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Ryan smiled. “I’ll put something on. Am I disturbing you?”

“Nope. I should probably get up and stretch before my skeleton fuses in this position, actually.”

His smile grew as I levered myself off the couch.

“Hey,” I said softly as I followed him into the kitchen, “is this weird? Like, how comfortable we are? It’s like we did a speedrun through that whole part where you’re supposed to date and jumped straight to living together.”

“It’s weird,” Ryan agreed. He wrinkled his nose. “But it doesn’t feel wrong.”

His gaze held mine, and I saw my own questions reflected back in it. Like, what the hell were we doing? And why didn’t it feel wrong?

“Almost makes me believe that whole two parts of a single soul philosophy,” I said.

“I think it was Plato that came up with it. Like, before you’re born, you and another person are one complete being.

But after birth, you get broken apart and your soul gets split in two, and when you find each other again, you just fit together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.

He probably didn’t say the last part though, because I don’t think they had jigsaw puzzles in Ancient Greece.

” I shrugged. “I think I got a lot of that wrong. I’m pretty sure I’m right about the jigsaw thing though. ”

“The eighteenth century,” Ryan said. “They used to cut around the countries on a wooden map to teach kids geography. They named them dissections. They only started calling them jigsaws in the next century, because that’s when they started to use fretsaws and jigsaws, the actual saw, to make them.”

“Oh, wow. YouTube?”

“Yeah.” He flushed and rubbed the back of his neck. “I’ve made a couple before and was looking into where they came from.”

“In my head, I’m trying to figure out if this is just a vacation thing,” I said, my stomach knotting.

“Because I really like you, but are you like this all the time? Am I like this all the time? Because sometimes when you’re in a different place, you act differently, right?

Suddenly on vacation you’re all about trying new things and going on adventures and eating stuff you normally wouldn’t.

Is that what this is? Is it us having a vacation from our usual lives? ”

“I don’t know,” he said quietly. “I like you, and you like me, and I think we fit well together, like you said. I also know you’re not here forever, so maybe that takes the pressure off?”

“Right,” I agreed. “Anyone can make a good impression for a short period of time, but what if I’m really awful?”

He tilted his head. “I’ve seen you in the mornings before coffee. You think you’re hiding anything?”

I snorted out a laugh. “Maybe not.”

He closed the distance between us and took my hands.

He smelled like fresh sawdust. “I like you, Adam, and I feel as though maybe we’re heading for more than just liking each other, but I don’t want to mess it up by thinking about the future yet, because the future is you going back to Ohio and leaving me here.

So maybe we can just enjoy this for what it is right now—”

“A vacation marriage,” I said.

His eyebrows shot up. “Uh, I guess. Is that a thing?”

“I have no idea.”

“Okay, so maybe we just enjoy it in the moment, and see where it goes?”

I wasn’t a patient person. Like, if I had a problem that was stressing me out, I had to keep mentally poking it until I killed it or it killed me.

Whereas Ryan, I remembered, carved out wooden bowls and then put them away for a year so they matured, or dried, or did whatever the hell they were supposed to do.

Ryan worked with wood that had rings that showed every slow-passing year in increments of inches.

He was a guy who understood how to wait and see, whereas I had burned the roof of my mouth more than once because of my inability to let a microwave meal sit for two minutes after it was cooked.

I squeezed his hands. “I can try that, yes. Because this feels too good to mess up, you know?”

He nodded, his expression suddenly serious. “Yeah.”

A rush of warmth flowed through me as understanding spread between us.

Whatever this was, and I probably shouldn’t call it a vacation marriage again, it was good.

We liked each other, and we liked being together, so why the hell shouldn’t we enjoy our relationship even if we couldn’t out a label on it?

And if it was the start of something bigger, and it seemed like we both thought it could be, then why not nurture it?

I lifted my chin for a kiss, and Ryan obliged. And then, before that kiss could turn into something heated, the cat appeared out of nowhere and yowled.

Ryan’s smile broke the kiss. “You got a name for her yet?” he asked as the cat wound herself around our ankles.

“She’s your cat.”

He raised an eyebrow. “I’m not the one who let her in.”

“I’m probably going to get a terrible guest rating, aren’t I?”

“It’s lucky you’re cute,” he said. “You and the cat.”

We broke apart, and I bent down to scoop the cat up. “Dinnertime, miss?”

She yowled again.

I fed the cat and then washed my hands and helped Ryan with dinner prep. We didn’t make anything too fancy, just grilled burgers on the porch and ate them sitting together in the swing, looking out at the trees.

“Whoever built this place made the porch face the wrong way,” I said. “The lake is behind us.”

“Mmm,” Ryan said, “but if it was facing the other way, the loft wouldn’t have the lake view. So I guess I don’t mind too much. And a back porch is on the list, for sure. Maybe a wraparound.”

Like it was no big deal.

“I definitely want to be in your group for the zombie apocalypse.”

“Huh. And what are you bringing to the team?”

I elbowed him and laughed. “Everyone needs a storyteller, Ryan. A chronicler. Also, I can learn to knit or something too.”

“That’ll work,” he said with a smile.

We pushed ourselves lazily back and forth on the swing, enjoying the slow progression of the dusk into evening.

“Did you get much done today?” Ryan asked at last. “You looked like you were still in the zone when I got home.”

“Oh, it was great! Almost a full chapter, and I had this amazing idea that I’m really excited about.

My amateur detective, Alex, the bookstore owner, has spent the last three books butting heads with Beckett, the local deputy, but what if all that previous tension was actually sexual tension and they get together in this book?

I mean, a bunch of fans have been shipping them since the start, so I don’t think it’s too much of a leap character-wise.

Ugh, now I’m going to second-guess myself about it.

Read the first book I gave you and tell me if there’s any chemistry there? ”

“Oh, uh, okay.” He cleared his throat and stood up. “Do you want dessert? There might be some ice cream in the freezer?”

“What flavor?” I asked.

He looked down at me, judgingly.

“Yeah, you’re right,” I said. “Any flavor is good. I’d love some! Do you want me to—”

“I got it,” he said, setting my plate on top of his and carrying them inside.

I pushed my toes against the boards of the porch, setting the swing in gentle motion again as I waited for him to come back with ice cream, and thought about how coming to Harmony Lake was feeling like the best thing I’d ever done.