Too Old to Be a Crush

Marin has spent years rebuilding a lighthouse and a reputation strong enough to carry an entire town’s expectations. She knows how to lead meetings, steady budgets, and keep the work moving even when people complain. What she doesn’t know how to do anymore is want something for herself without feeling like she has to apologize for it.

Cole doesn’t arrive like a reckless crush. He arrives like quiet certainty. He sees the woman behind the responsibility, and he doesn’t treat her desire like a crisis to be hidden. Their connection is adult, consensual, and real, but in a town addicted to optics, “real” becomes dangerous the moment someone decides to turn it into a weapon.

When rumors begin to spread and pressure moves from whispers into institutions, Marin is forced to choose how she will survive. She can shrink to protect everyone else’s comfort, or she can hold the line with boundaries, documentation, and the kind of truth you only need to say once.

Too Old to Be a Crush is a contemporary age-gap romance about dignity under scrutiny, love that refuses to be shamed into secrecy, and a woman learning that she doesn’t have to disappear to be respected.