Page 89 of Moonlit Colorado

I collapsed beside her with a groan. Grace rolled onto her side to rest her head on my chest. We lay like that for a while as the beams of sunlight slowly shifted.

Finally, I asked, “What if I told you I’d like to keep seeing you after this weekend?”

She lifted her head to look up at me. “That wasn’t our deal.”

“So what? I want to negotiate a new one.”

“You don’t know how long you’ll be staying in Silver Ridge.”

I grumbled under my breath, not at her but at myself. Because that was true. I wasn’t promising her much, was I? “Those are details,” I said. “I can figure them out.”

“But I have this pact with Piper. We both swore off dating.”

I smirked. “You swore off dating? I thought people only did that in movies.”

“It’s not funny.”

I wiped my smirk away. “No, it’s not. I’m not laughing. You told me about your trust issues, and I take that very seriously. Means a lot to me that you’ve given so much of your trust to me so far. Staying with me after the break-in. This trip.” I smoothed my hand over her sex-tangled hair.

“Iwantto trust you.”

But… She didn’t have to say the rest.

Spending a weekend with me was one thing. Trusting me to take care of her for a few days.

Giving me her heart? That was something entirely different.

I reached out to cradle her face. “And I want to earn it. Let’s enjoy the rest of this trip together. I’ll work on the details for afterward. Then we can see what happens. Deal?”

Her teeth tugged at her lower lip.

“Deal,” she whispered.

TWENTY-SIX

Grace

“Here we go again,”Dane said with a sigh. “The Kip and Bristol show.”

We were in the car on our way to the wedding ceremony. “At least they’ll be busy the whole time with the event and their guests,” I said. “They’ll hardly have time to notice we’re there.”

“Good point.”

“I bet we’ll even have fun.”

“What are we betting?”

I leaned into him and whispered, “If I’m right, you can tie me up again.”

He gave me a hot look, shifting against the leather seat.

We’d spent as much of the afternoon as possible naked in his bed. Enjoying each other, napping, snuggling under the covers.

We’d talked about our families too. Both the good memories and the bad. Dane told me stories about his time with Ashford in the Army, things I’d never heard before. It was strange to think of how close Dane had been with my brother before I even knew him. But at the same time, that connection between us was comforting. Like we’d always been destined to meet.

Ugh, I was getting so romantic about this man. It wasn’t a good thing.

He’d asked me that afternoon to keep seeing him after this trip was over, but how could that possibly end well?

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