Still The One

by Joan Reeves

  He took another step toward her.

  "Don't come any closer. I'll call for Percy. He's just across the hall."

  "You mean Preston," Burke said, grinning.

  "Right. Right," Ally said, rattled.

  "It won't do you any good to call him."

  "Why not?"

  "He isn't home. He's still in Houston. How do you think I got your key? And who do you think told me "

  "I don't know. Maybe you de-materialized and slid through the keyhole."

  At his quiet chuckle, she said, "Give me my key."

  "You know, I kind of like this bossy side of you."

  Ally had a flash of memory. Of her on top of him, telling him how she wanted to be loved. She couldn't help the blush, but she fought the desire nonetheless. She snapped her fingers. "Now. Give it."

  "I'll be glad to give it to you," he said, covering the distance between them in two long strides. "But I'm not talking about any old key. Unless it's the key to my heart."

  Then he was all over her, and she was too swept away to protest.

  * * *

  A long while later, Ally awoke. Something was tickling her nose. She opened her eyes and found Burke above her. He was brushing a strand of hair back and forth across the tip of her nose.

  "Is this some kind of exotic torture," she asked, stretching lazily. She liked the fact that his eyes followed her every languid movement.

  "It's time for that talk I mentioned."

  "Oh, Burke, don't spoil things now."

  He shushed her with a kiss. "No, sweetheart. This won't spoil anything, but it will explain several things. What I have to say will make everything right."

  And it did.

  Epilogue

  "Hurry, Burke, we're going to be late," Ally said anxiously.

  "If we don't get to the church on time, it won't be my fault. You know how I am about red lingerie." He grinned at her.

  "You are so bad," she said with a giggle.

  "And aren't you glad?" He waggled his eyebrows in an exaggerated leer.

  "There it is," Ally cried.

  Burke swung the steering wheel of the Jag. In a maneuver worthy of an action film, he cornered expertly and swooped into the driveway of the church, double-parking the car. "Come on, Ally, let's hustle."

  They rushed in and dashed to the room reserved for the wedding party.

  "We made it," Ally cried. "There's my grandmother and your grandfather. Prepare for a lecture on punctuality."

  Frederick Winslow and Edith Fletcher turned. They both looked anxious.

  "I think the only wedding you two have ever made on time was your own," Frederick grumbled. "Help me with this darn tie, Burke."

  Ally and Burke exchanged amused glances and began to fulfill their duties as matron of honor and best man.

  Before they lined up for the processional, Burke pulled Ally aside. He thanked the powers that be that he'd had a second chance with her for he couldn't imagine life without her.

  "How many weddings does this make that we've been to in this church?" he asked, gazing into her eyes.

  "Counting our first one and your near second one, and then our reaffirmation of vows, we keep this place in business," Ally said, laughter sparkling in her happy eyes. "My favorite part though is always the end when the minister says you can kiss the bride."

  Burke looked over at Frederick and Edith as they waited for the strains of The Wedding March. The nervous couple were getting a jump on the minister's instructions as they kissed and whispered together.

  Ally followed his gaze and smiled at the two people who meant so much to her. Granny Edith had known for months about the unsigned divorce papers. When she'd met Frederick on that cruise and discovered who he was, the two had decided to lend Fate a hand.

  Without their meddling, she and Burke would never have been brought together in such a dramatic way. She swallowed against the knot of emotion.

  "When do you think we should tell them they're going to be great grandparents?" Burke whispered, reaching out and stroking her flat stomach.

  "Why don't we wait until their reception," Ally said. "In the meantime, let's practice that last part of the ritual, just in case we decide to have another wedding."

  Laughing, he teased her with a chaste kiss on her lips.

  "You call that a kiss?" Ally teased. "Come on, Burke, kiss me like you mean it. Like I'm still the only woman for you."

  "You are still the one, the only one, for me." Then Burke kissed her again, this time with all his heart and soul poured into it.

