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You hated the countryside.
Not in the dramatic way people in movies hated things eitherâwhere they complained for ten minutes before magically learning to love the fresh air and the scenery. No. You genuinely hated itâhated the heat that stuck to your skin like wet fabric, hated the dirt that somehow always found its way under your nails no matter how much you washed your hands, hated the smell of livestock drifting through the air every morning, hated how quiet it got at night, so quiet you could hear insects screaming in the grass outside your window.
And most of allâyou hated that your father lived there because every summer visit meant labor.
Your dad believed in âhard work buildinâ character,â which was just another way of saying heâd drag you out into the fields until your body ached and your skin burned while he barked instructions at you from twenty feet away.
Meanwhile youâd spent the entire year enjoying city lifeâsleeping in, staying indoors, wasting hours on your phone, eating whatever you wanted whenever you wanted. Then suddenly you were expected to wake up before the sun and work until your muscles felt like they were splitting apart.
Packing your bags had been easy enough. Just throw clothes into a suitcase and ignore your mother giving you sympathetic looks from the doorway. Leaving your actual life behind though? That part sucked. You practically mourned your bed before walking out the front door.
Every mile farther from the city made you more irritated. Buildings disappeared. Stores disappeared. Signal disappeared. Eventually all that remained were endless stretches of land, fences, patches of wheat, old tractors rusting in grass, and skies so open it almost felt uncomfortable.
When your fatherâs truck finally pulled into the gravel driveway, you stared at the old farmhouse with immediate dread.
Same stupid windmill off in the distance.
You let out a long sigh while dragging your suitcase out of the carâand the heat hit immediately.
Your father clapped a rough hand onto your shoulder with enough force to nearly shove you forward. âQuit sulkinâ. Ainât gonna kill ya to spend a lilâ time outside.â
The first day passed surprisingly fast though. Maybe because your father was oddly softer after not seeing you for months. Dinner had been decent. You talked a little, laughed once or twice.
And thankfully, he didnât force you into the fields immediately. You spent the evening sitting on the porch while cicadas screamed in the trees, pretending the entire trip might not be completely terrible.
Then morning cameâviolently in fact.
You woke up to your father pounding on your bedroom door at seven in the morning, and groaned.
You nearly choked yourself in the pillow to death.
The room was already warm from the sun leaking through the curtains. You dragged yourself out of bed looking half-dead while your father tossed clothes at you.
âWear somethinâ light. Gonna be hot today.â
You reluctantly changed into shorts and a thin shirt, already annoyed by how exposed you felt. The countryside somehow made everything feel more embarrassing. Maybe because everyone stared too long here, maybe because there was nothing else to look at except each other.
You barely had time to wake up properly before your father marched you outside.
The fields stretched endlessly under the burning sun, golden and green blending together beneath the bright sky. Workers were already moving through rows of crops in the distance. You hated how alive everyone looked this early.
Then your father introduced you to him.
âAxilen!â your father called.
You turned lazilyâand immediately regretted it.
The man walking toward you was huge, not just tall but built like a damn fridge.
Muscular arms strained beneath the sleeves of his worn shirt, sun-bronzed skin glistening slightly from sweat already gathered across his neck and collarbone. His jeans were dusty, boots caked with dirt, and his hands looked rough enough to split wood barehanded.
His eyes landed on you and didnât leave, not for a second.
It was immediate, and shamelessâshameless in the way his gaze dragged down your body slowly before returning to your face with a grin that looked far too pleased.
âWell now,â he drawled.
His accent was thickâdeep countryside. Words slow and honeyed, vowels stretching lazily off his tongue. âAinât ya just beautiful.â
Your father didnât seem bothered at all.
Axilen stepped closer, still staring openly. âLord above⌠ainât got a flaw on ya either.â
His eyes moved againâup, downâ slow like he was savoring the sight.
You shifted uncomfortably, offering an awkward nod purely because your father stood beside you and you didnât want to start problems immediately.
Unfortunately, that tiny reaction seemed to completely charm him.
Axilen grinned wider, dimples appearing in his cheeks. âCute too.â
The work started immediately after introductions, and somehow Axilen made everything worse.
Everywhere you wentâhe followed.
Every row you worked on suddenly became his row too. Every basket you carried mysteriously got taken from your hands before you could finish. Every task turned into an excuse for him to hover beside you talking endlessly while you sweated yourself half to death beneath the blazing sun.
âYou city folk always this delicate?â he teased while effortlessly lifting something you struggled carrying earlier.
You wiped sweat from your forehead irritably. âNo. I just donât enjoy manual labor.â
He laughed at that, adams apple bobbing, his chuckle deep and loud. âAw, donât worry. Iâll take careâa the hard stuff.â
You almost rolled your eyes hard enough to collapse.
And the worst part was how persistent he wasâmost people backed off when you acted uninterested, axilen didnât.
If anything, it encouraged him more.
Youâd ignore him and heâd simply move closer. Youâd answer with one-word replies and heâd grin like youâd flirted with him. Every dismissive look you gave him only made his expression soften into something dangerously fond.
