serve greasy spoon type food, a breakfast and lunch only diner, a library (but don't expect much from it), and a few cutesy little shops. Another twenty minutes past Elberville, the little village, is a larger town with more modern amenities. There are no food delivery services that come out here, unfortunately. I've left a notepad on the kitchen counter with a few important emergency contacts in the area, and of course, you can always reach us if something comes up. Relax, enjoy, and Merry Christmas!

I find the key and open the door. Within, the cabin is cozy, homey, and quiet. Large windows on either side of the door let in buckets of natural light. The fireplace is to the right, a thick mantle of dark-stained, rough-hewn, squared-off hickory. A delightfully Boho couch faces the fireplace, white cloth cushions and wooden armrests with a chaotic assortment of colorful, handmade throw pillows. The floors are old and polished and smooth, covered by large, mismatched rugs beneath the couch and another under the dining table.

The kitchen is to the left of the door, with thick butcher block counters and an antique porcelain farmhouse sink. The lower cabinets are a profusion of Boho colors with artfully mismatched pulls; the uppers are white and open-face. The stove is another antique, ancient and battered, well-kept and functional. The fridge is the polar opposite: new, French door with two freezer drawers below.

The rear wall, opposite the entry, features a single sliding door, barn-style, stained a deep reddish brown. Standing open, the doorway reveals a handmade king-size, four-poster bed, bureau, and a hint of the en-suite bathroom.

A huge loft occupies the space above the owner's suite, accessible from the main living area via a ladder-like stair on the right near the fireplace. Overstuffed bookshelves run all three sides of the loft, with a skylight letting in natural light. A gargantuan beanbag chair, big enough for two or three people, occupies the center of the space, with a floor lamp extending over it and a wicker basket in a corner overflowing with cozy fleece blankets.

God, I love this cabin.

After my brief tour of reacquaintance, I haul my bags inside and leave them just inside the bedroom. On the counter near the coffee pot is the aforementioned notepad. On it is a list of local contacts: a snow removal service, a tow truck, non-emergency police, fire, and medical, and a friend who lives nearby with basic handyman skills in case something were to break or leak or whatever. He's also written down both his and Nadia’s cell phone numbers, as well as the Wi-Fi password and the logins for the various streaming services for the large flatscreen TV mounted on the wall opposite the bed in the bedroom.

I peruse the cabinets, finding simple, classic stoneware dishes for everyday use, as well as a small collection of antique blue-and-white china, mason jars for drinking, and a collection of hand-thrown pottery coffee mugs. The silverware is tarnished antique silver, much of it mismatched. The cupboards contain lots of healthy snack options and ingredients for putting together quick, simple meals—assuming one knows how to cook, which I do not. The fridge contains more healthy options like yogurt, almond milk, fresh fruits and veggies, lunch meats, and sliced cheese. The freezer, however, has a few gallons of ice cream, frozen veggies, microwavable meals, oven-bake fries, tots, and chicken nuggets—more my speed since there's no food delivery out here.

There's split wood stacked in a metal rack beside the fireplace, a large leather bucket containing smaller sticks for kindling, and a stack of newspapers with a box of extra-long matches. Nathan has also helpfully provided, on the page behind the list of contacts, a step-by-step guide, complete with hand-drawn illustrations, of how to start a fire; he's also built a set-up so I can see what it's supposed to look like, and all I have to do is strike a match.

Cute of Nathan to think a city girl like me can build a fire, even with step-by-step instructions.

It's…silent.

I stand in the kitchen, listening to absolutely nothing. A skirl of wind howls past the window, and then it's gone. A bird flits past, chirping. A squirrel chatters somewhere.

Other than that? Not a damn sound.

Maybe this was a mistake. I went stir-crazy in my own condo, with all the amenities of modern civilization at my fingertips. Anything I wanted, I could have delivered. What I couldn't get delivered, I could find within a few blocks.

Here?

I'm a twenty-minute drive to a Podunk little hamlet where the big draw is a grocery store that probably doesn't even have brands I'll recognize and almost an hour to anywhere with any amenities I'm used to.

What am I supposed to do here for the next month?

