Her Lawman Protector

by Patricia Johns

  “What if it didn’t have to be?” he asked, frowning slightly. “I know you don’t want a cop, Liv... I know you’ve had that life and hated it, but I’m not Evan. And I could very easily make you my top priority. I admit it—I’m a cop to the bone. That can’t be helped. I am who I am! But I’d also be yours to the core...if that counted for anything.”

  Liv stared at him, emotion misting her eyes. “Because I’ve just cleared my name?” She shook her head. “So I’m safe now because you could go on and build your career in Internal Affairs?”

  “No—” Jack frowned, then shook his head. “Liv, no! This isn’t about that. I talked with Nate Lipton about chess moves, and it got me to thinking. I can’t keep living defensively. I wanted to chase down the dirty cops because of my rough experiences growing up, but before I got bitter and jaded, I had a different set of dreams, and those included a house and a car...a wife. Maybe kids, if she were so inclined...” He brushed a tendril of hair away from her face. “I’m tired of living in reaction to hard times. Maybe I’d rather be the good guy in a kid’s life—the cop who made a difference just by being there and being honest.”

  Liv swallowed hard. “Scandal will cling to me, Jack. You can’t be naive about that.”

  “Naive?” He chuckled softly. “Liv, I’d forget Internal Affairs and take up a position here in Eagle’s Rest if you’d have me.”

  “You’d—” She stopped short. “Really?”

  “I’m in love with you, and if I don’t do everything I can to win you over, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. I want a life with you. I want to wake up to you, go to bed with you—” He smiled. “I want it all, Liv. With you.” He shut his eyes for a moment, then shook his head. “But you don’t want a cop...”

  “I didn’t,” she whispered. “I don’t! But I realized that Evan wasn’t just hiding his life from me, he was hiding a whole criminal element. What it comes down to is this—I don’t want to be discounted. I don’t want to be forgotten. I don’t want to be betrayed, cheated on, cast aside.” She fought back the tears that filled her eyes. “I don’t want to be left out of your life. I don’t want you to tell another cop how you feel when you should be telling me! I don’t want to be pushed aside because I’m too civilian—”

  Jack silenced her with another kiss, and when he finally pulled back he looked into her eyes with more tenderness than she’d ever seen in life.

  “You’ll be my first stop, Liv, my confidant, my everything. Too civilian? Liv, you took down Evan Kornekewsky by yourself!”

  “With a little help once he was strangling me,” she said with a small smile.

  “I was coming by your place tonight because I’d realized I could still be the cop I wanted to be—I could have the dream I’d had as a boy. And when I realized that, the one person I wanted to tell was you. Even when I knew you didn’t want me.” Jack pressed his lips against her forehead. “I love you, Liv. I’d marry you in a heartbeat, and I’d spend the rest of my life eternally grateful that you shared your days with me.”

  Liv swallowed, her mind spinning. She knew what she wanted—she wanted him. She wanted love and kisses, laughter and plans together. She wanted the kind of life they’d been playacting these last two weeks.

  She sucked in a wavering breath. “It’s all a little fast...”

  “I just want a life with you,” he said quietly. “And I want it to start as soon as possible, but I’m not going to pressure you, either. How about this...tomorrow night, I want to take you out for dinner. And the night after that, I want to take you out for dinner again. And the night after that, and the night after that... And I’ll keep taking you out for dinner until you decide you’d like to take me up on my offer of forever. And when that happens, you let me know.”

  “Okay,” she whispered. “What time will you pick me up?”

  He grinned. “Seven.”

  They resumed their walk toward the car, and when they got there, he opened the door for her. Her heart was full as she looked out at the starry night, the full moon, and then back at the man standing next to her.

  “If we’re going to make this official, we could go scandalize your aunt and tell her the whole story,” he said. “What do you say? Maybe her good manners will take over, and she’ll offer us more of that potato salad.”

  “Yes,” Liv said with a soft laugh. “But you know, I can make that potato salad myself.”

  “No need to sweeten the deal, Liv.” He dipped his head down and kissed her tenderly. “I’m already yours. But be warned—every time you break out that potato salad, I’m going to propose.”

  Liv laughed and shook her head. “I love you, Jack.”

  Standing in the open door of the car with Jack’s strong arms wrapped around her, Liv felt all her misgivings drift away. She was safe with this man, both in his arms and in his heart. Standing in her hometown with all her hopes for the future swirling through her mind, she could see her biggest hope in the gentle eyes of this big cop.

  She was home in Eagle’s Rest, and her happily-ever-after had only just begun.

  EPILOGUE

  EAGLE’S REST, AS it turned out, did have minable gold, but the environmental groups rallied together to keep it unmined for the sake of the eagles who roosted there. It was all tied up in the courts, but the courts eventually ruled in favor of turning that land into a protective sanctuary, leaving the town intact and the property taxes reasonable. Jack couldn’t be more pleased. Not everything came down to making money.

