CHAPTER FIFTEEN
TARA RAN BEHIND BOONE, not quite catching up even though she was moving faster than she ever had before, even as a child. Her heart pounded and adrenaline raced through her system like a fast-acting drug, causing her head to reel, and the most elemental of fears thrummed inside her.
Boone rounded a bend up ahead, both dogs flashing at his heels like streaks of furry light, and, impossibly, Tara quickened her pace.
A boat, rickety and definitely not seaworthy. And in it her stepdaughters, the treasures of her soul, in obvious danger.
She heard a thin cry then, riding the wind, and stumbled, nearly fell, covering the rough ground, which had begun to tip and sway under her feet.
She kept running, blindly now, praying a one-word prayer under her breath, syncing it with her heartbeat. Please—please—please...
Boone shouted something just as Tara reached the scene, already kicking off his boots.
It was all surreal to her, like some horrible vision, a nightmare playing out in the bright, clean light of a Montana morning.
The concrete spillway resembled a small dam to Tara, though it must have been twelve feet high, and water thundered over its top, foamy white. Below it, in the midst of a whirlpool, a vortex, a black hole, Erin clung to what remained of the ancient rowboat, and to her sister, who looked as boneless as a rag doll.
Tara screamed.
Boone was already in the water, fighting his way through the noise and the foam and the parts of dead trees, swirling, caught at the edge of the whirlpool’s orbit. For all his strength, he had to fight his way through.
Finally reaching the overturned boat, Boone curved an arm around Elle, held her firmly, tossed his dark head once to shake away the water and clear his vision. With his free hand, he gripped Erin’s shoulder.
Tara, caught in some strange time freeze, broke free, ran down the bank.
“Stay where you are, Tara!” Boone yelled over the roar of the spillway. “My phone’s on the ground somewhere—call 9-1-1. Now!”
Something in his tone reached past Tara’s hysteria into the calm part of her mind, submerged until then. She searched the muddy grass, found his phone, flipped it open and made the call.
A woman named Becky told her to hang on; an ambulance was on its way.
Tara closed the phone, sank to her knees, watching as Boone spoke to Erin, his words lost in the din of the Big Sky River, spilling into the churning pool. She nodded, her blond hair slicked back from her face, and when Boone turned, supporting a now-stirring Elle, keeping her head above the water, Erin let go of the remains of the rowboat. After an instant’s hesitation, she flung her arms around Boone’s neck and clung to him.
Slowly, Boone made his way back toward the bank, toward life and breath and safety. Once or twice, waking, terrified and confused, Elle struggled in his grasp, but he held her and, with just his legs and his left arm, battled the wild water that might so easily have taken them all under.
Tara was on her feet again when Boone reached out and grabbed hold of a clump of tree roots, looked up at her as she reached for Elle.
“Be careful,” he said hoarsely. “I think she might have some broken bones.”
Tara moved past her panic, shoving it into the background to be dealt with later, and pulled her half-conscious stepdaughter onto dry ground. The dogs, fitful, hovered nearby, giving the occasional yelp.
Boone hauled himself and Erin out of the water. A siren sounded in the near distance.
Tara knelt, sopping wet even though she hadn’t gone in, held a shivering Erin in one arm and a moaning Elle in the other.
Boone’s young sons appeared, still in their pajamas and barefoot, drawn by the shriek of the approaching ambulance. It came to a screeching halt up the hill, and two EMTs, a man and a woman, neither of whom Tara had ever seen before, hurried down the slope, gear in hand, sidestepping.
Boone was on his feet by then, breathing hard and fast and deep.
Explanations were made while the EMTs checked both Elle and Erin for injuries.
“Dad?” Tara heard one of Boone’s boys say in a shaky voice.
Boone went to his sons, but his gaze was locked with Tara’s.
Thank you wasn’t enough, she thought, shaken, but that would have to be figured out later. Elle needed X-rays and both girls were in shock. Tara scrambled up the hill, her arm supporting a still-mobile Erin, though Elle was strapped to a stretcher by then.