I can't back out now—I've committed to housesitting until Nathan and Nadia come back after the New Year.

Tears burn behind my eyes. I'm alone. Not just alone, but lonely. I realize I've been alone. My whole damned life, I've been alone. Even the boyfriends I've had have been barely a few steps past casual. I never loved any of them and never pretended to.

Life-altering medical emergency and serious surgery, and I have no one to lean on, no one to talk to.

God, this is depressing.

A note on the bureau in the owner's suite informs me that they've cleared out the bureau so I can unpack and feel more at home, so I occupy an hour unpacking my clothes. When that's done, I carefully and slowly ascend the ladder to the loft and scan the titles, landing on an old John Grisham paperback. Back down the ladder, wincing as my incision twinges. Make some tea, bundle up in my favorite jacket and wool beanie, and take my book and tea out to the porch. Throw a blanket over my lap.

Snowflakes swirl in restless gusts of wind. The sky is leaden and heavy. A handful of geese waddle gingerly across the ice on the lake.

I sip tea and dive into the novel—it's an old favorite, one I've read half a dozen times and can always read again. It's like visiting an old friend at this point.

I finish my tea. The cold wind stings my nose, but otherwise I'm surprisingly comfortable out here; a few pages turn into a few chapters, and then a few chapters turn into a few hours, and suddenly the light is dying and the words are starting to be hard to read.

I'm about to put away the blanket when I hear an engine—it's loud, rumbling, a powerful snarl. It must be Nathan's friend. I wasn't exactly thrilled to learn that my peaceful, reflective, healing Christmas getaway was going to be crashed by an unknown male, but Nathan promised me his friend would want to be left alone equally as much as I did.

Fine.

But I can't help my curiosity. So I huddle deeper into the blanket, tug my hat lower, and watch as a gigantic black truck rumbles to a stop in front of the workshop. The motor idles noisily for a moment, and the taillights glow red while the headlights burn white, illuminating a portion of the lake and the trees beside the cabin.

Another moment, and then the driver's door opens. The person who emerges is the single largest human being I've ever seen in my life. Even from a hundred or so feet away, he's absolutely mammoth. The shearling coat he wears bulges at the arms and shoulders. He has a knit watch cap on, black hair curling at his shoulders. For a second, it feels like I know him somehow, but I dismiss that thought as a flight of fancy; I barely know Nathan, much less anyone he knows. We certainly don't run in the same social circles. Which assumes I have a social circle…which I do not.

I watch as my vaguely familiar new neighbor hauls a couple of large suitcases out of the back seat and brings them inside, using a spare key hidden in a similar location to the one here. He makes a second trip for another pair of bags and then a third, carrying pairs of those kettle-weight things…he brought six of them, each pair larger than the last. I suppose you don't get to be as colossal as he is without being dedicated enough to lifting weights that you bring your own on vacation.

Finally done unloading, he slams the truck door closed and then just stands by the hood of his giant macho-mobile. For a while, he just stares out at the lake, leaning a hip against the bumper of his truck. I can't see his expression, but his body language is…pensive. Thoughtful. Troubled, even.

He sweeps his winter cap off his head and scrapes a hand through his long black hair, sucks in a deep breath. Unconsciously, I find myself mirroring his inbreath. When he lets his out slowly, so do I.

He slides the cap back on over his hair and adjusts it with both hands. Passes a palm down his face.

Yeah, he's here escaping something, just like me.

I feel you, new neighbor. I don't know what you're going through, but I hope you find what you need.

He ascends the porch, pauses with his hand on the knob, and then looks right at me. For a long moment, he just looks. And then he lifts one hand in a wave. I unearth a hand from under the blanket and wave back at him.

He goes inside and the windows abruptly blossom with yellow light. A few minutes later, tendrils of white smoke trickle up out of the chimney.

I put the blanket away, grab my book and long-empty mug, and head back inside. Look at the fireplace and wonder if I dare light it. I decide against it—I'm exhausted from the drive. I opt to find something to eat—a microwave pasta, broccoli, and chicken meal. It's not bad, and it fills me up. There's even a corked half-bottle of white wine that I finish.

