I love this post-orgasmic glow you’re wearing,” Ash said, helping Sorene buckle her overalls while copping another feel.

Heat and joy radiated out of her in waves. Sorene couldn’t remember ever being this sated and happy. How did one fall so helplessly in love in just a handful of days? To be truthful, she’d always been in love with Ash. She might have buried the feelings under responsibility and work, but it had simmered under the surface waiting, for a fissure to break free.

They set the SUV back to rights and headed to Quinn’s, not wanting to wait any longer to tell their fathers about their engagement. Sorene had called Jack, and since they were still playing phone tag, she left a message to meet her and Ash at Quinn’s because they had news.

That should have her father poking his head up from the hole he’d been hiding in.

Ash parked next to Rea’s Subaru. Outside of the vehicle, he took Sorene’s hand and they hurried up the steps and across the porch. Entering, they found Quinn’s hospital bed bare, the IV stand with the full saline bag hanging from it, the tubing lying on the discarded sheets. The living room was empty, the TV playing reruns of Law and Order. “Dad?”

A crash sounded down the hall, coming from the bathroom.

“Dad!” Ash ran for the door, swinging it open, and rushed in.

Sorene dashed behind Ash, praying Quinn was all right. She ran into Ash’s back when he came to a sudden stop.

“What the hell is going on here?” Ash bellowed.

Quinn stood naked in the shower, trying to shield Rea’s equally naked body with his own. “Ash, what are you doing home so early?”

“What’s going on here?” Ash repeated through clenched teeth.

“Sponge bath?” Quinn tried for levity that fell flat.

“I wasn’t born yesterday,” Ash ground out.

Sorene laid her hand on Ash’s arm and tried to pull him out of the bathroom. “Why don’t we let them get dressed and then we’ll talk in the living room?”

“Good idea,” Quinn agreed, color staining his cheeks, both sets of them.

She’d just seen way more of her future father-in-law than she’d ever wanted to. “Come on, Ash.” Sorene pulled on his arm again.

She led Ash into the living room and worried her lower lip when he stood by the hospital bed, staring at it, his shoulders tightening with each second that passed.

Quinn stumbled into the room, tying the drawstring on his sweatpants and pulling down a blue t-shirt with “Sawdust is Man Glitter” written across the front.

“You told me you were dying. Dying, Dad.” The words were spoken quietly and landed louder in the room because of it.

“Now, son, my heart has been sick worrying over you, knowing you weren’t happy. Besides, I never said I was actually dying.” Quinn shifted on his bare feet. “And technically, we’re all dying.”

Rea appeared, dressed in nursing scrubs, looking sheepish. “I’m going to…go.”

“Are you even a real nurse?” Ash pinned her with a steely stare.

“Uh, yes.” She glanced from Quinn to Ash and then settled on Sorene. “I work part-time at the clinic. Sorene can vouch for me.”

“Leave me out of this,” Sorene said. How had Rea been talked into this charade?

“What did he promise you to get you to help him with this farce?” Ash asked the question burning inside Sorene.

“She didn’t want to at first,” Quinn said, “but I talked her into it. And as you witnessed earlier, we’re an item.”

There was a knock on the door and Jack barreled into the cabin, all smiles. “Hey, kids. Rea…Quinn…” He trailed off, feeling the frigid undercurrents in the room. “Uh-oh.”

“Were you in on this, too, Dad?” Sorene asked. “Is that why I haven’t been able to reach you for days? You knew I wanted to question you about Quinn’s health, didn’t you?”

“How dare you put me through this?” Ash demanded of Quinn, his hands fisting at his sides. “For what reason?”

“How else was I going to get you to come home, marry Sorene, settle down, and give Jack and me here some grandchildren?” Quinn’s shame turned to bluster. “Lord knew, you weren’t doing anything about it.”

“Quinn, I’ll call you later. This is really a family matter.” Rea beat a hasty retreat, but no one gave her any mind as the four of them squared off in the room.

Ash took a threatening step forward. “You worried me needlessly for grandchildren? Pushed me to marry Sorene—”

“Pushed you,” Sorene interrupted. “You had to be pushed to marry me?”

“Yes. No. Shit.” Ash raked a hand through his hair. “It wasn’t like that.”

“You both needed pushed,” Jack said.

“Is that why you turned over the lake house to me?” Sorene asked him. Jack’s eyes shifted to the side, giving her his answer. She turned to Ash. “Did Quinn tell you to marry me or not?”

“Now, Sorene—” Quinn started.

“You stay out of this. I think you’ve done enough.”

“Wild Heart,” Jack warned. “That is no way to talk to your elders.”

“It sure as heck is when they are acting like children, pulling childish pranks like this, toying with our affections.” She addressed Ash again. “Did he tell you to marry me? His dying wish?”

Ash’s gaze flicked to his dad’s, and his lips tightened. “Yes.”

A sound escaped her as her newly mended heart splintered.

Ash reached for her, but she backed up. He raised his hands in front of him as if not to scare her off. “I asked you to marry me, Sorene, because I want to marry you.”

“Be honest. The first time you asked me was because of him.” She pointed at Quinn.

“I was drunk.”

“And your point?”

“Okay, yes, the first time was for him. But not the second or the third.”

“What sweet hell have you put this boy through?” Jack asked.

“Stay out of this, Dad.”

“I will not. You are my daughter. I care about you. You’ve given too much of yourself, taken care of everyone, well, I was just trying to take care of you.”

“By finding me a man? This isn’t the nineteenth century and I don’t need my father securing me a match. I can take care of myself, thank you very much.”

“You know me, Sorene.” Ash inched toward her as though afraid to spook her. “Last night meant everything to me.”

“How am I to trust you? Trust that you wanted me and not just to fulfil Quinn’s dying wish? If he hadn’t lied about being sick, would you have ever returned home?” His pregnant silence answered her question. She held her hand out to her dad. “Give me the keys to your truck. I need to get away from here.”

“Sorene—” Ash reached for her, and she slapped his hand back.

“I need some space. From all of you.” She took the keys Jack held out to her.

“Where are you going to go?” Ash asked, the vein in his jaw throbbing.

“I’ll know when I get there.” She turned on her heel and walked out of the cabin, trying her best to keep tears from disgracing her further.

How could she have been so happy an hour ago, and feel so devastated now?

She climbed behind the wheel of the oversized diesel truck and started the engine. The reality of her situation struck her like a blow.

Because of her, they hadn’t used protection last night. She could be pregnant, and she had no one to blame but herself. Ash hadn’t even told her he loved her. It had all been about getting married for Quinn, to make a dying man happy.

Well, Ash was now free to return to his life, far, far away from her, and if she did carry his baby, it wasn’t like she hadn’t raised kids before.