  The End

  Meet Joan Reeves

  Hello! I'm Joan Reeves. I write funny, sexy romance novels about two people who have yet to discover that they are made for each other. Why? Because I think the world needs more laughter, love, and committed relationships!

  I guess you want to know a little about me or you wouldn't be reading this. I can never figure out the best way to write a biography for readers. Should I use third person, as if some unknown assistant were writing it? (I should be so lucky!)

  Ms. Reeves is a multi-published novelist who has seen her books published in North America, the United Kingdom, and in many countries of the world. She is known all over the Internet for her freelance writing published under her name, various pseudonyms, and as a ghost.

  Now, doesn't that seem just a bit pretentious? Trust me on this. I'm the least pretentious person you'll ever meet. I'm just a small-town girl who ended up in a big city in Texas. In case you're wondering, yes, I do have that distinctive Texas drawl.

  I lucked into writing as a profession. I say "lucked into" because when I started, way back about the time they invented sliced bread, I knew nothing about writing as a career. I just knew that I loved to read, and I loved to write stories.

  Because I am a writer, my favorite people in the world, next to family, friends, and other writers, are readers, of course! By buying my book, you are now one of my BFF's (Best Friends Forever!).

  When you buy my books, I promise you that I will always do my best to make sure you feel your money was well-spent.

  If you'd like to read more about me, or read more of my writing, please visit my websites: SlingWords.blogspot.com and JoanReeves.com. I'll be publishing more ebooks, and I'll post information about these new books on my websites.

  Next up will be Jane I'm Still Single Jones and a nonfiction book tentatively titled KISS Guide To Successful Blogging.

  I'd like to leave you with some witty insight, but all I can come up with is what I laughingly tell everyone is my motto. It's my Vision Statement, and I try to live by these words. Maybe you'd like to adopt them as your motto or Vision Statement too.

  "It's never too late to live happily ever after."

  * * *

  Ebooks by Joan Reeves

  Available at Major Ebook Retailers

  Just One Look

  The Trouble With Love

  Still The One

  Excerpt, The Trouble With Love by Joan Reeves

  Book 1 of Texas One Night Stands

  Every woman makes mistakes.

  Susannah Quinn glared at the door to the Sheriff's private office. Yep, every woman makes mistakes, but most women didn't have to put up with a constant reminder of their not so brilliant actions. And most women didn't have their mistake showing up at their office -– flaunting tanned muscles and polluting the environment with clouds of testosterone and male arrogance.

  Of course, mistake didn't quite describe what she'd done. No tiny lapse in judgment for old Susannah Quinn. When she decided to throw common sense out the window, she didn't mess around. Her fair skin flamed at the memory.

  Temporary insanity was the only explanation for her behavior. If temporary insanity was a legal defense in criminal court, shouldn't she also be able to escape punishment for her lapse in judgment? Instead, she had her mistake aka D. E. Hogan show up, right on her doorstep. That was cruel and unusual punishment if she'd ever heard of any. That kind of redress might be
banned by the U. S. Constitution, but, apparently, in the grand cosmic scheme of things, it was still being dished out. What was even worse was that Hogan turned out to be the new consultant for the Murphy's Cove Police Department down on the coast. To make matters worse, he just had to drop by the Sheriff's office every blasted day.

  Susannah picked up her coffee cup, an oversized white mug emblazoned with red letters: Deputies do it in mirrored sunglasses! She drained the lukewarm black coffee. Muttering beneath her breath at the injustice of it all, she slammed the heavy ceramic mug down.

  "What's wrong with you this morning?" asked Grace Collier.

  "Nothing." Susannah didn't look over at the dispatcher for fear of encouraging her. She'd known Grace, her best friend's mom, all her life and loved the outspoken woman, but she wasn't interested in being on the receiving end of one of Grace's well-meaning lectures.

  The ringing phone saved her. Grace punched a button. "Dispatch. This is Grace."

