Wind River Wrangler (Wind River Valley #1)(78)

“I’m definitely going to have to pay Maud a visit and ask to see your mother’s artwork. It sounds incredible.”

“Like your chandelier. It touched me in the same way. I could feel how alive the wood was. The twining of the other wood felt like it was living and growing before my eyes. I thought the blue, green, and transparent crystals represented how it breathed.”

Roan smiled a little. “I like the way you view the world, Shiloh, seeing the beauty of it.”

“I try to do that in my writing, too. I want my characters to leap off the page and breathe for my readers. I want them so alive that my readers believe they truly are real.”

“Your mother had art with paints and you have art with words.” Roan stood, taking their plates and flatware to the kitchen sink.

Shiloh stood and put the lids on all the emptied containers. “I like to think I got the best from both my parents,” she murmured, her heart heavy because she missed them so much. Roan walked over to her. As she straightened, his arm went around her waist and drew her against him. The gesture meant so much to her, as if he felt her grief.

“Come on,” he urged, “there’s more for you to see. . . .”

As Roan guided her beneath his arm, he directed her to the wide, well-lit hall. He halted in front of one door halfway down on the left. “Go on in. Tell me what you think.”

She met his gray gaze, saw warmth and need in them for her. “Another surprise?” She saw his male mouth curve.

“Darlin’, didn’t I promise you surprises last night?”

Chuckling, Shiloh put her hand on the brass doorknob and twisted it. “Indeed you did and you’ve been a man of your word.” He released her and stepped aside as she pushed the door open.

Shiloh gasped as she stood in the entrance. She recognized the room because it was the master bedroom that Roan had shown her previously. Only, it wasn’t a hollow shell anymore. She wasn’t sure where to look first.

The drapes were pulled aside to reveal the huge window where light flooded the large bedroom. There was a mahogany sleigh bed against the far wall, covered with a colorful patchwork quilt. Shiloh automatically thought that Roan’s mother had made the quilt for this bed. There were mahogany bed stands carved exactly like the ones out in the living room on each side of the king-size bed. As if to counter the dark wood, near the door to her right was an antique blond oak dresser. And on the other side of the door, another one of the same design and size. There was a settee in one corner, covered with a gold-colored fabric similar to what she’d seen in the chandelier hanging in the living room. And nearby a stool with the same fabric color and a rocking chair. Shiloh could picture herself curling up on that feminine-looking settee and reading one of her books on her iPad.

She was thrilled to see that the drapes were exactly like the quilt bedspread. They were heavy and hung to the cedar floor. No one lived in Wyoming without seriously heavy drapes across windows during the winter. It absorbed the cold air at the window. She saw a straight-backed chair in another corner where a person could sit down and take off his boots for the day. Everything had been thought out, was practical and yet beautiful.

“This—” she gasped, “is so incredibly gorgeous, Roan!” Shiloh turned to him, seeing the pride in his eyes over the work he’d done to bring this room together.

“Like it?”

“Love it.” She shook her head. “Your poor mom must have gone to a LOT of work to not only create the bedspread, but the drapes. It’s a stunning design idea.”

“My mom had a year to make them,” he reassured her. “And she wanted to do it. If I’d tried to refuse one of her quilts, she’d likely have killed me,” Roan chuckled.

Shiloh grinned. “Your mom sounds so wonderful.”

“Well,” Roan said lightly, placing his hand in the center of her back, guiding her toward the master bathroom, “maybe one of these days you’ll get to meet her.”

She didn’t have time to answer as Roan ushered her into the bathroom. She halted, feeling as if transported to another time and era. Roan had already laid down the ivory porcelain tile throughout it. The floor was heated so it would be warm in the winter. The huge area was decorated with a slipper tub with brass claw feet and Shiloh, who knew quite a bit about antiques, figured it was probably a bathtub from the late 1800s that Roan had somehow scored. There was a large oval quilt rug of the same patchwork colors as out in the bedroom. The windows were large, allowing southern light to flood the whole area. There were patchwork quilt drapes that did not go to the floor, tied back, to allow the light in.

“Ohhhh,” she whispered, moving into the tiled area, “a spa!”

“Thought that might appeal to you,” Roan said.

The spa was circular, the inside a pale blue and Roan had put dark blue tiles around the outside of it. There were three small steps up and into the lovely spa. Roan had tiled the outside of it with the same blue ceramic tile. To her right was the bathroom, the door open. It was large and roomy.

Shiloh moved to the other side of the room and stood, mesmerized. The shower was large enough to easily fit two people. There were two round raindrop showerheads on opposite sides of it. The tile was light blue on the floor. Along the first three feet of it, the tiles were made of that rectangular glass she loved so much. This time, the glass tiles matched the variety of colors in the patchwork quilt drapes and rug. The rest of the one side where there was no glass was of the same ivory-colored tile as the floor.