It was all over. Dugan’s organization was in shambles and he was begging to take a deal. No trial. Pearl was free to go.
As was Liza.
“Heard you were looking for me.”
He turned to find Liza leaning against one of the trees lining Main Street. In fact, it was the very tree he’d been stuck in the day he’d first met her.
She caught him looking up, and her lips curved. “Seems like a long time ago, doesn’t it?”
He nodded. She did that fairly often—read his mind. It had stopped surprising him. In fact, he found he rather liked it. “In some ways, it does.” He stepped closer to her. “In other ways, I still feel like I’ve barely gotten to know you.” He pulled her into his arms.
“What other ways?” she asked, sliding her arms around his waist.
He felt that jolt of pleasure he always felt when her body molded to his. He didn’t bother to hide it. “Like that. Every single time, it does that to me. That still feels new.”
She looked up at him, a considering look on her face. “Maybe it will always be that way.” She pressed her face to his chest. “I feel it, too.”
Her voice had grown uncharacteristically soft. His heart skipped several beats. He’d wanted this moment, but he wasn’t prepared, hadn’t thought of what he’d say. But it was likely to be his best chance, so he took it. “Maybe we should find out.”
She looked up at him, but before she could say anything, he had to tell her. “I heard from Quin tonight. Dugan won’t be going to trial. They had him cold, so he took a deal. It’s all over.”
Her eyes lit up and she pulled out of his arms to clap her hands. “Pearl is a free woman?”
“She’s always been a free woman.”
“You know what I mean. Oh, I can’t wait to tell her.”
“She knows. I called at the house.” Where she was watching his mother’s birds. Another battle he’d lost. Right at the moment, looking into Liza’s shining eyes, he didn’t mind so much. Although it should horrify him to think he was actually getting used to being ganged up on by the women in his life.
“Is she staying?” Liza asked. “Do you know? I have to talk to her.”
Dylan grabbed her waving hands and pulled her close, tucking them beneath his arms. “She’ll still be here tomorrow. You can talk to her then. Right now I want you to talk to me.”
She smiled up at him, then must have seen something in his eyes, because her smile faded. “What’s wrong?”
“That’s just it. Nothing. Except you leaving. That would be wrong.” She started to talk, but he shook his head. “Let me get this out.”
She merely looked at him, but nodded.
“You told me you were looking for something to fulfill yourself. Well, I don’t know if you’ve felt it, or noticed it, but this town sure has. You’ve made a place for yourself here, Liza. Just ask anyone. In fact, I’ve never seen someone who could waltz into a place and claim it as thoroughly as you have Canyon Springs.”
“Thank you,” she said, but he couldn’t read anything else into her tone. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“I agree with you, about the town. I like it here. I like the people here. When I help them, it feels…I don’t know, more personal. Meaningful. I’d like to find a way to do that in a more official capacity.” When his eyebrows lifted, she smiled and said, “I’m still working out the details.”
His heart, which had stopped momentarily, started again, in double time. She was staying. Had he heard her right? He couldn’t be sure, for his pulse was thundering in his ears.
“But, more importantly,” she continued, “I’m starting to build friendships here. The real life kind I’ve only felt with Natalie. I like it.” Liza’s smile turned wistful. “Remember when I told you I was envious of your extended family, of having so many people connected to you that you could turn to? Well, that’s sort of what I feel I can have here. Not merely business contacts, but people I actually care about, who might actually care about me.”
“Then you’re staying.” He wanted to hear her say the words, so he could start believing his best wish had come true.
“That depends. You never answered me.”
“On what?” He tried not to sound panicked. He sounded panicked. “What didn’t I make clear?”
She laid her hands on his shoulders, then lifted the tips of her fingers to brush at the sides of his face. “You said I claimed the town as mine. Although I think they’ve claimed me just as thoroughly. Was that your only concern—about me abandoning the people I’ve started to help here?”
“No. They could live without you, if they had to.” He pulled her hands together and clasped them in his, then kissed her fingertips. “But I can’t. You claimed me just as thoroughly, perhaps more so. I know you’re going through big life changes, Liza. But I want to be one of them. In fact, I want to be the main one. I’m finding I’m selfish like that where you’re concerned. Normally I’m a patient man, but with you, I don’t want to be. I love you. I want all of you, all the time. And I don’t want to wait.”
“Well, that dovetails nicely with my plans then,” she said, her smile bright, but her voice a bit wobbly.
“It does, does it?” he asked, his heart as wobbly as her smile. But every other part of him was racing ahead. “And here I thought I was doing the planning, the asking.”
“Are you? Are you asking me? I could have sworn you were telling me.”
“I’ve learned with you that telling is sometimes more effective than asking.”
Her brows arched and she tried to pull her hands away.
He held on tight. “You know I’m right.”
She pulled again.
“Don’t make me use the cuffs,” he warned, knowing she could see the teasing glint in his eyes. Just as he knew she’d give it right back to him. He wasn’t disappointed.
She pushed up against him and moved her hips just right. “Maybe I’d enjoy that, Officer.” She wiggled a little and enjoyed the hell out of the tight groan she got from him. “I did the last time, remember?”
He could barely string words together. She did that to him, too. God bless her. “Yeah.” It was all he could manage. How did she make her hips do that, anyway?
“So, why don’t you take me home and tell me what else we’re going to be doing for, oh, the next forty or fifty years?”
“I seem to recall you telling me once that I didn’t need to drag you all the way up the mountain to have fun with you. That our pleasure taking didn’t have to be so private.” He spun her around and pulled her up tight against him, then pressed his lips just below her ear. “And now we’ll have plenty of time to play at home. Years.”
“Oh?” Her breathing was just a little shallow, a little quick.
Keeping her off guard was a real challenge. One he hoped he was up to for, oh, the next forty or fifty years. Someone had to be. “Did I mention how desperately in love with you I am?”
“I think maybe you mentioned something about that.” She tried to wiggle those hips against him again. “Desperate though, huh?” She made a little purring sound and shifted closer.
He managed to shift away just in time. “Oh no, you don’t. Not this time.” He slipped back until the shadows beneath the tree swallowed them up. Holding her hands in one of his, he used the other to slip his tie off.
“What are you doing?”
He looped the tie around her wrists, then pulled them over her head and looped the other end over a low branch.
She tensed, but didn’t pull away. “You wouldn’t.”
He wondered if she could see his grin in the dark. “I would have asked you up in the tree, but as I recall, you’re not a climber.”
“Dylan,” she yelped as he began unbuttoning the top of her dress. She was squirming, but not trying to get away from his reach. “Anyone could walk by.” The excitement was clear in her voice.
“Then I guess you’re just going to have to be really quiet.”
Whatever she might have said died on a low hiss as he pulled one puckered nipple into his mouth.
“Dear God, you always taste so damn good.”
“I’d taste even better at home in your house.”
“Our house.” He closed his fingertips around her other nipple and continued to taste the first one. “And you taste just fine no matter where we are.”
“Dylan, please—”
“Thank you, I think I will.” He slid his hands beneath her dress and drew his palms along her thighs. “What surprises do you have for me tonig— Dear God.”
She chuckled then, but he didn’t mind the little self-satisfied noise. He was too intent on crouching down and taking advantage of the nothing she wore beneath her dress.
“I thought you might like…” The rest came out in a long, low moan. “Have I mentioned how much I love you?”
He stood up and quickly unlooped her from the branch. “In fact, I think you neglected to ever let that slip.” He tried to sound nonchalant, teasing. But the fact of the matter was, they were words he’d been dying to hear. And they’d sounded way better than even in his best fantasy. And he’d had…oh, one or ten.