  Susannah ignored the conversation, knowing it was Grace's friend Eunice who ran the Courthouse Cafe across the street. The woman called every morning so she and Grace could discuss yesterday's episode of their favorite soap opera. Soap news ranked at the top of the list of excitement here in Vance.

  There was never any criminal activity in Alton County. Other than high school seniors climbing the spindly old water tower to spray paint Class of whatever on the rusty tank. Sometimes, a few years passed before a kid got an itch and a can of spray paint along with the desire to immortalize his graduation from the consolidated high school that served most of the small towns in the county. Nothing ever happened in this narrow slice of coastal prairie far west of Houston. That was the way her uncle Barney Drummond, the Sheriff of Alton County ever since Susannah could remember, liked it. Life here moved as fast as a crawling turtle.

  Not much occurred even down in Murphy's Cove, the county's richest town. Besides, the resort town had its own overpaid police department to deal with the few year-round residents as well as the many rich divorcees who mobbed the coastal enclave for the rich and perpetually bored.

  The only hotbed of activity was over on the four-lane highway that sliced through part of Alton County. That's where the real action was. Susannah sighed. If catching speeders could be considered action. Disgruntled at her lot in life, she tried to return her attention to the report she was typing. Unfortunately, that reminded her of her temporary insanity.

  "Just Hogan," he'd said when her uncle the Sheriff had introduced him. Susannah had shaken his hand as if she'd never laid eyes on him before.

  Until Hogan, she'd had only one secret in her life. It had caused her humiliation and anger. Now, she had something else to hide. Ironically, Hogan was the only person on earth who knew anything about her first painful secret. One thing about being hurt, humiliated, and angry. Those emotions sure helped squash the warm tinglies that assaulted certain parts of her anatomy every time Hogan walked through the door. If only those painful emotions had changed her body's instinctive reaction to him.

  Another sigh escaped her. There was just something about Hogan. If she'd been a woman given to flights of fancy, she'd have called it love at first sight. But she didn't believe in love. Much less love at first sight. She knew enough about human sexuality to know love at first sight was nothing but pheromones. Calling it smell at first sight would be more accurate. It was just basic primitive sexual response.

  Whatever you called it, Susannah would do anything to keep Hogan from learning how susceptible she was to him. Her delicate chin squared in resolve. She might not be able to run away now that he was in her county, but she could stand and fight. Or take cover behind cynicism and sarcasm. Whatever worked.

  "Just try to be agreeable, and the day will pass easier," Grace advised.

  "Being agreeable is what got me stuck transforming Hogan's chicken scratch into a report. If this report's for the Mayor of Murphy's Cove, why can't Mr. Hotshot Consultant get someone in that police department to type it?"

  "Maybe he likes the way you glow like a red warning light when he hands you his notes."

  "It's the principle involved. I'm a deputy, not a secretary."

  When Grace just chuckled, Susannah frowned. "Well, I am. Or I would be if I were given half a chance. Stop laughing. This isn't funny."

  "You're too danged serious. Lighten up. Be nice to Hogan. After all, he was pretty gracious about that little faux pas as you call it."

  "He was not! He was obnoxious and overbearing. I'll tell you what his initials stand for. D is for demanding. E is for egotistical. To top it all off, he got Uncle Barney to tear up the ticket."

  "Tickets," Grace corrected. "One for parking. The other was for a cracked tail light on the Suburban he was driving. At least that's what you said."

  "Tickets then. And the tail light was cracked." Susannah hoped Grace attributed the crimson that stained her cheeks to anger. That day, meeting Hogan again, here in her town, had shaken her. After her uncle had introduced him, Hogan had possessed the nerve to ask her to lunch. Fear had flooded her. Fear that he thought they could have a fling. Fear that he didn't want a fling. Most of all, fear that she might not be able to keep her hands off him.

  When she'd declined his offer, his eyes had mocked her. She'd pretended to be absorbed in the fax from the state police that she'd been reading.

  In a voice so soft she'd thought perhaps she'd imagined it, he'd said, "Coward."

