Ashley stood on the porch under the overhang wanting to step down the stairs and explore the beautiful property, but fear gripped her whole body like a vise and froze her in place. Mia stood beside her. She didn’t move, just stared out at the yard like she had all the time in the world and had no intention of going anywhere. Her attention to every little sound and sight eased Ashley enough to make her take that first step to real freedom.

She stepped down the first tread, then the next, and all the way down to the path Beck must have shoveled clear while she’d taken a shower this morning. She stood in the cold and sun, her face raised to the sky more blue than gray clouds now. She stared at the massive expanse, sucked in a lungful of crisp air, and just breathed.

This was the first time she truly felt free.

“How long’s it been since you were outside?” Mia’s gentle tone coaxed her to open up.

The account she typed into Beck’s computer took everything she had to put into words how devastating her experience had been, but talking to Mia about the more mundane things that took their toll on her seemed easier and harder at the same time.

“A long time.” She breathed through the pain that admission caused her. So many simple things taken away from her. “He mostly only let me out at night. I have a feeling he had people at the house, the cleaning people, gardeners, others tending to the horses and cattle during the day. I never saw anyone after he made me disappear, except for the people he wanted me to see from the secret passageways. But I know the workers were there because of the fresh-cut flowers and the beautiful meals laid out on the table.”

“Meals you never got to eat,” Mia guessed, nodding toward Ashley’s stick legs.

“Sometimes. But I had to earn it. And even then, I barely got a few bites down before he took it away or dragged me back upstairs for . . .” She couldn’t choke out the words. The humiliation and punishment he subjected her to tasted bitter and vile, turning her stomach.

“Did Beck tell you Caden stood me up twice for our first date?”

Ashley appreciated the change of subject. Mia started down the path, her gaze straight ahead as she went on, expecting Ashley to follow. She did, because she wanted to know . . . “Why did you give him another chance after that?”

Mia glanced over, a sweet grin tugging at her lips. “Our aunts are a couple.”

“That complicates things, I guess.” Ashley knew many gay couples, but her friends Sophia and Lara made her jealous. Their connection and love so deep, you couldn’t help but acknowledge how special and rare it was for others. She’d wanted something that extraordinary in her life, so deep and true, she couldn’t live without it, or the man who gave her that kind of peace, connection, and love.

The familiar tingle danced over her skin. She turned to the house and spotted the outline of Beck standing in the window watching over her, sending a wave of warmth through her heart.

She warned it to stop hoping for impossible things.

“The aunts begged me to understand Caden’s work sometimes took over his life and it really wasn’t his fault. They conspired to get us together, but even they were exasperated with Caden’s deplorable behavior. He made up for it though. Even though the date ended with our kidnapping and Beck almost shooting me, then shooting a drug dealer dead—it started off so good.”

Ashley couldn’t help the smile that came with Mia’s soft giggle.

Mia gave her all the details from dinner to disaster, including Beck’s heroic sniper shots that helped Caden save Mia’s life. “We haven’t spent a day apart since.”

Ashley struggled to trudge through the deep snow. “And he asked you to marry him within weeks?”

“He asked me to move in and gave me the ring to let me know that it didn’t matter when I said yes or we got married, but our being together was forever no matter what.”

“You don’t need a ring and a piece of paper to tell you that,” Ashley agreed.

“Which is why I didn’t care what anyone thought about how fast or slow we took things. As long as I have him, I have everything. After what I went through with him, almost dying, I didn’t want to waste a single day. Not when I knew in my heart I loved him, he loved me, and that’s all that mattered.”

Ashley felt that way, too. She’d lost so many days. She tried not to think of all Brice cost her. It wasn’t the movie roles she missed, the covers she didn’t grace. What if she missed meeting the love of her life? What if she died and never knew that kind of love, or never had a child of her own? She had that chance now.

She’d spent the last five years working nonstop. She had her own home, money saved up, a few good friends, her mother for the most part, and not much else going on in her life. She loved her work, but in the end was the legacy she wanted to leave behind her image on-screen or the family she wanted more than anything?

“You’re quiet.” Mia stood beside her.

Ashley hadn’t realized she’d stopped trudging through the deep snow and lost herself in thought in front of a winding creek. The water cascaded over rocks and swished around the next bend. Bare-limbed trees, heavy with snow, hung over the water and concealed them in this slice of pristine Montana paradise.

“It’s like we stepped into a photograph.”

“Beck found a great place to escape.”

“He’s hurting.” Just like me.

“He’s tired and disillusioned and sad and angry and feeling guilty for things that were out of his control and not his fault.” Mia sighed. “You know how he feels, don’t you?”

“More than you know.” She thought of how they’d played a part and forgotten who they were and what they wanted. “I feel like I’m still waking up from that nightmare. Part of me is still in it while the other part is struggling to come to terms with my new reality. I’m not the woman I used to be. I’m not the woman he made me be. I don’t know the woman I am right now, but I know I want him to pay, and I want something better for my future. I deserve that.”

