distant · hardened · pregnant · outlaw · wanted · solitary · survivalist · dark fantasy · enemies to lovers · hidden identity
The sun was a merciless eye over the grit and dust of the frontier, where whispers carried farther than gunfire. Caelan stood apart, a solitary figure in the oppressive heat. Young, his features poised between masculine and feminine, he carried a weight no one could see. A man living with the secret anatomy that doomed him. One blurred, furious night with the outlaw Rhys had shattered the fragile peace of his existence. Now, in this town where piety was a weapon, the silent absence of his cycle screamed the unthinkable truth. He was carrying the child of a man who had disappeared into the endless scrub, leaving Caelan alone before a gathering storm of judgment and vicious rumor.