She and Erin climbed into the back of the ambulance once Elle had been loaded inside and secured, and as the doors closed, Tara caught a glimpse of Boone Taylor, dripping wet, holding Fletcher in one arm while Griffin clung to his wet pant leg, wide-eyed with fear.
“It hurts,” Elle whispered, “it hurts, it hurts...”
“I know,” Tara whispered back, holding the child’s hand, smoothing tendrils of soaked hair away from her forehead. “Hold on, sweetheart. Try to be strong. We’ll be at the clinic in a few minutes.”
Elle nodded, her face still ghastly pale. “Sorry...” she murmured, either fainting or falling asleep.
Tara wanted to scream again—wake up, wake up—but of course she didn’t. There was plenty of fear to go around—it was courage that was most needed. She looked at sweet Erin, kneeling on the other side of the stretcher, meeting Tara’s eyes.
“Are we going to be arrested?” she asked.
Tara made a sound, part laugh, part sob, so raw that it clawed painfully at her throat. “No, honey,” she hastened to say. “Of course not.”
Erin’s expression was soft and unfocused—only then did Tara realize the girl had lost her glasses. “We looked at a map on the internet,” she said, rotelike, staring off into an unseeable distance now. “We thought the river would take us far enough away that Dad couldn’t find us and make us go to that school....”
Tara’s heart clenched as painfully as if a strong hand had reached into her chest and locked around it mercilessly. The plan had been foolish, of course, wildly improbable and, needless to say, dangerous. But the twins were only twelve years old, after all, and they must have been desperate.
The next hour or so passed in a colorful blur—Erin’s wet clothes were stripped off and she was wrapped in warm blankets, while the initial medical exam and subsequent X-rays revealed a fracture in Elle’s left forearm that would require minor surgery, as well as a cast. Because she, too, was suffering from shock, Elle had to be stabilized before the operation could take place, so she was blanketed, like her sister, and a mild painkiller was administered.
Boone arrived, his hair still wet but wearing dry clothes, and it was all Tara could do not to run to him.
“The boys?” she asked softly, when he stepped into the small room where Tara kept vigil with both her stepdaughters.
“They’re at the office, with Becky and Scamp,” Boone replied. “Lucy, too.”
Tara felt a soft spilling sensation, balm to her fear-battered heart. He’d saved Elle’s and Erin’s lives, this man, risking his own in the process, and he’d even thought, in the aftermath, of Lucy’s well-being.
Whatever his reasons for handing over his very young sons to his sister to look after following Corrie’s death, Boone wasn’t anything like James Lennox.
“Thank you,” she said softly.
He cocked a weary grin at her, executed a half salute. “All in a day’s work,” he replied.
“Hardly,” she said.
Now that Elle and Erin were both resting comfortably, with a cheery young nurse to attend to them, Tara felt she could leave the room.
It was time to call James, not only because he had a right to know about the boating “accident,” but because his permission would be needed before Elle’s surgery could take place. Tara had no authority.
She and Boone stepped out into the corridor. Though referred to loosely as a hospital, the establishment was actually a clinic, exceptionally well equipped. Babies were delivered here, tonsils were removed, the odd appendectomy went down, but the seriously ill or injured, like Dawson McCullough, were always airlifted to a larger city with adequate facilities—Missoula, Boise, even Seattle.
It was one more thing to be grateful for, Tara thought distractedly. None of the E.R. staff had said anything about sending Elle away for treatment.
Boone grasped her shoulders there in the empty hallway and tilted his head to one side to look directly into Tara’s face. “What about you?” he asked. “Are you okay, Tara?”
“I’m just fine,” she told him, feeling a strange urge to kiss the cleft in Boone’s chin, snuggle into his arms, cling a little. “Color me very, very grateful, though, Sheriff Taylor.”
He chuckled, a reassuring sound, masculine and somehow soothing. “Is this the part where I say, ‘Aw, shucks, ma’am, it weren’t nothing’?”
