by Christa Wick
Naomi sashayed up to the store’s door. She tugged on the handle then knocked when it wouldn’t budge.
“Take your time, Team One, boyfriend’s out of the car and moving toward Lookout One.”
Quinn shifted in her seat. I stopped watching the screens and stared at her. Like a hummingbird’s wings, her pulse fluttered wildly at her neck. I leaned close and whispered again.
“She’s going down, love, and all because of you.”
Quinn flicked a smile. It struck me then that she didn’t want the credit for her sister getting sent off to jail. I should have thought about that sooner. If this was one of my brothers acting crazy and trying to ruin my life and endangering the lives of others in the process, I'd still be torn up about luring him to an arrest.
“I’m sorry, baby,” I said, my arm sliding across the back of her chair to rest gently against her shoulders. “But you deserve to be free and you’re keeping her from hurting other people. Who knows what she would do if it was a civilian instead of a cop working on that truck.”
Nodding, Quinn turned and hid her face against my neck for a second.
“Lookout One has contact with the boyfriend,” Barnes advised. “Open the door, Team One.”
On screen, Naomi lifted her hand to knock again. The monitor jumped to the interior view as a tall blonde threw the lock on the door and slowly pushed it open.
“Quinn? I…uh…” The female cop’s voice held a note of distaste and the level of shock a real business owner would likely feel upon opening the door for a job applicant and finding her dressed in a dirty hoodie, the pale foundation and heavy black eyeliner and lipstick making her look like a roadie at a Marilyn Manson concert.
“That’s me,” Naomi snickered. “Hey, I’ve got to whiz really bad. Is the restroom working in this joint?”
The cop pointed toward the back of the room. “That’s my partner, Mark, at the table.”
“Cool,” Naomi answered, her gaze on the blonde as she locked the door.
“That way,” the female cop indicated. “If you still need to…whiz.”
“Like you wouldn’t believe.” Naomi sauntered forward, drifting toward the table where the second cop had a high-end laptop open next to a combination printer and scanner.
“Boyfriend is in custody,” Barnes advised. “I repeat, boyfriend in custody.”
“Nice equip—”
“Police!” the blonde shouted, grabbing Naomi’s right wrist and yanking it halfway up her back as she kicked out Naomi’s right ankle and slammed the teen chest first onto a second table set up with folders full of blank papers.
“That’s it,” Quinn said, her voice taking on the numb tone of the prior night. “That’s really it.”
“Love…” I didn’t care if my cousin was right there or about Gamble and the detective up front or how many cops outside the van might hear me. I turned Quinn toward me and grabbed her shoulders. “You had to do this, love. She was never going to let you have a life. You heard that guy say she was going to stick around and mess you up…just like you thought she would.”
Quinn stared at me, a dozen emotions running across her delicate features.
“Don’t fade on me, love.”
She shook her head, the motion releasing a flick of tears that landed and sparkled on her cheeks.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Quinn answered, lifting her arms and wrapping them around my neck. “Except home with you.”
27
Quinn
The faint jingle of silver bells woke me. An even softer giggle followed the bells. I forced my eyes open but didn’t lift my head.
“I think we might have a fairy lurking outside our door,” Barrett whispered.
I propped myself up on an elbow, the nap officially over now that we were both awake.
“It’s only a fairy if it has fairy dust,” I said, my voice purposefully lifting to carry beyond Barrett’s old bedroom at the ranch house.
A stampede of jingling bells and a three-year-old’s laughter disappeared down the hall. Like champagne bubbles, the sound of the toddler may have disappeared, but its effect lingered in my smile.
“Come back down here,” Barrett ordered, the command vibrating in his throat.
I looked at him, one brow lifting in a challenging arch. If he wanted more time in bed with me, our bodies curled around one another, he had other options than a Sunday nap at his mother’s house. He could ask me to move in with him or not resist my getting an apartment instead of staying at the ranch in his old room as I had since Naomi’s arrest over a month and a half before.
Barrett drew his bottom lip into his mouth. Forgetting the reason behind my resistance, I moved into the crook of his arm, my head pillowed by his shoulder, my arm across his brawny chest. I breathed deeply, still fascinated by the scent of him.
On Barrett’s side of the bed, the clock switched from three twenty-seven to three twenty-eight.
“People will be arriving soon,” I warned.
“And?” He stretched the question out.
I lifted up, half my torso draped over his. I ran the tip of my finger against the stubble on his chin. He had been back in Willow Gap less than twenty-four hours after two days containing a fire on the eastern side of the state. He had come straight to the ranch house and stayed most of the evening, but returned to his house to sleep.
“Aunt Dotty is one of those people. You’ll offend her sensibilities lingering in bed with a woman you’re not married to.”
His gaze sparkled, the curve of his mouth turning dangerous with its sharp smile. “I’m pretty sure Dotty’s done a little more living than you give her credit for.”
“Well, if we linger much longer, when we walk out there, you’ll be facing your aunt and uncle, Dotty, your mom, Jake and Leah, Sage and Ashley, Siobhan, Cassian, all of your brothers…maybe another cousin or two…”
Finished, I drew a deep breath. “Wow, no wonder your mom was up at six cooking!”