“Yes, you do. So do the first, so you can have the second.”

Damn straight. “How did you get past it?”

“I was kidnapped and terrorized for one day. I have no idea how you survived for nearly a year. The second attack lasted about five minutes and felt empowering because I took the guy down with a pot and saved Caden.”

“Really?”

Mia nodded. “The threat is real, but I’m not giving up what I have with Caden for anything.”

Mia tilted her head. “It took great strength to overcome my fear. You’ll need that now. I had Caden to see me through the rough days.”

“Beck has been amazing,” she admitted. His steady presence and direct manner pushed her to move past the fear and face what came next. “I guess I’ll have to find some of that strength to face what comes next on my own.”

“Oh, you won’t be alone. Beck’s in this with you now. He won’t stop until the man who hurt you is dead or behind bars. You can count on that.”

“I can’t ask him to do that.”

Mia smiled. “You don’t have to ask him. But you already know that. Let me tell you the one thing I know for sure about the Cooke brothers. They don’t fall easy, but when they do it’s hard and fast. The way Beck looks at you”—Mia pressed her lips together and nodded—“it’s the same way Caden looks at me. He’s all in.”

Ashley didn’t know what to say to that. The thought both thrilled and scared her.

Mia stared at the vast landscape spread before them. “You found the perfect place to escape to.”

“What do you mean?”

“Beck named this place Hope Ranch. When all else is lost, hope endures, just like this land.”

Ashley didn’t know what to say, but the name fit.

“Come on—he’s probably prowling the house waiting for us.”

Ashley took one more look around the pretty creek, then sucked in a surprised gasp.

“What is it?” Mia pulled the gun and expertly held it in both hands sweeping the area, ready to face any threat.

“Nothing. No one is here. It’s me. I’m sorry to scare you. It’s just this place reminds me of something.” Her perfect escape by the river in her mind. Where her hope for survival and finding something better endured.

Mia let her hand fall to her side, the gun bouncing against her thigh. She let out a relieved sigh. “Oh. Sorry. I guess I’m a little jumpy.”

“All the more reason to stop stalling and do what needs to be done.” Ashley gave one last, forlorn look at the creek that looked so much like the special place she’d dreamed up in her head to escape to when things got really bad.

She walked back to the house with Mia in the lead. Fatigued by the hike through the snow, her thigh muscles ached, but it felt like progress. She needed to build her physical strength back. She hoped she had the mental strength to get through what came next.

A surge of relief, a flutter of awareness, the pull she fought but wanted to give in to, and a sense of determination swept through her all at once when they came into view of the house and there stood Beck on the porch waiting for them. Reassuring and scary at the same time.

Mia easily made it to the house and up the stairs, smiling at Beck as she passed him and went into the house, closing the door and leaving them alone as Ashley approached at a much-slower pace.

Beck walked down the steps and met her on the shoveled path. “Tired?”

“Sore. Tired. Frustrated. Ready to move on, but stuck in some ways. But I’m good.”

One side of his mouth cocked back in a half grin. “Sounds about right.” He got it.

She liked that she didn’t have to explain the complex and convoluted emotions she didn’t quite get herself but made sense nonetheless in a way.

She didn’t know what possessed her to say it, probably the way Beck looked at her with that intense stare that saw everything and didn’t judge, but she blurted out, “Caden really loves Mia.”

Beck’s head tilted and his eyes softened and filled with understanding. “Yes, he does. He’s a lucky man. They’re lucky to have each other.” Those words told her so much more than what he said out loud.

“Are you ready?”

She meant a hell of a lot more than taking the next step to put Brice behind bars and letting everyone know she was alive and a survivor, not a runaway movie star. Beck had been through a lot, had spent the last many weeks hiding out here, trying to figure out his life. Neither of them were coming into this thing from a good place.

His sharp, intent gaze never left hers. “I don’t think anyone is ever ready for something like this.” He held his hand out to her.

She took it and walked into his arms. She stared up at him. With his face inches from hers, she saw the flecks of light and dark blue in the gray of his eyes and the redness in his cold cheeks, and smelled the coffee on his breath. Their bodies pressed together, heat and need rushing through her system.

“Despite the dangers we face, yes. I want this thing we both feel.”

They had a hell of a lot to overcome. Brice. The drug cartel after him that also put her in more danger. But like him, she felt it was worth it to have something good come out of all this bad.

“If you want me, Ashley, not the star, not some character I’ve played, I’m in.”

“None of that matters. I want you.”

With those heartfelt words, he lowered his mouth to hers. She lost herself in the sweet, soft kiss that didn’t demand, but lingered, warming her from the inside out, telling her he wanted her, but more, he wanted her to want him.

With her whole scarred and battered heart, she did.