“It was something, Boone. Without you, I wouldn’t even have found the girls in time, let alone managed to swim through all those currents and get them both back to shore.”
Clearly, Sheriff Boone Taylor was not very comfortable in the role of hero. The way he saw it, most likely, he’d done what anyone would do in the same situation. A crisis had arisen, and he’d handled it.
Tara sighed. “I’d better call their father,” she said. “He’s not going to be happy about this. Especially when he finds out they posted their big plan online beforehand—a lot of schools monitor things like that, especially with new applicants—and running away, successfully or not, ratchets up the legal-liability factor sky-high.”
“I could call him for you,” Boone offered solemnly. “Make it an official call.”
Tara actually considered taking that out—she was still pretty shaken up herself, after all—but after a few moments of thought, she shook her head no. This was her responsibility, not Boone’s.
Except she’d left her phone at home, too panicked after finding Erin and Elle missing from their room to remember the handy device. Luckily, she’d dressed as soon as she got out of bed, or she’d probably be standing here in her nightgown.
“Borrow your phone?” she asked.
Boone nodded, handed it to her.
She went outside, sat wearily on the rock surround of one of the clinic’s flower beds and searched her memory for James’s numbers—work, home, cell, etc. Nothing. She’d so rarely had reason to call her ex-husband.
In the end, she had to call Information, and the operator put her through to James’s office, where an assistant picked up. Tara identified herself, gave a short, faltering version of what had happened and asked to be put through to James.
Dr. Lennox, the assistant explained coolly, was already in transit, on his way to Montana to “collect” his children. Did he have the proper contact numbers?
Tara dredged them up, her mind sluggish now.
James was on his way. Damn.
And when he got to Parable, there would be hell to pay. Once he learned the whole story, he’d be furious at Tara, accuse her of being irresponsible, probably remove his daughters from her company—permanently—as soon as they could travel. And since he was a doctor, that would probably be allowed to happen sooner rather than later.
He’d whisk Elle and Erin away for good, and she’d be very fortunate indeed if she saw them again before they turned eighteen and could legally make such decisions for themselves.
And it would be six years until the twins came of age. By then, they might have been poisoned against their erstwhile stepmother, or simply have lost interest, young women busy with beginnings, with wide circles of friends, college and careers to plan, attractive guys asking for dates.
Tara set the borrowed cell in her lap, rested her elbows on the still-damp, mud-streaked knees of her jeans, and covered her face with both hands.
* * *
HOURS LATER, Boone and the boys stepped up onto Tara’s porch. Griffin and Fletcher both held balloons and bouquets, bought at the supermarket in town. Their faces were scrubbed and their hair and clothes were clean. All without any help from Opal, Boone thought drily.
Tara answered their knock, looking harried and so beautiful that Boone wondered if he’d always been in love with her, long before they met, even before Corrie.
“Hello,” she said, smiling at the boys.
“Can we see Elle and Erin?” Griffin asked earnestly. According to Boone’s source—namely, Becky—both twins had been released after Elle’s brief surgery and a little time in the recovery room.
Boone realized, albeit belatedly, that he should have insisted on waiting until tomorrow to pay a visit, instead of giving in to Griffin and Fletcher’s nonstop campaign to do it now. Witnessing the tail end of the rescue operation down at the spillway that morning the way they had, the kids had been jumpy all day, unable to concentrate in day camp, full of questions when Boone arrived at the community center to pick them up.
So they’d stopped for the flowers and balloons, spruced up at home and practically herded him next door, like a pair of minute wranglers driving cattle to market.
“We’ll come back if they’re resting,” Boone said awkwardly, feeling his neck redden around the collar of his crisp white shirt.
Tara’s smile was as bedazzling as a Montana sunrise, and she pushed open the screen door, shaking her head as she did so. “Elle and Erin will be glad to have company,” she said. “Come in, all of you.”
Lucy, the golden retriever, greeted the ever-present Scamp with a little more interest than usual, and he seemed to be beside himself at the compliment.
