“I have an answer for you now,” he said. He made no effort to move closer to her. He simply stood there, hands in the pockets of his jeans, his bright blue eyes leveled intently on her face.
“And?”
“And…no. I haven’t been particularly happy.”
“That’s a shame,” she murmured. “I thought you enjoyed your carefree life.”
“I did, for several years. But it gets old, you know? Drifting. Looking for the next way to earn my parents’ disapproval.”
She heard the irony in his comment, and she knew he wasn’t being literal. Despite his complicated relationship with his parents, Dan had made his choices for reasons of his own. He’d been following his dreams, looking for his own place in life, she realized abruptly. He’d expected his parents to disapprove, probably because they so often did.
“I know what it’s like to spend your life trying to prove something,” she told him quietly. “You’ve been trying to show everyone that you are your own man, free to make your own mistakes. I’ve been trying to convince everyone I don’t make mistakes—not since my disaster of a marriage, anyway. Always in control, always on the job. That’s me. And then Serena Sossaman pointed out that I’m turning into her mother. And I had to stop and ask myself if that was really what I wanted. You aren’t the only one who’s been rethinking your life during the past month.”
Dan moved then, his hands dropping onto her shoulders, his expression stern. “You are nothing like Eva Sossaman,” he told her flatly. “She means well, maybe, but she railroads over everyone to get what she wants. You don’t do that. You care about what other people want. You do everything you can to make sure you provide it for them, which is why you’re so successful here, and in your real-estate career. But maybe sometimes you forget to ask yourself what it is that you want.”
She knew what she wanted right now. Wanted more than her next breath, in fact. And to her amazement, he was standing right in front of her.
“Do you remember the last thing you said to me before I left last month?” he asked huskily.
She moistened her lips. “I said I hoped you’d find what you were looking for.”
“Yes.” He smiled a little then, his fingers flexing on her shoulders in a light caress. “It took me a few weeks to realize that I’d already found it. Like an idiot, I got scared and walked away from what I’d been looking for all my life.”
She felt her eyes widen. “Dan?”
?
?I know you think I’m not the serious and committed type. That I don’t stick with anything very long. I know you don’t know me well enough to fully trust me yet when I tell you I can make a commitment and stick with it. It took me a while to trust myself in that respect. I know you’re much too practical and realistic to believe in love at first sight. That you believe in what you can touch and feel and prove with your ledger sheets. But if you’ll give me a chance, I’ll do my best to prove to you that I…”
With a smile, she reached up to lay her fingers against his mouth, stopping the flow of words in midsentence. “You don’t have to prove anything to me, Dan,” she murmured around a hard lump in her throat. “I’ve come to believe in a lot of things I can’t explain during the past month. Love at first sight is only one of them.”
His arms went around her, drawing her hard against him. His somber face lit with one of his amazing smiles, and his blue eyes were as bright as the sun when he looked down at her. “We’ll take it slow from this point,” he promised her. “All the time you need. I’ll still have some traveling to do with my job for now—but I’ll always come back to you.”
“And I’ll be very busy here with my job—but I’ll always make time to welcome you back,” she assured him, slipping her arms around his neck.
His lips moving against hers, he murmured, “I think this is going to work out very well.”
“I have no doubt of it,” she replied, then took his mouth with hers.
As the kiss deepened and heated, she had the strangest feeling that someone was watching them…and smiling.
* * *
Her bed was a tangled, rumpled mess, the covers half on, half off, pillows on the floor, a few items of clothing tossed across the headboard. Dan lay half across Kinley, sticky skin fused with hers as they breathed in ragged unison, trying to calm their pounding hearts and racing pulses.
They hadn’t stayed at the inn long after he’d shown up so unexpectedly, only long enough to tell Bonnie he was back and that Kinley was taking the rest of the day off. Maybe tomorrow, as well.
Bonnie had heartily approved.
With an effort, Dan lifted his head, studying her flushed, damp face with visible satisfaction. “Now that,” he said, “is what I call a welcome.”
She laughed softly and nipped his shoulder, making him chuckle.
He kissed her lips, her cheek, then nuzzled into the curve of her shoulder. “Kinley?” he murmured.
Her eyes drifting closed as she ran her hands slowly down his sleek, warm back she responded, “Hmm?”
“That night in the woods. You saw her, didn’t you?”