It was irritating and weird, especially because he stared at you constantly. And it wasn't like it was subtle either.
Every time you glanced up, he was already looking like he physically could not stop himself.
You bent down to pull weeds from the soil, sweat sticking your shirt against your back while the sun roasted your skin alive. A shadow fell over you seconds later.
Axilen crouched beside you easily, broad shoulders blocking some of the sunlight.
âYâknow,â he started casually, ânever seen someone look so pretty workinâ in dirt before.â
âget lost,â you muttered.
He grinned instantly, that grin was becoming a problem.
âCareful there, sweetheart,â he drawled, voice dropping lower. âMight get the wrong message.â
You frowned up at him. âWhat message?â
âThat yer playinâ hard tâ get.â
You stared at him flatly.
But Axilen genuinely didnât understand why you werenât warming up to him yet. In his mind, this was practically fate.
The second he saw you standing there beside your father, suitcase in hand and irritation written all over your face, something inside him had latched onto you instantly.
Heâd grown up in this town his entire lifeâseen the same people, same women, same routines, nothing ever changed.
Then suddenly you arrived looking all soft and pretty and completely out of place beneath the country sun, and Axilen felt like someone had slammed a hook straight through his ribs.
He couldnât stop looking at you, didnât want to.
The way your face twisted whenever you got annoyed was adorable to him. The way you clearly hated the heat made him weirdly affectionate, even your attitude charmed him.
Especially your attitude.
Axilen always got pissed off when city people always looked down on countryside folk. Yet there you were in shorts that showed off your legs while glaring at him like he was a mosquito buzzing around your head, and he just bit his bottom lip to keep from groaning.
You were cuteâso damn cute.
And you smelled good, not like dirt or hay or sweat, you smelled clean and sweetâwrong for this place.
He watched you more than he worked honestly. He watched the way you wiped sweat from your neck, watched your irritated expressions. He watched your fingers struggle with simple tasks, watched the way you sighed dramatically every five minutes.
And by lunchtime, Axilen had already decided he was gonna keep you.
Not literally, of course.
âYer burninâ up,â he said later when he noticed your face flushed from heat.
He laughed again. âLanguage.â
He loved when you glared.
Axilen stepped behind you suddenly, making you tense when his large hand brushed your shoulder lightly before tugging your hat lower over your face to shield your eyes from the sun.
"there." He murmured, and your stomach twisted in annoyance.
He blinked once, then smiled softly. âCanât really help it.â
That answer made your skin crawl slightlyânot because he sounded threatening, but because he sounded sincere, entirely too sincere like touching you had become instinct already.
The day dragged on endlessly.
At one point your father sent the two of you to repair fencing farther from the main fields, which really meant trapping you alone with Axilen for nearly an hour.
You nearly died internally.
Axilen, unfortunately, seemed thrilled, and the walk there was torture because he refused to stop talking.
âTold yer daddy Iâd help out with ya personally.â
âWanted tâ spend time with ya.â
âYou always this grumpy?â
âWhen Iâm overheating, yes.â
âAinât overheating. Yer just dramatic.â
He grinned immediately. âThereâs that face again.â
You seriously considered shoving him into a ditch.
When you reached the fencing area, Axilen got to work quickly while you awkwardly attempted helping. Except every few minutes heâd interrupt to hover over you.
âNo, noâhold it like this.â
His hands covered yours from behind, warm and hugeârough palms against your skin.
You immediately stiffened.
Axilen noticed, and his expression softened instantly.
âYou nervous âround me?â
That actually made him laugh hard enough to bend forward slightly.
You hated how often he called you cute.
Every sentence out of his mouth sounded flirtatious somehow.
Even when he was talking normally his voice carried this low lazy warmth that made everything sound way too intimate.
At some point you sat beneath a tree for shade while drinking water, completely exhausted.
Axilen watched you openly while leaning against the fence.
âYou know,â he said eventually, âainât never seen someone lookinâ so miserable.â
âGlad I could entertain you.â
Something about his tone changed, still warm, and still playful but heavier now.
His eyes lingered on your face too long.
âYou got no idea what ya do tâ me.â
You stared at him cautiously.
Axilen smiled again, but this one was quieter, softer.
It should not have looked that intense after one day.
And by evening, everybody noticed Axilen hovering around you constantly. The older workers teased him relentlessly for it.
âBoyâs gone stupid already.â
âAinât seen him this lovestruck ever.â
âCareful, kid. Heâll follow ya home.â
That was the concerning part.
Even during dinner at your fatherâs house, Axilen somehow ended up there too. Apparently helping neighbors often ate together around here. Unfortunately for you, that meant enduring his attention for another two hours.
He sat across from you staring constantly.
Your father found it hilarious.
Axilen found it mesmerizing whenever you got irritated enough to snap at him.
âYou gonna keep starinâ all night?â
âAt least youâre honest.â
âAinât no point lyinâ âbout pretty things."
His gaze dropped briefly to your mouth before returning upward again.
His mama always told him to persist when he wanted somethingâand that was exactly what he was gonna do, just now the goal is you.
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