That Unexpected Kiss

by Tamara Ferguson

  Jeff said quietly, “We’ll talk about all of this soon. Okay? I’m going to go sit with Anne.”

  “Alright, Dad,” Julie answered.

  Dylan’s eyes met Jake’s before he turned back to Julie. “Where are those notebooks?”

  “They should still be at home laying on the patio. Brent knew about the one with the property numbers, but he didn’t even bother to take it with when he pointed the gun at me and made me walk to the Scott’s cabin.”

  Hearing Brent’s gun had been pointed at Julie, Dylan was ready to go after him again.

  Jake looked at Dylan. “I’ll send someone out there right away.”

  “Better yet, why don’t you let Julie and I go home and get cleaned up and change clothes. We can get Buster outta here too. Brent won’t be back until later tonight. Right?”

  “Go ahead,” Jake answered, grimacing. “By the way, Sam’s got Marilyn Bradshaw in lockup, and we haven’t been able to shut her up.”

  Julie stared into Dylan’s eyes and they both burst into laughter.

  “I thought that might cheer you two up,” Jake said and grinned.

  * * *

  Six hours later, it was ten o’clock at night, and Brent was in the interrogation room sitting once again with that calculating look in his eyes.

  Probably because he’d had time to think and had a lawyer sitting beside him.

  “We’ve seized your computers, so as soon as one of our techs goes through your files, we’ll be able to charge you with fraud.”

  Brent whispered into his lawyer’s ear.

  “Go ahead. You’re not going to find anything,” his lawyer said.

  No worries, they had enough other stuff to put the idiot away for the rest of his life.

  “Where’s Leanne Thompson’s body?” Dylan growled.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Brent answered.

  Shit. “You told Julie that you killed her mom,” Dylan said.

  “That’s her word against mine,” Brent said.

  Dylan growled. “She saw you.”

  “A six-year-old? Hardly,” his lawyer answered.

  Dylan looked helplessly at Jake.

  Jake smiled strangely, walking over to the door and opening it.

  A woman who appeared to be around Dylan’s age stood in the doorway.

  “Hello, Father.” She smiled emotionlessly. “I see they finally have you where you belong.”

  A look of panic appeared on Brent’s face.

  She stared at Jake first, and then at Dylan. “I’m willing to testify that he began molesting me when I was four years old,” she told them quietly.

  * * *

  They’d locked Brent overnight in the cell beside his wife’s and Dylan wasn’t sure if it was the unexpected appearance of his long-lost daughter or the berating of his wife that had made Brent decide he was willing to talk.

  Brent wanted a deal. Yeah, right, Dylan thought lifting a brow at Jake.

  Jake gave Dylan a grim look.

  Uh, oh. Shoot. It better not be anything less than the rest of his life in prison, Dylan decided, or else he’d personally see to it that Brent regretted it somehow.

  As Jake allowed Dylan’s mother to walk inside the interrogation room, Dylan played the conversation he’d recorded on his phone.

  “Again,” Brent’s lawyer said. “What does that prove? So what? At one time my client worked for your father. He just wanted the money he was owed. It doesn’t mean he killed your father.”

  “Yeah, it proves nothing,” Dylan answered, looking at Brent with cool calculation. “Unless the gun you brought with you to the airport was the same one that killed my father?”

  Yep, Dylan could tell by the defeated look on Brent’s face that he’d guessed right.

  “Why did you have to kill him? That’s all I want to know,” his mother pleaded. “It’d been six months since you’d worked for my husband. Obviously, you had a way to get inside the office if it was just about stealing the money in the safe.”

  Hesitating, Brent looked indecisive turning to his lawyer.

  “He gets to serve his time in a protected facility?”

  Keep him away from his fellow rapists and molesters? No way.

  Brent was definitely panicking. “I can give you names.” He hesitated. “No, I’m not talking about the guys here in town. I’m talking about some of the bigger names.”

  Jake met Brent’s gaze. “Where?”

  Brent closed his eyes. “New Orleans, Michigan and even here in this state.”

  Shit. Jake knew Brent was telling the truth because he was looking at Dylan, hoping he would understand. Jake was going to give in. Those were the exact locations where Dylan’s mom’s investigator had gone cold with his leads so maybe they had a chance to nail the ringleaders of the organization.

  “You’ll need to explain why you killed Matthew Endicott, here and now.”

  Brent’s lawyer looked at Brent, who nodded his agreement.

  “Alright,” his lawyer answered.

  Brent shrugged. “Your husband put a freeze on both of my accounts and he was getting ready to contact the feds. I was in big time trouble cause one of them wasn’t my account, if you get my drift. But I was ordered to get rid of him. There was someone who worked there that was much higher in our organization and he was able to reverse the freeze after that.”

  Brent sneered. “But the penalty I paid was my personal account. That’s why I took what was in the safe after I shot him, so I could start over.

  Sam Danielson came into the room. “I talked to Jim Edmonds. The reason that this guy wasn’t on your radar? He was supposedly working at another real estate firm in Lake Geneva. Did you know that the Bradshaws used to have multiple offices in Wisconsin when Brent’s father ran the company?”

