Last updated on 02/11/2026
He’s built walls out of scars… but she slipped through.
Anson Sutter came to Valor Ridge to disappear. The former Navy EOD tech spends his days shoeing horses, tending his skittish wolfhound, Bramble, and pretending his burn scars stop at the surface.
They don’t.
Every scar became another brick in the walls he lives behind, and only one person has ever breached them–Maggie, his pen pal. He built his new life around the hope she sent him, falling for her one letter at a time, knowing he’d never deserve to meet her in person. Men like him don’t get happy endings. And women like Maggie don’t fall for ex-cons hiding at a ranch for broken veterans.
She builds sanctuaries for others… but now she needs one herself.
Magnolia “Maggie” Rowe restores broken places for a living, her DIY show making her a reluctant celebrity. But fame comes with a a stalker who’s turned obsession into something vicious. And when he proves he can reach her anywhere, she runs to the man she trusts Anson.
But the man she finds in Montana is nothing like the gentle voice from her letters. He’s guarded and gruff, already retreating behind the scars he thinks define him. And her arrival may have drawn her stalker straight to Valor Ridge, threatening the quiet life Anson has barely begun to reclaim.
Can a love built on paper survive a threat written in blood?
To protect her, Anson will have to face the fire again.
To love her, he’ll have to embrace the scars he’s spent years hiding.
Embracing His Scars continues the emotional journey of the Valor Ridge series with a slow-burn, pen-pal-to-lovers romance. If you crave scarred protector heroes, brave heroines who refuse to break, and a found family that stands between danger and their own, this story will hold you captive from the first page to the last.
Absolute love–and worth the wait! (Not that I didn’t love Walker and Jo’s story–I did! But the final scenes at the end of each book that tease the next one are BRUTAL, and having a different book come out before this one made me almost unbearably anxious for what was chasing Maggie…)
Anson and Maggie’s story was a hard read, at times–they had a six year slow burn(!) going on, and the Anson of his letters seemed like a totally different guy than Anson IRL so much of the time and Maggie didn’t know what to do about it. He really needed to get his head out of his posterior, and good grief did he take his own sweet time doing it. Bramble of course was the bestest boy ever, taking messages back and forth like and champ and using the power of tiny, helpless kittens to bring his people together.
Yes–dogs and cats this time around (not for the first time, but they do play a bigger role than in Nessie and Jax’s book)–plus the horses, of course. No complaints here! 🙂
I absolutely love how the guys (and women, now) of Valor Ridge constantly show up for each other, offering both unflinching support and swift kicks in the butt as needed. We get some #couplegoals updates here which will have me smiling for days, so as usual I will say that this one *could* stand on its own but really works better if you’ve read them all in order and can appreciate everything that is going on with the side characters as well as our MCs.
And of course Ms Burrows leaves us with a heck of a cliffhanger for the next book–Bear’s–which I need to read yesterday, please! 😉
Rating: 4 1/2 stars / A
I voluntarily reviewed an Advance Reader Copy of this book.
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