Page 192 of Wild Then Wed
He looks like a blonde Clark Kent—square jaw, broad shoulders, eyes that make me forget how to talk. But it’s everything else that gets me. It’s the way he remembers things. Small things. Like the kind of food I can eat, or how I didn’t eat enough this morning, or that I like tea better than coffee. He doesn’t just listen—he hears me. And he doesn’t do it for points or recognition. He does it because that’s who he is. Because he gives a shit.
He’s thoughtful in this quiet, intentional way. Always doing little things that make me feel seen and taken care of without ever making it feel like I owe him anything for it. He paysattention without putting pressure on me to perform or explain or apologize for the way I move through the world.
I think—no, I know—he would’ve been a really good dad. I see it in the way he talks about Nora. In the way he still gets a little choked up when he mentions Violet, like he never stopped being her dad, even if he never got to meet her. There’s so much heart in him, so much goodness, and sometimes I wonder how he carries all of it around without falling apart.
I’d sworn I wouldn’t fall in love again. That I wouldn’t hand over my heart—so unguarded, so fragile, so bare. I’d convinced myself it was safer to stay in control. Love, the way I’d known it before, was complicated and conditional. It made me feel like I was too much and not enough all at once. Like I had to bend and stretch just to be worthy of staying for.
But this? With Sawyer? It doesn’t ask me to be anything but who I already am.
It’s in the way my body settles against his at night, like it’s found the place it was always meant to rest. It’s when he tells me a story about his childhood and I find myself wishing I’d been there—wishing I’d known him then, too. It’s the way I can feel his eyes on me in a room full of people, as if I’m the only one he sees. It’s how just the thought of spending another day with him makes me feel like I’ve won some impossible lottery—like somehow I got lucky enough to exist at the same time as him.
I don’t know if he loves me back. He hasn’t said it, but I know that if he ever did—if those words ever left his mouth—I wouldn’t hesitate. I’d say them back before he could finish.
Somewhere along the way, my heart stopped belonging just to me. It found a home in him. And I haven’t felt even the smallest urge to take it back.
“Oh my god,” Lark says suddenly.
My eyes snap up to the screen. “What?”
She’s smirking now, in that annoying older-sister-by-proxy kind of way. “You love him.”
My hand stills, the lip liner clutched awkwardly between two fingers. “You can’t possibly know that.”
“I do.” Her voice is gentle. “Wren, come on. I’ve known you since you were five. That look on your face? That’s the exact look I’ve had on mine every day of my life loving your brother.”
I make a gagging sound and toss the liner onto the counter. “Well, thanks for that visual. Could’ve lived without it.”
Lark laughs, but when I glance back at the screen, her smile softens. She leans forward like she’s about to tell me something important.
“Okay,” she says. “I’m gonna give you some sisterly advice, and I want you to listen to me. Got it?”
I sit down on the closed toilet lid and set the makeup bag in my lap. “Alright. Fire away, wise one.”
“You deserve it. All of it. Every ounce of love Sawyer has to give you—you deserve it.”
I don’t say anything. Mostly because I’m shocked and not sure I can.
“You’ve spent your whole life thinking you have to earn things that should’ve just been given to you. Like love is some limited resource and you’re only allowed a little bit if you work hard enough or ask nicely. But that’s not how it works, babe.”
I swallow hard, my eyes trained on the tiled floor.
“You’re not too much. Or too complicated. Or too honest. You’re not a burden or an afterthought or some extra thing to manage. You’re someone that people are lucky to love. And Sawyer—he already knows that. So let him, okay?”
I blink up at her. My throat feels tight.
“I mean it,” she says. “You’re allowed to have this. You’re allowed to be happy.”
And just like that, I can’t hold it in anymore. I press my fingers beneath my eyes, trying not to smudge all the work we’ve just spent the last thirty minutes on.
Lark sees it, but she just smiles again and says, “Also, maybe add a little setting spray. You’re getting weepy on me.”
I let out a wet laugh. “Yeah, yeah. I’m on it.”
Lark grins, proud of herself—which, honestly, she should be. Then she claps her hands together and leans closer to the screen. “Alright. Now we’re gonna teach you how to use this curling iron without setting the hotel on fire.”
I glance warily at the metal wand sitting on the counter. It looks suspiciously like a medieval torture device. “If I burn my ear off, I’m blaming you.”
“Fair. But you won’t. We’re gonna start with small sections, okay? You don’t need to do your whole head, just a few pieces around your face to make it look like you put in effort.”
