The Forever Girl (Wildstone, #6)(24)

Except Maze. She remained at Walker’s side while he looked over Dillon’s nose.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly to Dillon, eyes filled with genuine remorse as she apologized.

And here Walker had thought her in her wet tank top was the hottest thing he’d ever seen, but Maze accessing her emotions and acting on them definitely moved to first place.

Dillon waved her off. “We’re even,” he said, sounding very nasal. “You saved Poly.”

Maze nodded and, with an unreadable look at Walker, walked off. She went straight for the cookies.

“What?” she asked defensively when he caught her double-fisting a pair of snickerdoodles.

“Those things’ll kill ya.”

She shrugged, like she wasn’t sure she had a long life span coming anyway. “At least I’ll go happy.”

“Will you?”

Her eyes landed on his. “I’ll have you know I’m very happy.”

“With John.”

“Oh my God,” she said, and narrowed her eyes at him. “You damn well know his name, you’ve got the memory of an elephant.”

Something he wouldn’t mind not having when it came to her, because remembering every detail was painful. “The opposite of you, apparently,” he said lightly.

She scowled and went back to ignoring him.

Once Dillon stopped bleeding, the groom-to-be claimed fun lake time over, and they all began the walk back. They were spread out on the trail, Dillon and Caitlin in the lead. Dillon had the backpack this time and Caitlin had Roly and Poly on their fancy leashes. She was telling a story that was making Dillon laugh and restoring his good humor.

He really did appear to love her, Walker had to admit, at least in his own way. And who the hell was he to judge anyway, when he couldn’t seem to manage the sort of intimacy that a relationship like that required.

Footsteps came up behind him, and he knew who it was without looking because his blood pressure rose. “Nice shot back there, Tex.”

Maze blew out a breath. End of conversation, he thought. But then she slowed down so they were side by side. “I didn’t mean to do that,” she said.

“Your life motto.”

She gave him a shoulder nudge that was really more like a shove as she passed him, which suited him just fine because . . . short shorts.

“Are you staring at my ass?” she asked.

“Yes.”

She tripped over her own feet.

Heather came along and grinned at them, looking far more carefree than she had when she’d arrived yesterday. The reason for that was apparent. Jace had Sammie on his back, piggyback style.

“Look, isn’t it beautiful out?” Caitlin called back, pointing to the green rolling hills. “To our right are the bluffs, where ten thousand years ago, glaciers from the ice age melted and created craters that eventually became Rainbow Lake. And if you look to our left, there’s a perfect specimen of a ponderosa, can you believe it?”

Dillon laughed and hooked an arm around her neck. “She narrates like that in bed too. It’s cute. ‘This here is your funny bone, and then south, we come to a bone that isn’t funny at all, it’s perfectly hard and—’”

Maze, who’d been walking and munching on a PowerBar, made a face like she was gagging. “Hey, trying to eat here.”

Jace, his palms on little Sammie’s legs as he held her firmly on his shoulders, ducked a little to look into Maze’s eyes. “Everything okay here?”

“Yep.”

Jace took her hand and pulled her in closer. “Sure?”

Maze gave the guy a smile. “Yes, I’m sure, you goof. I’m fine.”

Jace nodded, brushed a kiss over her lips, sent Walker a long gaze that held some sort of warning in it, and moved off.

Maze waited until Jace was out of earshot. “I’ve got a problem,” she said.

The smile that crossed Walker’s mouth happened all on its own. He liked Maze a lot of different ways, but whenever she had a problem, it made her good and pissed off, and a good and pissed off Maze was one of his favorites. All that defiant energy and scorching attitude really did it for him. The only thing better was Maze in his bed. Because a turned-on Maze was adventurous, curious, single-minded, generous, and holy-shit hot. “So dump him.”

She blinked. “What?”

“Dump the asshole if you don’t like him. Jeff seems like the kind of guy who’ll move on without issue.”

She rolled her eyes at the “Jeff” and shook her head. “I’m not talking about Jace.”

He shrugged. It’d been worth a try. “Okay, so what’s the problem?”

“I don’t like Dillon.”

“You don’t like ninety-nine percent of the population.”

“I’m serious, Walk.”

He met her gaze. “We both know this is Caitlin’s call.”

Maze drew a deep breath. “Even if we think she’s making a mistake?”

We. The last time they’d been a “we,” she’d had his ring on her finger and he’d thought his life couldn’t get more perfect. “Probably we shouldn’t be throwing stones from glass houses.”

Her mouth tightened at the truth of that, and they walked some more.