  Tourists who were eager to catch a glimpse of eagles in the wild came pouring into town, and Liv’s bookstore sold more books on eagles than any other subject matter. She had an entire section dedicated to them. Jack was proud of her. She’d made a thriving business out of Hylton Books, and he was glad that she’d be keeping her last name after she married him. She’d worked too hard to get it back.

  Jack went to see his cousin in prison and they had some good long talks about what was possible in the future if Berto got clean and turned his life around.

  “I’m not like you,” Berto said. “But I want to be.”

  And that was the first step. Berto deserved a chance to set his life right, and Jack was determined to give his cousin all the help he could. He’d be behind bars for a few more months, but then Jack had arranged a job for him working with wounded eagles that were being rehabilitated for the wild. Rehabilitation took time—for humans, too.

  As for Tanya, she wasn’t a long-term fling for Evan—especially after his lengthy court case began. Liv didn’t trust her in the same way again, but it was the beginning of a new cousin relationship—built on forgiveness and an understanding of what they both had to lose.

  And then one Saturday morning in the winter, Jack put on a black tux and he stood at the front of Deer Lake Church, his heart in his throat. He’d waited for this day most patiently. Liv had needed time, and he understood that. But he’d been true to his word, and when Liv made him that amazing potato salad last spring, he’d pulled out the ring he’d been carrying around and asked her to marry him. It had taken all of a heartbeat for her to say yes.

  Now, as he stood in front of the church filled with friends and family on both sides, he shot his mom and dad a misty grin.

  This was it—the life he’d dreamed of as a kid. Maybe he didn’t drive quite so nice a car as he’d wanted back then...but the intelligent, thoughtful, amazing wife? Yeah, he’d beaten the mark on that one. And Liv was more gorgeous than he’d ever even dreamed of in his youth.

  The organ music swelled, and the doors opened to reveal Liv in a white wedding gown. It was fitted over her hips and then fell to the floor in a foam of lace. He’d never seen a more beautiful vision in his life. He couldn’t see much of her face behind the voluminous veil, but he noticed the engagement ring sparkling on her finger, and he saw the way she clutched her dad’s arm.

  He loved
her...that was all that mattered. And he’d spend the rest of his life convincing her that he was the best choice she could ever make.

  She moved up the aisle, and when she got to the front of the church, her father passed her hand into Jack’s, and he felt the reassuring squeeze of her fingers. He lifted her veil—as they’d practiced—and looked down into those glittering green eyes. Then they turned toward the minister.

  “Marriage is a sacrament...” the minister began, and Jack stole a look at his bride.

  How he loved her.

  This was what happiness looked like. If anyone cared to take note.

  Jack Talbott was home.

  * * * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Coming Home to You by M. K. Stelmack.

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  Coming Home to You

  by M. K. Stelmack

  CHAPTER ONE

  MEL GREENE WATCHED through the plate-glass window of the Tim Hortons coffee shop at a traffic accident about to happen a couple hundred feet away. A motor home had stopped on the highway and signaled to enter the side street leading to Spirit Lake’s top shop for caffeine addicts.

  But the turn was too sharp. Not much shorter than a railroad car, the unit would flip in the ditch or, worse, collect vehicles in the oncoming lane.

  No one else had noticed. The other customers drank and ate, or stood in line. Coming up on seven o’clock on a sunny July morning, it was rush hour at the Tim’s—a couple dozen vehicles were likely funneling through the drive-thru at that moment.

  “Mel.” Linda, his as-of-five-minutes-ago ex-girlfriend, sat across from him, her voice soft and confidential. “Are you listening?”

  The motor home switched to the right-turn signal. Mel relaxed. Right led to a street of businesses for light manufacturing, and a minimal risk of injury or death, if the motor home crashed.

  The unit swerved into the oncoming lane—empty at this hour—veered the other way before straightening and then trundled down a street that made no sense for it to go on.

  Mel dragged his attention back to Linda and to the end of yet another relationship. His seventh, to be precise.

  He managed a belated nod because it hurt too much to talk right now. Still, to show he was taking their breakup with grace, he sipped from his coffee with its swirl of whipped cream.

  Linda tapped her upper lip, and he wiped the froth off his mouth. A routine exchange honed over the last eight months of starting most days with a simple forty-minute coffee together.

  Not anymore.

  “You’re a good man, Mel,” Linda said.

  Not the first time he’d heard that. His third girlfriend had been the first to use that line when she’d dumped him for a guy who’d been arrested for stealing antifreeze at a convenience store.

  After the fifth breakup, he figured he might be a good man, but also an unlucky one. He’d been engaged to that girlfriend. She’d had three kids from a previous relationship, and an instant family was convenient and predictable. Then she’d become pregnant with another man’s child.

  “But—” Linda started.

  Mel disliked the word but. It undid everything good just said. Nice try but... I see what you’re saying but... Thanks for applying but... You’re a good man but...