“Okay,” he relented, fingers lightly tracing my spine. “I’ll get up—after you kiss me.”
My skin flushed head-to-toe at the bribe he demanded.
“If I kiss you, it’ll be another half hour before we get out of bed.”
It never stopped at one kiss. Not like it went further than that, but Barrett had a hundred ways to kiss me without ever dipping below my collarbone.
He rolled me onto my back, his body covering mine. I braced for the slow buildup of need that would stop just short of release.
“There,” he said, planting a kiss on my forehead. “That didn’t take half an hour, did it?”
“No,” I agreed with a pout.
Settling back on my side, I watched him stand up and grab the toiletry bag he’d arrived with that morning. From the back of the bedroom door, he lifted the pressed shirt he’d also brought with him from his house.
“I better make myself presentable.”
With a wink, he left me in bed dreaming after him.
The silver bells returned and stopped centimeters before reaching the open door to my room.
“Is that a fairy I hear sneaking around the hallway?”
Leah didn’t answer with a giggle. Instead, her body hidden, she blew softly and unleashed a short-lived whirlwind of rose-colored glitter.
“It is a fairy!” I proclaimed, jumping from the bed into the hall to sweep the little girl into my arms.
Dressed in the same rose tones as her fairy dust, Leah squirmed and giggled, her tutu whispering along with the miniature bells on her tennis shoes. With her right hand curled into a tight fist she held against her chest, she used the other to clutch at my shirt.
“I caught you fair and square, little fairy.” I blew a raspberry on the toddler’s neck. “Now you must use your magic fairy dust to grant me a wish!”
Calming, Leah pulled her clenched hand away from her chest and carefully uncurled her fingers to reveal a small remaining pinch of the glitter.
“Blow!” she comman
ded.
Closing my eyes, I obeyed. Exhaling in one long breath, I removed every last particle of the fairy dust, each mote warmed by the wish that I would spend the rest of my life with Barrett Turk
“I hope everyone left room for dessert,” Lindy said, coming out of the kitchen with a platter covered from one end to the other with tiramisu.
Ashley followed after her with a second platter of the dessert.
“Since you’re eating for two,” Ashley teased as she set the dish down next to Sage.
“Leah eating for three,” the toddler grumbled as her father slid a small slice onto her plate.
“Three?” Jake asked. “How do you figure that, baby girl?”
“Leah is three,” she answered then counted off on her fingers. “One, two, three.”
A chuckle traveled around the table until it reached Aunt Dotty, who raised her hand in a commanding gesture.
“No one touch the tiramisu,” she boldly ordered. “By that child’s logic, I’m eating for seventy-two. All the tiramisu is mine!”
Leah looked to her left then her right. Seeing all the adults with their hands in their laps or hovering someplace other than the dessert platters, she shook her head.
“Leah eating for one!”
The chuckles turned to a roar of laughter.
When the noise died down, Barrett stood up and excused himself from the table.
“I’ll be right back,” he announced.
“Don’t be long, child,” Dotty told him. “I have something I want to say and, at my age, I’ll forget if you’re slow about whatever it is you’re up to.”
“One minute, I promise.”
He returned a few seconds before the deadline, his cheeks pink and his hands buried in his pockets as he stood behind me. I pushed his chair out and slid a little to my right to make room for his return, but he smiled and shook his head.
“We’re all listening, Aunt Dotty,” he coaxed.
The old woman pulled a white envelope out from under the table. Prolonging the mystery, no writing interrupted the plain surface.
“Now, I didn’t say anything before now,” Dotty began. “But I took out an insurance policy on the construction site up at Jasper’s. What with the arson and the prosecutor working out a plea deal and everything, it took a while for the claim to be processed.”
She tapped the envelope against the dessert plate, her bright blue gaze moving between me and Barrett.
“The insurer reimbursed me both costs and the value of the labor. I donated the labor portion to the Willow Gap Family Emergency Fund in Jasper’s name.”
A murmur of approval circled the table.
Dotty slid the envelope across the table toward me.
“I expect one day you and my grand-nephew will be married after he works up the nerve to ask. And he has a home already,” Dotty said. “But Jasper’s cabin was always a welcoming place the Turk family spent time at—all of it good. It would be nice if that continued.”
Tears welling, I bobbed my head.
Hearing Barrett’s disappointed sigh, I looked up, my mood swinging from elated to distressed so fast I could feel my brain sloshing around inside my head, my vision blurring as cold nausea crept through my stomach.
What was it in Dotty’s words that had upset him?
The statement that we would one day be married?
“That’s really wonderful and all, Aunt Dotty,” Barrett chuckled, pulling his hand from his pocket. “But you just stole my thunder.”
I didn’t understand. Not even when he pulled his chair completely out of the way and got down on one knee.
Only when he opened the black velvet box and I saw the diamond solitaire did the world begin to stitch itself back together.
“Quinn Whitaker, I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you.” He paused, looking straight into my soul with those deep green eyes.
“Will you marry me?”