“The girls are in the living room, watching TV,” Tara said.
At this, the two boys rushed past her, balloons bobbing and bumping behind them, and the dogs, suddenly excited, leaped to join the noisy parade, barking gleefully.
Tara laughed at the ruckus, but her eyes were warm and solemn on Boone’s face. “Come in,” she repeated.
He couldn’t help remembering the last time he’d stepped over this threshold—was it only yesterday?—drunk on Tara’s kisses, her scent, the soft heat of her body.
Boone took off his hat and held it—subtly, he hoped—in front of his crotch. He had it bad, all right, but there was a lot to be settled, and nothing this important ought to be rushed. Just the same, it was all he could do not to ask her to marry him, right then and there.
“No sign of the ex yet?” Boone asked, following her through the house and into her kitchen, the heart of that old house.
The four kids were in the living room, all talking at once, while the dogs sang backup. The din was something to be relished as far as Boone was concerned—noise and children and dogs equaled life in his book.
Once inside the kitchen, Tara made a face and said, “No, but he’ll be here anytime.”
“Is there a plan?”
Tara trembled, sank into a chair at the table, as though her knees had gone weak. Did she still love this doctor-dude, Boone wondered? Or was she afraid of the man?
He sat down across from Tara, giving her space, and waited for her answer.
She shook her head again, the way she had at the front door when Boone had wanted to leave, come back later when things had calmed down a little.
Now, seeing her face, he was glad he hadn’t gone.
“No plan,” she said at last, after biting her lower lip for a few moments. “James called a little while ago, after his plane landed, and I told him what had happened.” She paused, swallowed, glanced nervously at the door, in case of eavesdroppers, then went on in a quiet voice. “Do you know what he said?” she asked.
Boone didn’t reply, figuring the question was rhetorical, since there was no way he could have known what Dr. James Lennox had to say.
Tara’s eyes filled with tears, but they were angry, defiant tears. “He said,” she whispered furiously, “that now everything was botched up because there’s some problem at the year-round boarding school he has picked out for the twins and he’s hitting a brick wall hiring a new nanny, too. Elle and Erin don’t have the best reputation in those circles, it seems. Now he’ll have to scramble to make other arrangements, and it’s all my fault.”
Boone cursed under his breath. “That was the man’s big concern?” he rasped. “That bringing the kids home and finding a sitter would disrupt his life?”
Tara nodded, swiping the moisture from her eyes with the backs of her hands. “He didn’t even ask how they were—if they were scared or in pain—not even how close they came to drowning. Instead, he yelled that he never should have let them come out to this ‘godforsaken wilderness’ in the first place—forgetting, of course, that it was his idea.”
“Sounds like he has quite a temper,” Boone said moderately, knowing he was on dangerous ground, given what he was about to ask. “Is he potentially violent, Tara? Would he hurt you or the girls?”
Tara immediately shook her head. “He’s not a monster, Boone,” she said, without a touch of defensiveness on her ex’s behalf. “But James is a selfish, egotistical, inconsiderate jerk.”
Boone grinned, partly because he was relieved. “Don’t hold back, now,” he teased. “Tell me what you really think.”
She smiled a tiny, fragile smile, ran a hand through her brown hair, which looked attractively rumpled. “Once upon a time,” she responded, “I thought the same thing about you.”
Something inside Boone took flight and soared, wheeling high overhead with the big sky for a backdrop. “And now?”
Her answer stunned him. “And now I love you,” she said.
Boone went light-headed. He blinked, tugged at one ear, not trusting his own hearing. “Did you just say—?”
She laughed this time. “I just said that I love you,” she confirmed.
“Since when?” Boone countered, remembering all the times she’d harangued him about his yard and his double-wide and his duty, as a public official, to set a good example for other home owners.
“I’m not sure,” she answered, “but what happened this morning cleared up all my doubts.”
