by Jill Sanders
Rory and Crystal glanced towards the edge.
The man stood and pointed his floodlight to the bottom. “Not much we can do to help her.”
“She tried to kill me,” Crystal said. The man turned towards her.
“Seems like you’re lucky to be alive, then,” he said, coming back to them. “If you can move, we’ll get you both into a warm car and wait for your ride.”
“It’s—” he started, but cried out when he moved his shoulders. “Dislocated,” he grunted, before passing out.
When he woke next, he was tied down in the back of an ambulance.
“Welcome back,” a young man said, looking down at him. He held a small tube in front of his nose and Rory almost gagged on the smell.
“I’m awake, put that god-awful thing away.”
The man laughed. “Your lady is in the cot next to you.” He moved over, and Rory glanced to the side as much as he could with his head taped to the gurney.
“Crystal?” he said.
“I’m here, are you okay?” she asked, reaching her hand out for his. He took it, then hissed.
“Yeah, might not want to use those hands for a while. You burned off the first couple layers of skin,” the EMT told him. “We’ll get you fixed up as soon as we make it through this snow.”
“I’m sorry,” Crystal said softly.
“We’re not going to do this again, are we?” he joked.
“Last time, I promise.” He could hear that she was smiling by the tone of her voice.
“Good, because I’d hate to spend the rest of our lives together always hearing you apologize.”
He heard her sigh. “That sounds wonderful.”
“What does? Hearing you say you’re sorry?”
“No, the thought of spending the rest of our lives together.”
“I know you’re not the kind of woman who agrees with marriage, but—”
“I do,” she broke in. “With the right man.” Everyone was silent for a moment. “And you’re the right man.”
He smiled as the EMT shook his head. “Well, this is a first. We’ve never had someone propose in our ambulance before.”
Crystal sat with Rory in front of the fireplace and watched Aurora across the floor. Rory’s good arm was wrapped around her loosely, since she was recovering from two broken ribs. He was holding on as if he never wanted to let go.
Their scrapes and cuts were almost healed, but they were still having issues with sore muscles and other aches and pains.
Yoga helped most days, but they’d taken to long hot showers and had talked about installing a hot tub on the back patio, so they could soak the pains away each night.
“Merry Christmas.” Rowan, Kayla, and Connor James entered the room together. Rowan and Kayla were both laden with packages.
Crystal smiled up at them, then gasped when she saw her sister, Genie, and her husband, Charles, walk in behind them.
It had been almost six years since they’d spent a Christmas together.
Crystal rushed to get up. When she cringed, Rory gently pushed her the rest of the way off the sofa.
She laughed as her sister wrapped her arms around her lightly.
“Not too hard,” Rory warned. “She still has broken ribs.”
“I’m fine.” She waved Rory off then wiped a tear from her eye. “You made it.”
“Yes, we thought our coming would be best as a surprise. We know how much you love surprises.”
“If I’d paid attention to the cards this morning…”
“I would have seen this coming,” Genie, Rory, and Serenity said at the same time, causing all of them to laugh.
“I’m not that predictable, am I?” She glanced around the room.
“Aurora!” Her sister finally noticed the little girl on the floor and rushed over to hug Serenity, then snatch up the girl, who immediately cried for her grandmother.
“She’ll warm up to you,” Crystal said, sitting down and letting her sister set the girl in her lap. “I still can’t pick her up yet.” She buried her face into her granddaughter’s hair. “Soon. Your grandmother is a fast healer.”
“I’m Charles.” Her brother-in-law shook Rory’s hand.
For the next few minutes, introductions were passed around, followed by a quick telling of what had taken place a few weeks ago.
“Now that we’re all here”—Rowan smiled and wrapped his arm around Kayla— “we have some news that can’t wait.” He glanced down to Connor James, whose smile grew.
“I’m going to be a big brother!” he called out.
For the next few minutes, they all hugged and cried as everyone congratulated Kayla and Rowan.
When everyone settled back down, Crystal was holding a very tired Aurora.
“Ben, Rowan, would you help them carry their bags upstairs,” Serenity asked. “I’ll go check on dinner.”
“I’ll help,” Kayla added, then kissed Rowan on the lips before following Serenity out of the room.
“So, was the girl the one who shot you?” Charles asked after Kayla came back into the room with a plate of gingerbread and hot tea for everyone.
“We’ll never know. They searched her place, but didn’t find a gun. She could have gotten rid of it,” Rory suggested.
“It could have been a woman on the video,” Kayla added. “But, I still say the figure was too tall to be Nichole.”
“What about Joe?” Serenity asked, coming back into the room. “Dinner is almost ready.”
“Joe was at the store. The surveillance footage there shows him leaving only two minutes before Rory was shot,” Crystal added.
Just then, Ben entered the room again. “Are we talking about the shooting?” he asked, sitting down next to his wife.
“Yes, we were speculating on if it was Nichole who shot Rory,” Crystal said.
Ben’s eyes moved around the room. “I have a theory on that.”
“Tell us.” Serenity leaned closer.
“Crystal had me doing some background checking after you were shot.” He glanced over at Rory.
“And?” she asked.
“I had your secretary, Gloria, look into some of your more recent cases. She mentioned that you were handling Senator Beranger’s finances.”
“What does Clark have to do with me getting shot?” Rory asked. A frown caused a small crease between his eyes.
“Well, normally, I would have thought nothing, but after hearing yesterday’s news… I’d think maybe the police would like to question him.”
“Yesterday’s news?” Crystal and Rory said at the same time.
For the past few weeks, they’d decided not to turn on the television, since most days, all they saw was their own faces plastered on the local channels. They were big news in that part of Maine. Everyone loved a happy ending.
