“Looks that way to me,” Ashley said, just as her father stood and headed their way.
“Could I have a word with you, Dillon?” he said.
“Planning on giving him fatherly advice?” Ashley inquired. “Or maybe warning him to treat your daughter right or face the consequences?”
To her astonishment, her father actually blushed.
“Not exactly,” he muttered. “Dillon?”
Ashley caught her husband’s arm. “Wait a second. I think maybe I should hear whatever he has to say.”
The inimitable Trent Wilde looked as if he’d been caught sneaking a smoke behind the barn door. “Baby, this has nothing to do with you.”
“Then there’s no reason not to tell me, is there? And don’t give me any of that stuff about guy talk, okay?”
“Damn, but you’re stubborn. Dillon, are you sure you can handle her?”
“He cannot, as you put it, handle me,” Ashley said. “We are partners, equals. Right, Dillon?”
“Of course, dear,” he said dutifully, an amused glint in his eyes that warned her she would pay for his cooperation, especially when it meant lining up against a member of his own gender, and the father-in-law he admired to boot.
“Come on, Daddy,” she prodded. “What are you up to?”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” he finally muttered. “If you must know, I was going to ask to borrow the Harley.”
“Why?” Ashley and Dillon asked in a chorus.
“Of course, it’s yours, if you want it,” Dillon added. He handed over the keys to prove it.
Without saying another word to satisfy their curiosity, her father walked away.
“You had to give him the keys before he explained, didn’t you? Now we’ll never know what’s going on.”
“I think it’s obvious,” Dillon said, nodding toward Mrs. Fawcett.
Ashley’s father had scooped her up and was heading straight for the motorcycle. The expression on the retired teacher’s face was one Ashley recognized all too well–the pure anticipation of a woman who’d waited a lifetime to take risks.
“She wouldn’t get anywhere near that thing with me,” Dillon said indignantly.
“She’s not crazy about you,” Ashley pointed out, then patted his cheek. “It’s okay, darling, I’ll ride with you anytime you say.”
He turned her until they were standing thigh-to-thigh. “Always?”
“Even when we’re ninety,” she promised, just as her father started the Harley and roared off down the driveway. He and Mrs. Fawcett waved just before they disappeared from sight. “I guess he had to come home to figure out how to really kick up his heels.”
“He’s not the only one,” Dillon said. He led Ashley to the porch, sank into a rocker and pulled her into his lap. “I’ve been thinking about us. I know you claim not to be the domestic type–”
“I’m not,” she assured him.
“Could you just listen for two seconds?”
She pressed a kiss to his delectable mouth and promised sweetly, “I’ll try.”
“I was just trying to say that we don’t have to have two-point-two kids, a puppy and a vegetable garden. We can design this marriage any way that suits us. We can travel around the world together on my security assignments. I’ll train you, if you’re interested, so we can work together. Our kids will grow up with experience in every culture on earth. We can come back to Riverton every now and again just to shock the daylights out of everyone who knew us way back when.”
For a woman who’d come home searching for answers, it was definitely a plan, one that appealed to her untapped rebellious streak. She gazed into Dillon’s dark eyes and realized it was hard to stir up much rebellion when she was so thoroughly, blissfully content. She grinned at him.
“You told the sheriff you were thinking of opening an office right here. Was that just a spur-of-the-moment jibe, or did you mean it?”
“Not if you’d rather be jetting all over the globe. I’m adaptable.”
“You want the truth?”
“Always.”
“I think I’d like to come home again. I’d like our kids to be part of a big extended family. I want them to know their grandfather, their aunts and uncles and cousins.”
“Cousins? Do you know something I don’t?”
“There will be cousins,” she assured him. “Sara and Jake are already working on it, and Dani will have babies if she has to adopt a whole flock of them. Something tells me, though, that there’s someone just around the corner for her.”
“You’re just in love with love at the moment.”
“True enough,” she said, “but I believe it. I found love when I least expected it. So will Dani.”
He grinned. “Okay, since you seem to have your sisters’ lives all planned out, what about ours? What will you do if we stay here?”
“I was thinking about Lacey.”
His amazement was plain. “Your old nemesis? Why?”
“Because of what you said about her wanting people to feel good about themselves. After what I’ve been through lately, I can see just how worthwhile a goal that is. Maybe she and I can put together some sort of school or retreat for people who want to work on their self-image. With my name–”
“And face,” Dillon said.
“Whatever. We should be able to market it.”
“I think that’s a wonderful idea, Mrs. Ford.”
“Do you have any other ideas, Mr. Ford?”
“Just one.” He leaned down and whispered in her ear.
“That is definitely the traditional way to start a honeymoon,” she agreed.
“Too traditional for the likes of us?” he inquired even as his caresses began to bring her body alive.
Ashley sighed happily as her pulse skittered wildly. “There are some traditions worth keeping,” she said. “And this is definitely one of them.”
Much later, warm and happy in Dillon’s strong embrace, Ashley marveled at how their lives had changed…and how they’d stayed the same. Images and expectations might come and go through the years, but their love, it seemed, was destined to remain constant.
* * * * *
eISBN: 978-1-4603-4542-9
The Bridal Path: Ashley
Copyright © 1996 by Sherryl Woods
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