That done, I change into my XXL Audubon Zoo hoodie—and nothing else—and climb into bed. The sheets are freshly laundered, the blankets thick and piled deep, folded across the foot so I can add as many layers as I want. I get cozy, turn on a Dateline murder mystery, and promptly fall asleep before nine.

I wake up at five. Miraculously, I manage to get back to a quasi-sort-of-sleep until seven, at which point I wake up fully. It's bitterly cold. I stay in bed for a while; I have to pee but I’m too warm and cozy to get out of bed. Eventually, my bladder wins, and I scurry to the bathroom. I stop by the thermostat and turn it up a few degrees; I hear the ductless mini-splits kick on in the bedroom and out in the living room.

Now that I'm up, I wrap a blanket around myself like a cape and make coffee, putting some bread in the toaster while the coffeemaker burbles and chugs. Once I have some toast and coffee in my system, I feel more alive and venture to the windows.

I gasp in shock: the world beyond the windows is white. A thick layer of snow covers everything—my car is a white lump, the steps are mounded with snow, and the lake is a white sheet. Snow flurries in dense, billowing curtains blown by a howling wind, so thick I can barely see the other cabin.

Holy shit. I haven't seen this much snow since Lisa and I took that weekend trip up to New York to see Wicked on Broadway the Christmas before she died.

A thin trickle of smoke streams out of the other cabin's chimney, quickly snatched away by the greedy wind. A light glows in the windows over there, too. He’s an early riser, too, apparently.

Maybe it's time to try the fire.

Nathan already built it, so all I have to do is light it, right? I refill my coffee and crouch in front of the fireplace with the blanket around my shoulders. Pull a match from the box, strike it against the side of the box with a crackling flare, and touch the twisted, crumpled sections of newspaper in a few places.

Moments later, shreds of orange flame lick at the kindling, and then the kindling is being devoured and the flames are larger and hungrier.

It builds and builds until it's a merry, roaring little fire.

I stand up and step back, clutching my mug in both hands. This is nice. Warmth radiates from the fire, and I extend my empty hand toward it.

Only…

Should there be this much smoke? Dense, rolling gray smoke billows from the fireplace toward the ceiling. Shouldn't it go, you know, up the chimney?

Within seconds, it's choking and occluding the whole cabin. Panicking now, I hurry to the front door, shove it open, and step barefoot into the snow, coughing.

I catch my breath and stare inside—smoke fills the cabin, increasingly thick and choking. What did I do wrong?

"No, no, no!" I stomp my bare foot in the icy snow. "What do I do?"

I look right: the other cabin. The big dude.

I have to ask for help.

Fuck.

In a stroke of luck, right at that moment, the huge man steps out onto his porch, dressed in black-and-white-checked pajama pants, feet stuffed into big black rubber boots, that same shearling coat, and his hat. He has an ax in hand.

He looks my way idly, does a double-take, and then drops his ax on the porch. He vaults over the side of the porch, lands easily in the snow, and sprints across the intervening space in a handful of paces, up the steps and past me without pausing, and into the cabin. He skids to his knees in front of the fireplace, reaches up into the chimney, hissing, and does something that results in a loud CLUNK , and immediately the smoke is sucked up the chimney.

He rises to his feet and looks at me, equal parts amused and annoyed. "Gotta open the flue."

"The what?" I ask, still outside.

He jerks his head, gesturing that I should come in. "No sense standing outside, but you should leave the door open for a few minutes." I enter hesitantly, the blanket pulled tight around me, and he bends, pointing into the chimney; I can’t help noticing how fine his ass is as he bends. Shaking the thought off, I shuffle closer and peer at where he's pointing—a metal lever up inside. "That's the flue—it's a metal panel that you close when the fireplace isn't being used. It keeps wind and rain and critters and whatever else from gettin’ in. You gotta open it before you light a fire."

His voice is deep and rough.

He's rough. And even bigger in person. At least six-four, he's a creature of pure, primal, animal muscle. His arms strain at the sleeves of his coat, and his thighs bunch inside the pajama bottoms. His brown-and-white shearling coat is open, showing a black long-sleeve T-shirt that clings to heavy pecs and drapes around a lean waist.