Boone opened his mouth, closed it again. “I never expected to love another woman after Corrie,” he heard himself say. “But I do believe I love you, Tara Kendall, chickens and all.”
Her eyes lit up and she reached across the table to squeeze his hand. Obviously, with all that was going on, the celebratory sex would have to wait awhile, but the promise of it was right there in the room with them, just the same.
“I have a confession to make,” she said, after a short, pulsing silence that caused about a million nerves to batter Boone’s skin from the inside.
“What?” He hardly dared to ask the question.
“I’m a fraud,” she confided. “I’ve never killed a single chicken. Around here, they die of old age.”
Boone took that in. Then he threw back his head and laughed, and it felt so damn good, leaching some of the tension from his neck and shoulders.
“When you asked me to donate some poultry for the fundraising over at Opal’s church, I practically lost it, right then and there.”
“I guess I didn’t notice that you were upset,” Boone noted mischievously, “what with your throwing yourself at me and all.”
She blushed then, swatted at him.
Outside, the chickens put up a fuss, and Tara’s expression changed instantly. “He’s here,” she said, pushing back her chair, shooting to her feet.
“Take it easy,” Boone said, taking the time to enfold her in his arms, rest his chin on top of her head. “We’ll deal with him together. You and me.”
He felt her soften with relief. Then she lifted her chin, squared her shoulders and said, “Here goes.”
* * *
TARA HAD BEEN dreading James’s arrival for most of the day, but now that Boone had her back, she felt braver.
Disgust twisted James’s handsome face when the chickens clustered around his rental car, squawking and pecking at the tires. He rolled down the driver’s side window and stuck his head out to holler, “Are these things dangerous?”
Tara, standing on the porch, stifled a laugh. Boone stood quietly behind her, as solid and strong as the Great Wall of China, and said nothing at all.
“No,” Tara called back. “They’re chickens.”
Looking doubtful, James pushed open his car door and stepped out gingerly onto the ground, wincing a little. Tara had always considered her ex-husband a very good-looking man, with his lean frame and sandy hair, but now, in proximity to Boone Taylor, he seemed ineffectual, almost effete.
Would he have jumped into the dangerous waters at the base of the spillway to save his daughters?
Probably, Tara reflected, because he was their father, after all. But she couldn’t picture it. Conversely, the image of Boone fighting his way to Elle and Erin, rescuing them and then fighting his way back, would be engraved in her mind and on her heart forever.
Not surprisingly, Elle and Erin had heard the exchange and stepped out onto the porch. Elle’s right arm was in a gleaming white cast, already emblazoned with Erin’s and Griffin’s autographs and a smiley face that was almost certainly Fletcher’s.
“We don’t want to go back with you,” Elle said boldly.
Erin, standing shoulder to shoulder with her twin, nodded agreement.
“Well,” James bit out, keeping his distance, “you’ve certainly ruined any chance of attending Briarwood.”
“Good,” Elle replied. “Because Erin and I want to stay here, with Tara.”
James’s gaze shifted to Boone, sized him up, swung back to Tara. He let out a long, exhausted sigh and shoved away some of the chickens with the side of one now-dusty oxford. “It’s been a very long day,” he said, no doubt thinking of his travel ordeal, rather than what the girls had been through. “I have a hotel room in town. Maybe we could talk all this over tomorrow?”
Tara felt a slight easing inside, the faintest flicker of hope.
“That sounds like a good idea,” she said. James hadn’t taken a single step toward his daughters. No hugs, no kisses, no declarations like “I love you” or “Thank God you’re safe.”
He’d had a long day.
As an afterthought, James took in Elle and Erin. “You’re all right?” he asked lamely, the car door already open so he could make a speedy exit.
James was ever so good at exits. It was sticking around, sticking things out, that came hard to him.
“Yes,” the twins replied.
James got back into his rental car, turned it slowly around, scattering chickens in all directions and raising a storm of good old country dust, and drove away.
Elle and Erin went back into the house, evidently uninterested.
So did Griffin and Fletcher and the two dogs.
