Page 179 of The Woman Left Behind

I edged closer to him and got up on my toes. “Those women came forward today, Harry, because they trust you’ll take care of them.”

He put his hands to my hips and whispered, “Sweetheart.”

“I don’t have to tell you that the police don’t have to be corrupt for women to hesitate to make those kinds of reports. It’s been embedded in our DNA there’s a good chance we won’t be believed, and if we are, the road to justice will be rocky, if justice is at the end of it at all. They need to know they’ll be handled with care. Those women came forward because they knew you’d handle them with care.”

That muscle twitched again.

“You were deep in it, it was all around you, so you don’t know,” I said. “You don’t know the sigh of relief that swept through Misted Pines, through this entire county when you were elected sheriff.”

He rested his forehead against mine, and he was hoarse when he said, “Baby.”

“Mom and Dad wouldn’t be dead if you, or a man like you, was sheriff back then, Harry,” I whispered. “You doing the job like you do, it keeps people safe every day in ways you’ll never know, but it happens.”

He closed his eyes like he was in pain.

He opened them when I continued whispering.

“It guts me. Absolutely guts me how crappy your day was today. I wish I could do something to make it all go away. But I can’t. The only thing I can do is remind you that you do the good work, Harry Moran. People know bad things are going to happen. People here also know they can trust you to knock yourself out to figure it out for them when it does.”

His fingers tensed on my hips. “I can handle it. Promise, Lilly. It was knowing he was fucking with you that put me over the edge.”

My smile was trembly, but grateful, when I replied, “I sensed that.”

“And I want answers for you.”

“You’re getting them, honey. You know this. Trust the process.”

He lifted his head from mine. “Let’s not get in the zone of thermostats and expensive dinners. This right here”—he pulled me so my body was flush to his—“is you giving yours back, Lill.”

“Good. A relationship doesn’t work if it’s not balanced.”

He took one hand from my hip to cup my jaw, and his brown eyes were so intense, it felt like they were branding me.

“Fuck, eight years ago, I thought I was the unluckiest man alive. Dead wife. The future I thought I had, gone with her. Working the only job I knew would fulfill me, but doing it for a man I had no respect for. And here I am. I do a job that’s hard to love, but I still love it. And I had her, I got to make her happy, for a time. And now I have you.”

“Now you have me,” I asserted firmly.

“Maybe the luckiest man alive,” he muttered.

Wow, that felt amazing.

Still.

“No, Harry, you’re just a man. A good one. A decent one. A smart one. A strong one. You’re the kind of man this world needs more of. Though, I might be the luckiest woman alive, because you’re also mine.”

“Thank you, Lilly,” he whispered.

But I wasn’t done.

I started swaying my hips, using my hands on him to encourage him to do the same.

“Before the day I met you,” I sang.

His eyes flashed, and he groaned, “Lill.”

“Life seemed so unkind,” I continued.

His forehead came back to mine, and he growled, “Fuck, Lillian.”

---