The Miles We Carry Forward: A Contemporary Romance

She walks alone.That is how Claire rebuilt herself. And it is how she intends to finish.After leaving Damascus without a goodbye, Claire moves north on the Appalachian Trail with the efficiency she has perfected: early starts, long miles, no attachments. The trail rewards discipline, and Claire knows how to disappear into routine. Forward motion is clean. Silence is safe. Needing no one has always felt like strength.Then Graham keeps showing up.The same shelters. The same water sources. The same steady pace, mile after mile.He does not push. He does not pry. He does not try to fix what she has not offered. He simply walks - present, capable, and quietly aware in a way that unsettles Claire more than overt attention ever could.As rain, heat, hunger, and distance test her resolve, Claire is forced to confront a harder truth than exhaustion: solitude may protect her, but it can also become another way to disappear. And proximity - practical, unremarkable, and impossible to ignore - has a way of revealing what she has been refusing to name.The Miles We Carry Forward is a slow-burn, emotionally grounded Appalachian Trail romance about restraint, trust, and the daily choice to keep walking in the same direction.No dramatic rescues. No grand declarations. Just two adults learning that autonomy and intimacy do not have to cancel each other out.Perfect for readers who love: - Slow-burn romance with emotional depth - Trail-authentic Appalachian Trail settings - Mature characters and midlife emotional realism - Low-heat, high-intimacy love stories - Stories where restraint is strength - and choosing someone is an act of courageEach book in the Northbound Hearts series follows a different couple, but the emotional journey moves north with the trail, from Georgia to Maine.The trail keeps moving. So does the heart.

Pagina's: 239, Paperback, Independently published