Which left Tara and Boone and the chickens.
Boone turned to Tara, cupped her chin gently in one hand and lifted her face for his kiss. “Everything’s going to be all right,” he told her.
He was all man, she thought, as strong and solid as the mountains surrounding Parable on all sides, sheltering the little community from all kinds of storms and mishaps.
Tara nodded. “I believe you’re right,” she replied. “Not all the time, of course.”
Boone laughed, kissed her forehead lightly. “Of course,” he agreed. “I’m not going anywhere, Tara. When you need me, I’ll be right here.”
She knew that was true—that Boone would be there for her, for Griffin and Fletcher, for any children they might have together.
“This will take time,” she told him.
“I know,” he said. “There’s a lot to figure out.”
A few minutes later, Boone had gathered his boys and Scamp and they’d all gotten into the police car—which had drawn a few curious glances from James during his brief visit—and headed for home.
Tara lingered on the porch for a few moments, her heart full of love for Boone, for his little boys and her stepdaughters and both the dogs. Impossibly, she felt an equal measure of sorrow, because James would probably take the girls away with him, and their absence would be a soul-wound, one she might never get over.
She went back into the house, found the girls in the living room with Lucy. They’d turned off the TV, mercifully, and Elle was starting to fade from fatigue and pain, since her medications were wearing off.
“Will Dad let us stay?” Erin asked, her voice small and tremulous. She was wearing her spare glasses, but they were outdated and sat crookedly on her nose.
“I don’t know,” Tara admitted, because it was important to be honest. She sank into an armchair, sighed and swept up both girls in a pointed glance. “What you two did today was stupid,” she added. “You could have been killed, both of you, and if you ever, ever do anything like that again, I’ll—I’ll—”
She’d what?
The girls were homeward bound, for all practical intents and purposes. In a day or two, they’d be out of her life, probably forever, and it wasn’t as if she’d be able to ground them via email or text.
“I’ll be very disappointed,” Tara finally finished. “Because I love you, both of you, with my whole heart.”
“But Daddy has all the power,” Erin supplied wisely. Sadly.
Out of the mouths of babes.
“Yes,” Tara answered. “He’s calling the shots, and we have to accept that.”
Elle’s lower lip jutted out a little ways. “I wish we’d made it all the way to the river,” she fussed. “By now, we’d probably be in Idaho at least, maybe even in Oregon.”
Tara suppressed a smile even as she blinked back more tears. Tears. What good were they?
“Must I go over—again—the many dangers of running away?” she asked, sternly loving. “There are some really bad people out there, remember?”
It was a shame the world could be such a dangerous place, but the truth was the truth. All manner of creeps lurked in bus depots and in train stations, down-at-the-heels cafés and even shelters, waiting to take advantage of young, innocent girls hungry for what they perceived as kindness.
Instead of arguing, Elle and Erin joined Tara in the armchair, squeezing in on either side of her, snuggling close, reminding her of the way chicks nestled under the wings of hens, mistakenly believing that nothing could hurt them there.
She kissed Elle’s temple and then Erin’s.
“How about supper?” she asked gently.
Elle countered with an unrelated question. “You do like Boone Taylor, don’t you? Like we said before?”
Tara sighed. “Yes,” she said, resigned. “I like him.”
Erin’s eyes were big behind her extra glasses. “He’s pretty strong,” she said.
“And brave,” Elle capitulated.
“Griffin and Fletcher are lucky he’s their dad,” Erin added.
Tara merely nodded, too choked up to reply.
* * *
THE WHOLE THING was none of his business, Boone concluded, but he knew James and Tara were facing each other across a back table at the Butter Biscuit Café that very morning, and it made him uneasy.
To make matters worse, Treat McQuillan, now Parable’s official chief of police, was hanging around Boone’s office, prattling on about how there’d be some changes around this town now that he was in charge.
In charge.
