Page 16 of Return to Laurel Valley

As soon as Coltraine could travel she had to get him on a plane and back to New York. She sure as heck wasn’t going to transport him in a car. Talk about misery. She’d have to leave her motorcycle here, but that shouldn’t be a problem.

Lily gathered up all her belongings and the paperwork to capture Coltraine and set them all on the coffee table in the living room. She wanted to be ready to go as soon as she had the green light. The sooner she could leave the sooner she could be back.

She went to the kitchen to make more coffee when she heard the knob turn and Blaze come in. His eyes automatically went to her bags on the coffee table. He stared at her a few seconds, and she wondered what was going through his mind.

“I’m going to grab a quick shower,” he said. “There’s sandwich stuff in the fridge if you’re hungry.”

She assumed that meant he wanted a sandwich too, so once he went into the bedroom, she started assembling ingredients on the counter. When he came back ten minutes later, Lily’s mouth went dry and her throat closed at the sight of him. He wore only a towel tied precariously at his hips.

The knife she’d picked up to cut the sandwiches clattered to the counter, and she forgot what she was doing.

“I—your sandwich. It’s ready.”

“I’m not hungry for that,” he said. “I saw your bags. Don’t go.”

“Blaze—” she said, shaking her head.

“Ssh, sweetheart. Just kiss me.” His lips touched the corner of her mouth and then trailed lightly over her jawline.

“Blaze—” she said again, but this time it came out as a moan. He didn’t realize that she’d already decided to stay.

“Don’t run from what we have,” he said. “What we can make together.”

She could barely form words to reassure him. Her head was spinning and her body felt weightless, but then she realized he’d picked her up in his arms and was carrying her toward the bedroom.

“Please, Blaze. Just love me.”

“I am,” he whispered. “I do.”

Chapter Nine

They spent the next three days lost in each other when they weren’t out dealing with the aftereffects of the flood. Lily had fit right in. She’d joined his siblings and cousins and other members of the community in giving out water, going on rescue missions, and making sure people were well taken care of. He’d loved every minute of having her by his side, being able to work together and then come home and share a meal and each other.

He’d thought—hoped—she’d say the words he needed to hear, but she never did. But it had felt like she loved him every time she touched him. Every time she looked at him and smiled. Every time she told him a story from her childhood, told him harrowing tales of some of her cases, and even when she’d finally shared what had happened the day her partner was killed.

They were like sponges, soaking in all the information and filling in the gaps of all the years they’d spent apart. He knew her like he’d never known another woman.

But on the fourth morning at dawn her phone had buzzed with a message that said Coltraine was cleared for travel. He was still weak, but he’d been given fluids and medicine, and he was no longer contagious.

It was as if the last days they’d spent together had never happened. She’d rolled out of bed, showered and dressed, stopping only long enough to make the coffee she seemed to need to survive.

He pulled on a pair of sweats and followed her to the kitchen, wondering why he felt as if a hole had been punched into his chest. He’d been shot and stabbed, punched and even ice-picked once. But nothing compared to the pain of imagining what life without her would be. How could she leave so easily?

“Stay,” he said. “Don’t go back to New York.”

She looked up at him in surprise. “I’ve got to take Coltraine back and get him booked.”

“I told you I loved you.”

“I know,” she said. “I love you too. And I’ve realized you were right. Being able to open up to you is what I needed. I can’t live my life as I have been. And I realize I’ve not really been living at all because of fear.”

“So is that it?” he asked, unable to help the emotion in his voice. “You’ve realized what you’ve been missing and now you’re just going to go back to New York and leave Laurel Valley behind? Can you really do that? Just walk away without giving it a chance? Laurel Valley is my home. But I’d leave in a heartbeat if it meant I got to spend another day—another lifetime—with you.”

His breathing was harsh and something that felt an awful lot like fear clutched at his belly when he saw the look of surprise on her face. He could feel her slipping out of his grasp like grains of sand.

“I know we moved fast. Maybe you regret marriage after knowing each other for such a short amount of time, and maybe I don’t even have the right to ask. But I’m going to anyway because I’ve got nothing left to lose. Could you stay? Could you be happy here? Leave the city and your job for a town with people who will want to know every inch of your past, present, and future?”

She clasped her hands in front of her and took a step closer, her gaze never straying from his. “No,” she finally said. “I couldn’t stay here for that reason.”

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