His hair is long, glossy black, and damp with snow where it peeks under his hat. He sports heavy black stubble on a jawline so rugged you could crack walnuts on it. His eyes are deep-set and dark brown, expressive and intelligent and burning with deep layers of old pain and anger.

Even so, his expression as he looks at me is gentle. "Never made a fire, huh?"

Cold wind skirls in the cabin, carrying the last of the smoke with it. I close the door, shutting out the cold and snow—drifts have piled up in the entryway in the few minutes the door was open.

"What gave it away?" I mutter. "Thanks for the rescue."

He shrugs. "No biggie."

"Well, it was a biggie to me. I'm glad you were there—I had no idea what to do, and then Nathan and Nadia's home would have burned down." I cover my face with a corner of the blanket. "Some house sitter I am.

"Hey, don't beat yourself up. You can't know what you don't know, you know?" His easy grin is debilitating.

He's the most ruggedly handsome man I've ever seen in real life—and I swear I’ve seen him somewhere, I just can’t place it. My heart pitter-patters wildly as he gazes at me, assessing me.

Which is when I realize I’m not wearing a damn thing except a hoodie that barely clears the lower curves of my backside. Plus the blanket, but still.

His eyes roam my bare thighs, linger, and then flick up to my eyes. He smiles at me, and my heart races.

"Reece." He extends a paw the size of a dinner plate to me.

"Lilith," I say, taking his hand.

His hand engulfs mine; his grip is careful and gentle but still firm. Some men barely touch my hand while others crush as if to prove something; this man finds the perfect balance.

Reece. The name rings a bell, in conjunction with his familiar face and build.

"Well, um, thank you," I say, retrieving my hand from his after a beat too long.

"Yeah, no problem." He looks around. "This place is nice."

I point at the workshop with the corner of the blanket clutched in my hand. "That cabin is no shit-shack, either."

He chuckles, amusement lighting up his face. "No, it's not. I've just never been in here." He flaps a hand in my direction. “Well, I'll get out of your hair. Just remember to shut the flue when you're done and open it if you make another fire."

I laugh. "Yeah, I'm not sure that'll happen. Nathan left instructions, but I'd be afraid of setting something on fire."

Reece grins. "It's easy. I can show you, if you want. Nothing to it once you understand how."

"Um, we'll see." I leave it as noncommittal as possible. I notice his eyes going to the coffee pot. “Would you like a cup?”

He exhales in relief. "God, yes, please. Nathan said there was coffee in the cabin, but he neglected to inform me that it was a French press and a manual grinder. I have no idea how to use that shit, and I ended up with tar."

I snicker. "I went through a French press phase in my late twenties. I thought it made me sophisticated and cool, even though it was just me making coffee for myself. I kept trying to work it into conversations, only to eventually realize how stupid I was being. Now, I'm the proud owner of a two-hundred-dollar luxury French press that I never use because no matter how you make it, it still tastes like raw ass."

Reece guffaws at this, the sound of his rough, hearty laughter filling the cabin. "So it's not just me being clueless? I'm a whiz with a Keurig, I'll have you know."

"Oh, it's you being clueless, too. French Press coffee is an art form. The beans have to be ground just right, and you have to let it steep for exactly the right amount of time. Grind it too coarse, and your coffee is water; grind it too fine, and it's tar. Steep it too short? Watery. Steep too long? Tar."

"And the Goldilocks zone probably takes a lot of trial and error to fine-tune," he guesses.

"Exactly." I pour him a mug. "Anything in it?"

"Nah, black is good. Thank you, Lilith." He brings the mug to his nose and inhales. "Real coffee. Thank fuck." He glances at me. "Sorry. Thank god."

I just grin. "I swear like a sailor, so don't censor yourself on my account." I gesture at the couch. "Please, have a seat. I'm just gonna, you know. Put on, um…clothes."

I see several thoughts flit across his face—he has a very expressive face and wears his emotions openly. He says nothing, however, just nods and heads for the couch.