  “—but I feel...I feel you want to be with someone, anyone, and you’ll do whatever it takes to make that happen.”

  He would do whatever it took. Marrying a good woman was what he’d wanted pretty much all his fifty years, and Linda was a good catch. A retired nurse with a good pension. A full-time volunteer and grandmother. A widow with a good head on her shoulders and beautiful blond hair, which she did up, even this early in the morning.

  She straightened, establishing more space between them and said, “And I refuse to settle. I know what it is to love. I want it again. And...and so should you.”

  He was willing to spend the rest of his life with her. If that wasn’t love, what was?

  “I wasn’t settling,” he mumbled to his coffee, finally speaking.

  “You’re taking it awfully well, then,” Linda said. “I mean, look at you. Even now, I’m breaking up with you and you don’t seem to care. You’re staring at your coffee, or out the window at traffic.”

  He forced himself to make eye contact with Linda. He’d probably often looked away from her throughout their relationship, giving her the impression he didn’t care. In reality, he was afraid if he gazed too long, if he fixed too much attention on her, she’d get scared and leave. Maybe he’d done that in all his relationships: wanted, yet hid his wanting. In the end, they’d all left, anyway. And it was always the women who broke things off because he’d neither the heart nor the guts for it himself.

  “It’s not that,” he tried to explain. “It’s... I do care,” he finished lamely. “I’m sorry I didn’t show it right.”

  Whatever the right way was.

  Linda ripped at her coffee lid, the soft brown plastic whitening before giving way. “I suppose I can hardly blame you for not being emotional. Tim Hortons is hardly the place—” she waved a hand over the crumpled wrappers and bags on the table between them “—for this. I didn’t intend to say this to you today. It just sort of...spilled out. I’d been thinking about Craig. I guess after Craig died... I guess I just wanted someone to fill the space. We’d been together for thirty-six years, after all.”

  So. She wasn’t over Craig. As usual, he’d missed the signs. He wasn’t even sure what the signs were. Shorter kisses? A few less dates?

  She gave a wavering smile, probably to show she bore him no ill will and hoped he felt the same. Which inevitably led to the other line all seven women had trotted out. He braced for full impact.

  “I hope we can still be friends.”

  What to say to that? What did it really mean? He’d called up his second ex to ask her out to the theater a couple of weeks after they broke up and she’d said, “Mel, don’t you get it? We’re not together anymore.”

  When he’d invoked the friend clause, she’d said that wasn’t how it worked. Decades later, he still wasn’t sure how it worked.

  The motor home had reappeared on the highway, signaling once more its intention to come toward the Tim Hortons. He waited for the indicator to switch. It didn’t. The unit—a full thirty feet long—swung into the opposing lane, forcing an exiting truck to brake to avoid a crash.

  “No,” Mel murmured. “No.”

  Linda sighed. She must think he
was answering her. He pointed out the window.

  The RV slowed and entered the narrow two-way lane into Tim Hortons, and then headed right toward them.

  People noticed now.

  The early eastern light banked off the windshield of the RV and temporarily prevented Mel from seeing the driver. Whoever it was would have to make an impossible right to clear the restaurant on the left and navigate past the vehicles parked to the right.

  This morning, the Spirit Lake Funeral and Crematorium hearse, with its extended rear, was right beside the entrance. Jim Creasley, the owner of the hearse and the funeral home, strode from the counter to the plate-glass window. Mel’s family had gone to him when their mom had passed a couple of years ago, and when Mel’s stepdad had died twenty years prior to that.

  Jim was dressed like he was going to a—well, he was dressed for work, which, given the early hour, probably meant he had to drive a ways. He was known throughout central Alberta, hundreds of miles in all directions, for his compassion.

  “If that brainless driver hits my vehicle,” he said, “there’ll be another coffin in the back.”

  The RV clipped the back end of Jim’s hearse and knocked it into the adjacent red car, which triggered a shout from a beefy young woman in a safety vest at the coffee counter.

  She tore outside, Jim a step behind.

  “The driver’s a woman. A senior,” Linda said, her head cranked to see up past the painted brown tones of the coach to the driver’s seat. Sure enough, an older woman wearing aviator sunglasses was at the wheel, hauling on it for all she was worth.

  Jim rounded the corner, waving and cursing as the motor home crept along like a giant steel sloth. As if watching an action movie, Mel stared, fascinated, disbelieving.

  Around him, people found their voices.

  “Get out of the way, Jim.”

  “Brake!”

  “She’s not going to make it.”

  “Is she insane?”

  The driver suddenly pitched to the side. Someone, another female, maybe the passenger, had pushed her and wrenched the wheel away. Mel caught a glimpse of a paperback, an arm covered in something white and lacy, and then the RV lurched to the left—too far to the left. The grille of the house-sized coach bore straight toward Linda and him.