“Ex-Senator Beranger tried to kill his estranged wife. He showed up at a restaurant she was dining at with her lawyer and pulled a gun on the pair of them. One of her recently hired security guards tackled him before he could get off a shot.”
“Oh no,” Rory said, sitting forward. “Clark.” He shook his head.
“Apparently, Beranger believed his wife would get everything in the divorce since he’d been the one caught cheating.”
“He stood to lose more than half,” Rory agreed. “He tried to get me to hide some of it, but…” Rory glanced at her.
“It could have been Beranger in the video,” Rowan added. “I can send the video along to the police handling his case.”
“I’ll go make a few calls.” Charles stood up and pulled out his cell phone.
“My father retired from the FBI,” Rowan added when his father left the room. “If anyone can find out, he can.”
“Dinner is probably ready,” Serenity said, standing up and taking Aurora from Crystal. Rory helped her into the formal dining room, which Kayla and Serenity had finished preparing for everyone.
Glancing around the room, she smiled. The last time it had been this full
, her parents had been alive. She smiled and wiped a tear from her eyes as Rory’s arm wrapped around hers.
“Here.” Serenity held out the chair at the head of the table. “Mom, this is your spot.”
She looked down at the chair her father used to fill and glanced once more around the room. Rowan, Kayla, Ben, and Genie were all delivering the food to the table. Everything and everyone was perfectly in place.
New Year’s Eve
Rory stood on the balcony, looking out over the night lights of Paris and tried to put everything that had happened to them in the past few months behind him.
Having Clark admit that he’d gone to Silver Cove to kill him had been a big shock. The divorce had clearly made the man delusional. He claimed to have been hurt that Rory had denied his request to hide his funds during the messy divorce. When Clark had found out that Rory had survived the shooting, it appeared that he went off the edge and tried to go after his wife instead.
Joe had admitted to the police that he’d given Nichole access to the store’s computers. He also admitted that they had been the ones to destroy all of Crystal’s Christmas decorations.
They’d been drinking after the confrontation at Serenity’s Attic. They’d driven by Holley Hall and saw it all lit up. It had taken them less than five minutes to destroy everything.
Currently, he was working on a plan to pay Crystal back for her loss, but Rory knew that for Crystal no amount of money would ever replace the items lost that day.
Nichole’s family lived in Cuba, where her accounts had been set up and the money had been sent. It seemed that in the week before Nichole’s attempt on Crystal’s life, the girl had transferred everything out of her offshore accounts and back into a local bank account.
Rory was working on having the bank release the money back to Crystal.
He heard a noise behind him and smiled as Crystal walked towards him.
“It’s more beautiful than I ever imagined.” She leaned back against his shoulder. He noted that he only cringed slightly with pain and smiled as his healed hands buried inside her long blonde hair.
“You’re beautiful,” he said, holding up his wine glass.
“To Paris.” She clicked her glass with his.
“To the first stop in a long journey,” he said before sipping the champagne.
“First stop?” She set her glass down and then took his and set it with her own. Her smile grew as she wrapped her arms around his waist. “Do you mean to tell me there’s more?”
“Maybe.” He held her close and tried to take in everything about her. Her blue eyes sparkled, like the first time he’d seen her walking down the stairs. Her hair was a tangled mess from the lovemaking they’d enjoyed when they’d first checked into their hotel. And her heart belonged to him.
“What do I have to do to get your secrets out of you?” Her eyebrows shot up. “I brought my cards along,” she teased.
He chuckled. “Paris, Madrid, Rome, Venice, and then Dublin.”
“So many different places.” She sighed. “I hope I packed enough.”
“If you didn’t, we could always go shopping.”
She laughed and reached up to kiss him again. “Have I told you how much I love you today?”
“Twice, but you know what they say—the third times the charm.”
Other books by Jill Sanders
The Pride Series
Finding Pride
Discovering Pride
Returning Pride
Lasting Pride
Serving Pride
Red Hot Christmas
My Sweet Valentine
Return To Me
Rescue Me
The Secret Series
Secret Seduction
Secret Pleasure
Secret Guardian
Secret Passions
Secret Identity
Secret Sauce
The West Series
Loving Lauren
Taming Alex
Holding Haley
Missy’s Moment
Breaking Travis
Roping Ryan
Wild Bride
Corey’s Catch
Tessa’s Turn
The Grayton Series
Last Resort
Someday Beach
Rip Current
In Too Deep
Swept Away
High Tide
Lucky Series
Unlucky In Love
Sweet Resolve
Best of Luck
Silver Cove Series
Silver Lining
French Kiss
Happy Accident
Hidden Charm
A Silver Cove Christmas
Entangled Series – Paranormal Romance
The Awakening
The Beckoning
The Ascension
St. Helena Vineyard Kindle Worlds
Where I Belong
Haven, Montana Series
Closer to You
Never Let Go
For a complete list of books: http://JillSanders.com
About the Author
Jill Sanders is The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of Sweet Small-Town Contemporary Romance Series, Thrilling Romantic Suspense Series, Sexy Western Romance Series, and Intriguing Paranormal Romance novels. She continues to lure new readers with her sweet and sexy stories. Her books are available in every English-speaking country and in audiobooks and have been translated into different languages.
Born as an identical twin to a large family, she was raised in the Pacific Northwest and later relocated to Colorado for college and a successful IT career before discovering her talent as a writer. She now makes her home along the Emerald Coast in Florida where she enjoys the beach, hiking, swimming, wine tasting, and of course writing.
Connect with Jill on
@JillMSanders
JillMSanders
JillSanders.com