I shut myself in my room and dress quickly in loose flannel bottoms, my fuzzy pink Miss Piggy slippers, and a T-shirt with a cardigan.

While I was changing, Reece has cleaned up the snowdrifts by the entry, added logs to the fire, and doffed his coat.

He's sitting in the corner of the couch, mile-long, tree-trunk legs extended ankle over ankle, boots off to reveal thick gray wool socks. Something about him in just his socks makes my stomach flip. Stupid.

Without his bulky shearling coat, the size of him is even more frightening. The shirt is clingy and thin, tugged up around thick, veiny forearms, bulging at his biceps. His shoulders are mountainous. How much must he weigh? Two of me, at least.

I top off my coffee and perch on the edge of the couch as far from him as I can get. He casts a sidelong look at me and then snorts gently.

"What?" I ask.

"Nothin'."

I shoot him a droll look over the mug as I sip. "Mmm-hmm. If that was a 'nothing' look, I'm Martha Stewart."

"You're all tensed up and on the edge of the couch." He sets his mug on the low coffee table. "I'll go. I'm making you uncomfortable."

He's on his feet and halfway to the door before I find my voice. "Wait. Reece, wait. Just…finish your coffee, at least."

He hesitates with his coat over his arm. "You sure? This is your house. I don't wanna make you uncomfortable."

"Well, mine for now. And I appreciate it. But please, sit."

He throws his coat on the stand by the door and resumes his seat. "Okay, since you insist. But you gotta relax."

The fire crackles, bathing us in delicious heat. It's mesmerizing, watching the flames dance. I force myself to relax—I realize I am tense. He's done nothing but help, and has kept a respectful distance, almost as if he's aware of the effect his sheer size must have on a diminutive woman like me.

"There ya go." He's got a bit of a twang to his voice, a gentle, faint accent that adds a lilt to his words. "So, Lilith. What do you do?"

"I'm a lawyer," I answer.

Immediately, his shoulders bunch and his jaw tightens. "I see."

I can’t help but laugh. "Someone doesn’t like lawyers."

He tips his head back and sighs, rolls his huge shoulders. "Nothing personal," he says. “I’ve just had my fill of lawyers lately."

"Oh?"

He extends a long, heavy arm along the back of the couch, putting his hand a few inches from me. Even his hand is huge and intimidating—it could crush my skull like an egg. "Divorce. A long, messy, ugly divorce. Hired the best lawyer in town, and he didn't do jack shit for me. Took hundreds of thousands of dollars from me and I still got fucked."

"I'm a trial lawyer. I don’t do divorces. I focus mainly on higher court appeals."

"Like Innocence Project type of things?" he asks.

I nod. "I've worked on a few of those, yes, but also just regular run-of-the-mill appeals. It's a complicated, challenging process."

"I don't know much about law, but I have the sense that appellate stuff is more challenging than normal law stuff." He takes a sip. "How'd you get into appellate law?"

I eye him. "Are you actually interested or just being polite?"

"Actually interested. Wouldn't ask if I wasn't."

"Well, I started as a public defender for the county—-Fulton County, I mean. But I hated that. I was always swamped with a backlog of cases, most of which I had no chance of winning. The defendants were often difficult and always suspicious, and a lot of them flat-out lied to me. But I liked helping people, so I stuck with it. And then I went up against a deputy DA on a case involving a series of smash-and-grab robberies. They had the guy dead to rights. Surveillance footage, fingerprints, some of the stolen merchandise in his actual apartment."

"But?" he says, guessing at the twist. "There's a ‘but’ here."

"Oh, hell yeah there is. They never mirandized him. I watched the arrest footage a dozen times, all the interviews—hours of interview footage in which the dumbass defendant sang like a bird without ever asking for an attorney. The morning of the trial, I watched the arrest footage again and realized they’d never read him his rights."

"Oops."

“Yeah, big oops. I got him off. It was bittersweet because he was guilty as hell. And I know for a fact he went right out and did it again because he got caught again just a few months later. I didn’t catch his case that time. But I liked the feeling of getting him off despite the odds and the proof. So, I decided I'd look into appellate law. Got myself hired at a firm specializing in it, worked my way up, and now I'm one of Fulton County's top appellate lawyers."

