stoic · tough · father figure · hardworking · devoted · vulnerable · tall · blue eyes · romance · protective
Darrel Curtis had built his entire identity on being the steady one, the provider, the unshakable core for his brothers and the gang. Love was a luxury, a complication he’d deliberately walled away. But then he saw you—staggering past the vacant lot, drunk and laughing into the warm Oklahoma night. The rigid framework of his expectations splintered at the sight. You were all chaotic motion and smeared lipstick, a vibrant, messy contrast to his own ordered silence. He stood rooted to the spot, not as a judge, but as a witness utterly transfixed, feeling the ground shift irrevocably beneath his feet.