I nodded, throat too tight for words. Then the tears started and I choked out a “yes” before melting into his arms.
When I could breathe again, Barrett led me over to Dotty, who squeezed us both in turn. I went from Dotty’s arms to Lindy’s then on to Sage, the faces becoming a fresh blur after that but everyone offering a hug or a kiss on the cheek.
Making it back to my chair after everything had settled down, I found that Leah had switched seats. The little girl brought a finger to her lips then motioned me closer.
“What is it, Honey Bee?” I whispered.
Eyes glowing with remembered mischief, Leah pinched an edge of her pink sleeve to reveal a few specks of glitter still clinging to her outfit.
“Did you get your wish?” she whispered back.
Head bobbing, I looked around the table at all the happy faces that would soon be my family.
“Yes, baby girl, I did," I answered. "I got my wish and so much more.”
28
Quinn
A perfect spring day blanketed the meadow in front of Lindy Turk’s ranch house. A hundred white folding chairs marched toward a newly constructed arbor garlanded with wildflowers gathered from the field. Two tents, one housing food, the other bridesmaids, offered shelter from the still gentle sun.
Peeking through the tent flaps, I spotted Sutton leading Leah toward me.
I breathed out. “Good, he found her.”
“Clean, I hope,” Sage chuckled. “Or clean enough.”
I nodded. “Looks it.”
Sutton marched the toddler up to the tent. Sage pulled the flap back just enough for Leah to enter, but the little girl planted her feet with a stubborn resistance.
Turning to her uncle, Leah held up her fist then carefully opened it.
Seeing pink glitter, he lifted his brows. “What’s that about?”
“Fairy dust,” I answered. “She wants you to make a wish.”
Starting to roll his eyes, he dipped his head and rubbed a thumb against his forehead. When he looked up, he smiled indulgently at the little girl.
“Tell you what, I’ll make an earnest wish if you promise to build a quartz radio with me this weekend.”
“No soldering,” Sage warned.
“Not at this age,” he agreed.
Leah’s head moved back and forth from uncle to aunt to uncle again. Seeing the confusion on the little girl’s face, Sutton touched the piece of raw amethyst hanging from a silver chain around her neck.
“This is a type of quartz,” he explained. “Using smaller pieces, we can pick up sound traveling through the air from hundreds of miles away.”
Mouth forming a loose “O,” Leah held the amethyst up and looked between it and the glitter in her hand.
“My rock is magic, too?”
He snorted before half agreeing with her. “It’s more magic than your fairy dust.”
“Deal,” she grinned, thrusting her hand closer to his face. “Now blow!”
Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath that eased the tension sharpening his handsome features. Softly, he exhaled. When he opened his eyes, the glitter was gone.
“Wonder what you wished for,” Siobhan smirked, sweeping past him in her bridesmaid gown to enter the tent.
Leah wagged a finger at her uncle. “Don’t tell her, Sutty.”
“I’d sooner tell Betty Rae,” he whispered before planting a kiss on the little girl’s cheek as he handed the child over to Sage.
I watched him walk away. The limp was gone, the step surer. Physically, Sutton seemed to have completely healed.
“He’ll come back to us,” Sage said, her voice kept low so that the conversation remained between her and me. “He’s just wondering where he fits after so many changes in his life and in the family.”
I nodded. “He belongs here.”
“Hopefully he’ll figure that out soon,” Sage said. She wrapped her hand around my elbow and turned me toward the center of the tent. “Let’s get that veil on you.”
Ten minutes later, the music began. Siobhan
was the first bridesmaid to leave the tent, her brother Cassian waiting just beyond the flaps to escort her up the aisle. Sage left next, her hand threading around her husband’s arm.
Bright blue gaze shining with joy, Dotty wrapped her fingers around Jake’s bicep like a grappling hook, clutching and smiling as he carefully walked her up to the arbor and the chair placed in the maid of honor’s spot.
“My turn!”
Leah danced out of the tent, an old hand at scattering rose petals for the recent brides of the Turk family.
“You look beautiful,” Sutton said, taking my arm.
I blinked, throat tight and tears threatening. I hadn’t known how to reach my father for the ceremony. But, even if there was a chance of reviving a relationship that had died so long ago, I wouldn’t want anyone other than Sutton walking me toward my future husband.
“Thank you,” I rasped, then teased with a still scratchy voice. “Make me cry before I get up there and you’re in trouble, mister.”
He shook his head.
Reaching Barrett, Sutton handed me off and took his seat.
Barrett circled an arm around my back as his fingers teased one of my hands away from the bouquet. He kissed my palm, my entire body shaking.
I had grown up as the girl who wasn’t allowed to have nice things no matter the riches surrounding me. Now, with Barrett about to make me his wife, I had everything. Part of me still expected a dozen Naomi clones to storm out of the tents and wreak havoc.
But that part of me had become very small, just a few misfiring neurons that hadn’t received the message that life was great all day, every day, because the man standing next to me loved me with his whole heart.
So did his family.
“God never made a more perfect woman,” Barrett whispered, his lips brushing against the soft lace of my veil.
“Or a more perfect man,” I whispered back.
29
Barrett