Boone let that one pass, since he was mainly concerned with Tara and her meeting with her ex-husband. If the man had a shred of decency in him, he’d let Tara raise his daughters, since he clearly didn’t want the job himself, and go on with his life. The problem was, Lennox didn’t strike Boone as the honorable type.
Still, if he was as self-serving as he seemed, the good doctor might see granting Tara legal guardianship of the twins as a plus, since he’d be free to do whatever he damn well pleased. But there was a hitch: Tara had clearly wounded Lennox’s masculine pride at some point, and he enjoyed spiting her.
“Are you listening to me?” former deputy McQuillan demanded, stepping into Boone’s personal space and thereby risking a mouth full of knuckles.
“Actually,” Boone answered, “no. I’m not. Most of what you say goes in one ear and out the other—or haven’t you noticed that before?”
“I’m entitled to respect!” McQuillan flared, going red around the jowls.
“That’s where we disagree,” Boone said quietly. “Respect is earned, and nobody—but nobody—is ‘entitled’ to it, including you.”
Treat looked apoplectic for a moment, then he turned on one heel, spitting mad, and stormed out of the office, slamming the door behind him. Both Becky and the dog jumped at the sound.
“That went well,” Becky said sweetly.
“Isn’t it time for your coffee break or something?” Boone retorted.
She made a big drama of looking at her watch, one of those small, old-fashioned ones with the stretchy band she’d probably had since she was twelve. “Darned if it isn’t,” she sang out. She stood up behind her desk, reached for her purse and pranced toward the door. “See you when I see you,” she said, and disappeared.
Boone growled under his breath, dragging his gaze over the empty cells on the other side of the room. With McQuillan policing the town, they’d probably be full by nightfall, holding dangerous nursing-home escapees who’d pinched a banana over at the supermarket, or Boy Scouts caught crossing against the one traffic light in the whole town.
Scamp looked up at him, gave a sympathetic whimper and wagged his tail once.
The door opened again and Boone turned, expecting to see McQuillan, wanting to rant some more, or Mayor Hale with another demand for Hutch Carmody’s arrest.
But it was Tara standing there, her face glowing. She clutched a paper in her hand, some sort of document, and waved it like a flag of triumph.
“James is going to let the girls stay with me—indefinitely!” she crowed. “Maggie Landers happened to be in the café at the same time we were, and she drew up a preliminary custody agreement then and there!”
If Tara was happy, Boone was happy.
He crossed to her, lifted her by the waist and spun her around in a laughing circle. “How did that happen?” he asked, setting her down but still holding her close against him.
“I was right about the social-media thing. The school isn’t going to take Elle and Erin because they’re afraid they’ll run away again.” She paused, sobered a little. “They’re probably right about that, I’m afraid.”
“But the bottom line is the twins are staying right here in Parable,” Boone supplied.
Tara nodded happily. “Indefinitely,” she said, tearing up a little.
And then he kissed her.
She melted against him. “I’ve never made love in a jail cell,” she crooned after the kiss.
Boone laughed. “I’d call that a good thing,” he said. “And I don’t want to be a wet blanket or anything, but this isn’t going to be your first time.”
Tara pouted prettily. “Don’t you want me?”
“Like a brush fire wants dry grass,” Boone answered huskily, “but it’ll have to wait.”
There was no telling how long the wait would be, since they’d agreed that lovemaking was out when the kids were around, which was pretty much all the time, at least until after they were married. And Boone was partial to beds when it came to sex, though a grassy meadow or the backseat of a car—a private car, not his cruiser—would probably fit the bill, too.
“Slow and steady,” Boone murmured, kissing Tara’s nose. “That’s how we’re going to play this, lady.”
Tara twinkled up at him, her arms around his neck, her hips grinding slightly against him.
No hat was going to cover this hard-on.
“That’s how I like it,” she teased, her tone sultry, her scent making him light-headed. “Slow and steady.”
“Then I’m your man,” Boone told her.
She smiled and kissed him, quickly but with sizzle. “Keep that in mind,” she answered. “At least for the next fifty years or so.”