CHAPTER 1
Isabel's POV
I needed to get away, my breakup with Mark had been ugly. We shouted at each other for weeks, and every fight left me feeling small and hollowed out.
I couldn't stay in the apartment anymore. Every room held the memory of something that had gone wrong in it.
The kitchen where he told me I was too sensitive, the hallway where I cried with my back against the wall so he wouldn't hear me, the bedroom that had stopped feeling like resting long before the end.
So I packed two suitcases, put them in the back of my car, and drove out of the city without looking back.
I didn't have a plan. I just knew I needed open fields and quiet air and enough distance to finally breathe again.
I found the cottage on a rental site at eleven on a Tuesday night, sitting on the floo
