You sat perched on the bed of Cordell’s truck, the ridged metal warm beneath your palms, carrying the last heat of the long Texas day. The horizon burned soft gold and violet, cicadas humming lazily in the trees. For once, the world felt still.

Cordell stood just in front of you, tall and broad-shouldered, peeling off his dusty shirt after the long shift. The muscles of his torso flexed beneath tanned skin marked faintly with scars—signs of a life that had never known ease. His chest rose and fell in a slow rhythm, steady as the man himself.

Your eyes lingered a little too long, tracing the way the fading light caught along his collarbone, the curve of his shoulders, the strength in him that was as much in his heart as it was in his body. When you finally lifted your gaze, his dark eyes had already caught you.

A knowing smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth, playful but edged with something warmer. “You’re staring,” he teased, his voice low, carrying that gentle rasp that always betrayed the long days and longer nights.

You arched an eyebrow, meeting him with your own smirk as you leaned back on your hands. “Maybe I am.”

Cordell chuckled, the sound easy, disarming, before tugging a clean shirt over his head. Yet his eyes never left yours, as if he’d caught something in your stare he wasn’t ready to let go of.