  “So let me get this straight,” Anne said. “You were working as Wallace Brewster at the bank, and you had a real estate office in town as well, where you were using your real name?”

  His mother looked Dylan’s way. Why hadn’t their investigator discovered that? Something just didn’t add up.

  Brent shrugged. “Dad sold off the office in Lake Geneva after all this stuff with the bank happened.”

  Sam stared at Brent. “Your Dad was part of this?”

  “Like I said earlier,” he said, staring at Dylan. “You have no idea of the reach of this organization.” He smiled strangely. “Or how many years it’s been in play.”

  Dylan stared hard at Jake, who was looking grim.

  EPILOGUE

  One month later.

  Julie couldn’t help thinking how beautiful the sky was this evening with its warm amber tones edged with a rosy purple haze. It was warm for August but the nights were beginning to get cooler since fall was right around the corner.

  “I can’t believe it took another month for us to hike up here.” She and Dylan were finally climbing Crystal Rock. Julie had found it difficult returning here after Christina Montgomery’s death. But it’d been over ten years, and Christina had loved it here just as much as Julie and would’ve been sad to discover that she was the reason Julie had stayed away.

  She and Dylan were quiet during their walk, and Julie began thinking about everything that’d happened over the past month, including finally being able to give her mother a proper burial. Apparently, the day that Bart had discovered Julie asleep in the backroom of the Bradshaw Real Estate office, his mother and father were off disposing of her mother’s body. At least she’d been resting in peace these last twenty-one years. She’d been buried near the Dragonfly Pointe Inn. Jake and Danielle Loughlin had been landscaping the lakefront, and having their waterfall constructed, so Julie’s mother had been laid to rest under the boulders and river rock near the top of the falls. Very little of the landscape had been disturbed to retrieve her body, and Jake and Danielle had created a memorial there to honor her memory.

  She’d given her father her mother’s journal to read. Unfortunately, with all the false
information he’d been fed from Julie’s grandma, who’d been a friend of Marilyn Bradshaw’s, Jeff had begun to believe that Leanne had been seeing another man, so he’d felt guilty after reading the journal. He hadn’t wanted his wife to work, and even though Leanne was raising Julie, Jeff had realized she’d been lacking purpose in her life. That’s probably why she’d dug so hard into the research after working part-time for the Bradshaws. Julie had a feeling her dad would have a hard time forgiving himself for not seeing his wife for the intelligent and loving woman that she’d been.

  And according to Jake, the notebooks were filled with an incredible amount of helpful information. They were keeping a close eye on the townspeople listed in the one notebook, and all the property information had been sent off to someone who did research for Jake. So far, nothing had been found on the Bradshaws’ computers, and even Bart was puzzling about where his mom and dad would’ve kept any private information.

  Sure, Brent was revealing names to the FBI, but at a very sluggish pace. And what was Jake to do? The deal had to be done, according to Dylan.

  But something interesting had happened after Brent had been captured. Someone had tried to access Brent’s account for the bogus funds that Dylan’s mother had supposedly deposited. So now there were even more questions needing to be answered.

  “Hey. You were right. This view is amazing,” Dylan said, as they finally reached the peak of Crystal Rock. He was studying her keenly. “What’s stopped you from coming back?”

  Julie sighed. “Memories. I had this friend. Well, actually, she was Kate’s best friend.” She smiled sadly. “But I swear, there was no one that didn’t like Christina.”

  “What happened?” Dylan asked softly.

  “She...died.” Julie’s eyes filled with tears. “She had cancer. It went into remission for a while, but...”

  Dylan pulled her into his arms and laying her head against his shoulder, Julie cried softly.

  But just as quickly, she was done, as suddenly her eyes went wide and her mouth gaped open staring at Dylan.

  “What is it Julie? Are you alright?”

  “I was just remembering something silly she said to me, the last time I spoke with her when we were there inside of that cave.” Julie pointed to the opening behind them.

  “Christina said...” She shook her head dazedly, repeating her words slowly. “Christina said it would happen with One. Single. Unexpected. Kiss.”

  “What?” Dylan asked, puzzled.

  Julie gave him an impish grin. “I’d fall in love!”

  “Seriously?”

  “Seriously!”

  He smiled widely before suddenly becoming solemn.

  Seeing the expression on Dylan’s face, Julie’s heart thumped madly.

  “And did you?” Dylan asked, staring into her eyes.

  “I did,” Julie answered with tears in her eyes once again.

  This was going to be it, Julie realized when Dylan dropped on one knee, taking her hand in his.

  “Julie, I’ve loved you from the moment we met. I knew right away that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you.”

  He dug a box out from the pocket of his leather jacket, and even though it looked kind of tricky, he somehow managed to open it with one hand.

  Her jaw dropped open again. “Dylan. That’s gotta be the biggest diamond I’ve ever seen. What if I lose it?”

  Dylan shrugged. “Eh. No biggie.”

  He grinned when Julie slapped him on the shoulder.

  “Julie. Will you please marry me?”

  She was crying when she snorted.

  “You know I will.”

  “I know no such thing.” Dylan sighed heavily and smiled. “It’s about damn time you said yes.”

