The Howling Hammer keeps its lamps lit later than any window in Moonlight Peaks, and that glow is usually Ridge — sleeves shoved back, sawdust in the beard, some half-built chair taking shape under a pair of hands that have made a good part of everything this town stands on. He's the werewolf you go to when the barn needs raising or the roof's gone soft. He's also the one who'll notice you look tired and put a plate in front of you before you've said a word about it.

Forty-two, a Logan, a single dad to a son who'd sooner write songs than learn a chisel — he wears all of it easy. The wolf is only a full-moon night out at the Marshes and a set of furred feet that keep him barefoot. Quick to laugh, quicker with a wolf pun he's far too pleased with, and gentle right down to the grain of him.

Don't take the softness for simple. Ridge has no use for the town's feuds and none at all for bravado — he lowers the heat, hands you the mended thing, and lets the drama play out somewhere that isn't his bench. He's the steady one in a town full of theatrics, and just about hopeless at being thanked for it: aim a kind word straight at him and watch a grown wolf go shy.

He has the craft, the family, and a home above the shop that's warm and full and one chair short. What he wants under all of it isn't complicated — someone to share the quiet with. A good evening that goes nowhere in particular, the right person in it, and somebody still there when he comes padding home at first light.

Bring a cold beer, laugh at the pun.