  Alarmed that he'd nailed it so perfectly, she'd not dared to look up. Moments later, the door had opened and closed. He'd left without challenging her further.

  Later, returning from lunch, she'd seen a black Suburban pull up and double park behind the cars filling the diagonal slots in front of the Sheriff's office. She honestly hadn't realized it was Hogan driving until she'd walked over to ask the driver to park in the lot across from the courthouse.

  His blue eyes had gleamed with amusement. And with something else. Something that made her breath catch. Suddenly, the heat of the July day intensified. She knew what Hogan was thinking. She could read it in his gaze as clearly as she could feel it in the pulse points of her body. And that really scared her. If only he hadn't looked at her that way. If the corner of his mouth hadn't lifted in that little smile.

  All it had taken to send panic chasing after the shiver of sexual awareness was his softly spoken question. "Don't you think we have something to talk about, Susy?"

  The timbre of his voice and the heat in his gaze were like flame to dry tinder. Terrified at her body's response to everything about him, Susannah had backed away. She shook her head. "Don't call me Susy." She knew her quavering voice must have matched her "deer in the headlights" expression.

  "No heart to heart talk today? No problem. I'll be here a few weeks. We've got time."

  Susannah had felt all the blood drain from her face. She'd felt hot and cold all in the same moment. She could find no words to counter what she viewed as a threat. To be honest, there was a traitorous part of her that wished she could leap into his arms. Into his bed. But that would be disastrous.

  All she'd had to do was make a joke about that night. Pretend that she was sophisticated. Unfortunately, she'd lost the ability to put together a coherent sentence, much less a smart, hip response to defuse the situation. So she'd taken refuge from his searching gaze and husky voice by whipping out her ticket book from her khaki shirt pocket. Gruffly she'd explained he was illegally parked. She'd only intended to write a warning. But Hogan had flirted. He'd winked and softly said, "Are you sure you don't want to go someplace private and talk about this, Deputy? Maybe we can work something out?"

  That had just increased her panic. In a flash she saw a future she dreaded. He'd finish his job at Murphy's Cove and shake the dust of this small town. If she yielded to her emotions, he'd leave her with nothing but regret. She'd ripped the ticket out and handed it to him. He'd laughed.

  The sound was the match to her fuse. She seared him with a glance and walked arou
nd the Suburban, making a pretense of inspecting the lights on the rear of the Burb just to buy her panicked brain more time. In her most official voice, she said, "Your right rear tail light is cracked."

  "Well, gee whiz, Officer," he said in a parody of a Texas drawl. "You sure as shootin' better write that up. Can't let a lawless desperado like me get away with anything."

  His mocking voice spurred her on. Retribution was a bitch with a ticket book in hand. Ripping the second ticket from the book, she handed it to him with a flourish. "As you wish."

  "You must not have been in uniform longer than a nano second, or you'd know you don't give tickets to other law enforcement personnel. It's not professional."

  His jeering words burned her. She'd wanted to smack him with her ticket book.

  Fortunately, her uncle had arrived just then. It hadn't taken the Sheriff long to get the picture. He'd tsk tsked a bit, taken the tickets from Hogan, and stuffed them in his pants pocket. She'd known her uncle would tear the tickets up. And he had.

  Battle lines were drawn that day. When Hogan dropped by, he alternated between flirting outrageously and treating her like a child. She countered with whatever put-down fit the occasion. She was just counting the days until he packed up and went back to wherever he'd come from. Until then, her best defense was a good offense.

  Still, it hurt that her best friend's mother seemed to side with Hogan. "Grace, you don't think it's right for Hogan to act as if he's above the law, do you?"

  "Oh, pish. You're too young to be such a stickler for rules. Just once I'd like to see you thumb your nose at responsibility."

  Grace's outburst surprised Susannah. "You make me sound like a, well, like a stick in the mud. A pompous stick in the mud at that."

  "Kids should be kids, but you skipped over that and went straight to adulthood. You're too serious to moralize like this."