  “Now you need to put the ring on my finger.”

  He cleared his throat. “Oh, yeah,” he answered, but he was already slipping it on.

  Of course, it was a perfect fit and Julie just stared at it numbly.

  “I love you Julie,” he said softy.

  “I love you too Dylan,” she answered.

  “Come on. Let’s rest for a while and enjoy the view.”

  They sat side by side, hanging their feet from the ledge and Julie laid her head against Dylan’s shoulder as they watched the sun set further.

  “Okay. Do we have that everlasting love and happily ever after stuff going on for us now?”

  “I would think so,” Julie answered distractedly. “Wait a second, how’d you find out about that?”

  “Murphy.” Dylan answered.

  “Murphy? Trying to eliminate the competition, I’ll bet.”

  Dylan’s eyes searched hers. “I promise, there’s never been any competition.” He continued softly, “You do know that, don’t you?”

  Julie nodded imperceptibly.

  “He told me it’s kind of a tradition to propose here.”

  Julie grinned. “You know what? I haven’t been thinking about that at all, but it just hasn’t felt right to say yes until now. So maybe subconsciously I was waiting for you to propose to me here.”

  “You probably just needed for me to rescue you one more time.”

  She smiled coyly. “Maybe. But it’s sure been some ride.”

  Dylan laughed softly, pulling her closer. “And if we’re kissed by fate, like your friend seemed to think was going to happen, that ride should last us for the rest of our lives.”

  And Dylan’s mouth covered hers.

  “On Valentine’s Day” he murmured, finally pulling away.

  “Valentine’s Day?” she asked, feeling rather dazed.

  “I think that’s when we should get married.”

  Julie’s eyes went wide. “But that’s only six months from now.”

  “Yeah, it is. But it was the first time I saw you, on Valentine’s Day, and it made such an impact on me, that I’ve never forgotten.”

  “I…” She laid her head against his shoulder. “It was the same for me Dylan. I looked across the room, and there you were.”

  “Well, there you go then. Let’s make Valentine’s a day we’ll always remember.”

  Sighing contentedly, she answered softly, “Agreed.”

  A Note from the Author:

  I hope you’ve enjoyed That Unexpected Kiss, the second story in my sweet and sexy romance and intrigue series, Kissed By Fate.

  Animals are very near and dear to my heart, so I love writing about pets who have similar habits to my own. I’ve adopted several dogs and cats as well as taking in many strays throughout the years; not to mention birds, rabbits, turtles and fish. Dealing with their loss can be the most difficult thing in the world when they are all part of the family.

  Don’t forget about the shelter animals available near you if you’re considering a new pet. I’ve had a positive experience with every animal I’ve ever adopted.

  I send out a bi-monthly newsletter where I provide information about new releases as well as free books and available promotion sign ups and giveaways.

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  Tamara Ferguson

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

  Writing steamy yet sweet compassionate stories of fate that are wonderfully romantic, Tamara Ferguson is the multi-award winning, #1 international bestselling author of the Tales of the Dragonfly Romance Suspense Series, the Kissed By Fate Series, the Two Hearts Wounded Warrior Romance Series and the Daydreams & Dragonflies Sweet Romance Series.

  Her wounded warrior romances, Two Hearts Unspoken, Two Hearts Su
rrendered, and Two Hearts Undone were all WINNERS at the 2016 Readers’ Favorite International Book Awards; with Two Hearts Unspoken earning the Silver Medal in Military Fiction. Two Hearts Surrendered is also a 2016 New Apple Romance Selection for excellence in Indie Publishing.

  Two Hearts’ Christmas Wish, the fourth story in the series, spent 6 consecutive weeks at #1 in the Mistletoe Kisses & Christmas Wishes romance set and has become a #1 Best Seller independently as well a 2017 IAN Book of the Year Finalist and was voted #13 BEST INDIE ROMANCE BOOK of 2017.

  Along with the 2015 Romance Reviews Readers’ Choice Award Winner That Unforgettable Kiss, Two Hearts Surrendered and Two Hearts Unspoken were also finalists for the 2016 IAN Book of The Year. Tales of the Dragonfly In Tandem was a romance finalist in the Indie Excellence Awards, while Tales of the Dragonfly In Flight was a romance suspense winner at the Readers' Favorite International Book Awards.

  Currently, she is working on Two Hearts Find Christmas (Two Hearts Wounded Warrior Romance Book 5) for an Author’s Billboard Exclusive Anthology A Christmas She’ll Remember, releasing in October, and Emergence, her third Tales of the Dragonfly Novel, due to be published by Windswept in early 2018.

  A member of the RWA, the Authors' Billboard and the Authors' Independent Book Network, her stories have been included in several #1 bestselling anthologies.

  Since she remains a full-time caregiver for an autistic son (along with a bunch of adopted pets!), you can usually find Tammy working at home, where she spends a lot of time not completing her numerous home improvement projects, because she's writing or helping author friends promote their books on twitter.

  An Excerpt

  TWO HEARTS SURRENDERED

  WOUNDED WARRIOR ROMANCE BOOK 1

  AMAZON

  2016 READERS’ FAVORITE BOOK AWARD