Prologue
His eyes are what first caught my attention.
My mother used to tell me to focus on people’s hearts—what’s inside matters most—she said it like she came up with that line on her own. Apparently, she never caught sight of a pair of deep brown, please-let-me-get-lost-in-you eyes. If she had, she would have known that the eyes are what link your soul to someone, because one look into them and I just knew…
Or maybe what ended up actually getting me was his smile. Because, God, could that boy smile. Those straight white teeth and dimples that pressed deep into his cheeks. The way the skin next to his eyes scrunched. It was all so beautiful.
Yes, beautiful. The word is not reserved only for women. I promise you, he was beautiful—all the way to the core.
Everything about him felt natural and safe. He made Fairbanks feel warm, even in the dead of winter when the temperature dropped far below zero.
You know, now that I think about it… Actually, maybe, it wasn’t the eyes or the smile that got me. Perhaps it had been the blush that crept up his neck and into his ears when someone asked about what he loved most about science and planes.
What’s there not to love? He asked—not answered. I love it all. It’s hard to say what I love most about something. Then he’d look at me with a half-grin and say Ask me what I love about Em. And I’d blush like you’ve never seen someone blush before. I swear, from my forehead to my ankles… Turned redder than a tomato.
Someone would ask the question he told them to ask, and he always said the same thing. Every. Single. Time.
What’s there not to love?
And everyone who listened in on the conversation would laugh, but I’d sit there shaking my head at him.
He made it absolutely impossible to not love him.
And, so, that’s what I did.
I’m going to tell you a story, and you’re either going to hate it or love it… or maybe a little bit of both if I manage to do my job properly.
But at the end of this, don’t say I didn’t warn you. All is not fair in love and war.