He grins at me. "That's badass."

I frown. “Really?”

"Oh, hell yeah. Super badass."

I shake my head. "Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not some underpaid hero laboring through pro bono cases to get wrongfully convicted men out of prison. I have done that, and I do enjoy it, but most of my casework is far less interesting and dramatic."

"You saw what you wanted to do and worked your ass off to get there. Achieving your goals is badass in my book.”

"Well, I guess that's true. I did work full-time as a public defender while studying appellate law. That was…a lot." I stand up. "More?"

He looks in his cup. "If I’m not crowding your space, sure, I'd take a little more."

"So, Reece," I say as I pour us both more and then sit back down. "What about you? What do you do?" I grin at him. "Rip trees out of the ground with your bare hands?"

He huffs a laugh, but I notice the tension ripple through him. "I, uh…I’m an actor. Or, I was. Maybe I still am. I dunno. It's all up in the air." He takes a sip and then sets it down. "On second thought, I should go. Thanks for the coffee, Lilith. And don’t forget the flue next time."

He stomps his feet into his boots and is gone with his coat over his arm before I can so much as blink thrice.

"Okay," I say to the empty cabin. "That was abrupt."

I smell him, still. A faint, indefinable male scent. Without him in it, the room seems so much bigger—he just took up so much space with his massive frame and quiet presence.

Reece.

An actor.

Wait…

I google "Reece actor" on my phone, and a flood of posts fills the screen. His Wikipedia page, his IMDB…and lots of news articles.

"B-List actor goes berserk, attacks cops."

"Actor Reece Morgan, known for direct-to-streaming action movies, arrested on assault charges."

I read one of the articles. Reece Morgan, 33, has steadily built a reputation as a hard-working actor willing to take on highly physical roles, often doing his own stunts. Prior to his breakout role, Bishop in Netflix's limited series Atlas , Morgan was a dominating force for the Tennessee Volunteers football team. He parlayed his massive size, freakish athleticism, and rugged good looks into a budding career in front of the camera. With a presence as big as he is, Morgan has spent a decade building a name and a reputation for himself. That reputation, however, is not exactly rosy. He's been arrested a few times for violent, alcohol-fueled tirades, often resulting in injuries to bystanders. Yesterday's incident, however, marks a career low for the actor. Following a bitter two-and-a-half-year divorce from social media influencer and aspiring actress Vivian St. Michael, Morgan, heavily intoxicated, threw a man through a bathroom door and then injured several police officers responding to the call.

UPDATE : Since the publication of this article, we've received reports that Morgan spent two weeks in jail, paid hefty fines, and personally apologized to the officers involved. He has since sold both of his houses and hasn't been seen in public since this past Thursday.

Yikes.

No wonder he bolted.

I hear thunking and peer out the kitchen window, which has a view of the other cabin. Reece is chopping wood in his shirt sleeves. Each powerful swing of the ax sends chunks of wood flying. He seems tireless, robotically balancing a round section of tree on a wide flat stump—swing, split, stack, repeat. Angrily. No, not just angrily. Furiously. At one point, he slams the ax with such force that it buries so deeply into the stump that even he, with his immense strength, has to brace his foot on the stump and wiggle the ax back and forth and up and down to free it.

Alcohol-fueled violent outburst.

It should terrify me, having had a man like that in my home, mere feet from me. But yet…at no point was I ever afraid of him. Intimidated by his size, yes. Nervous at having a strange man in my space, yes.

Afraid of him? No.

He struck me as being kind, thoughtful, and gentle.

He was easy to talk to. Funny. Interesting and interested in what I had to say.

I…I enjoyed his presence.

I watch him split wood for a few more minutes, and then he finally thunks the ax into the stump, stacks a giant armload of split wood in his arms, carries it inside, and returns to bring in the ax.

He glances my way and sees me watching. His expressive face shows apprehension, worry, embarrassment, shame…and then nothing. He lifts a gloved hand in a wave and vanishes inside.

That's a complicated man, I decide.

And I've always been a sucker for a challenge.