Shelter Mountain (Virgin River #2)(107)

“You think you’ve finally grown up, huh?”

“Possibly,” he said with a shrug. “Nearly getting killed tends to get your attention.”

“What if you could start over? What would you change?”

He thought for a moment. “For starters, I wouldn’t marry so fast. Not until I found the right woman, the kind of feeling that leaves no doubt. Jack did it right—he avoided commitment until the real thing came along. So did Preacher, although I’m not sure he did that on purpose. It’s obvious they found that lifetime thing, that forever thing, though it didn’t come to either of them early. Or easily. I didn’t wait for that. I prowled and hunted, but I think the hunt was more important to me than what I would catch.” He lifted his dark brows. “I admit I was stupid. Oh, mija, you don’t know what I’d give to start over.” He leaned toward her and said, “If I had a woman like you in my life, I think I would know what I had.”

She laughed at him. “Good God, you’re so obvious. You’re coming on to me!”

Some habits die so hard, he thought. But he was close enough to smell her sweet perfume and it addled his brain a little bit. “Dios, no! I wouldn’t dare! I’m admiring you, that’s all.”

“Well, you can stop admiring me—I’m never getting within a hundred miles of another one of you.”

“Another one of—me?”

“You’ve been through two wives and a million other women. Not exactly a good résumé, Mike.”

He leaned back on his hands and smiled at her. “For a little while, I thought you liked me.”

She lifted her eyebrows. “I’m not about to be tricked by a flirtatious man.”

He shrugged. “If you are, it will be kept in confidence, Brie,” he said, smiling at her.

“This is a beautiful place,” she said. “Why are there no fishermen?”

“It’s too shallow here for the bigger fish. This is where the young people come to be alone,” he said. “Down here where the grass is soft, the trees tall, and there are a few large boulders to hide behind. The river whispers past them while they whisper to each other. That old rock you’re leaning against—it has seen some delicious things.”

“The most delicious thing it’s going to see today is Preacher’s lunch,” she said, but she smiled when she said it.

“Thank God,” he said, teasing. “I admit, I was pretty worried. I wondered—if I gave you wine and music and you began to seduce me, how would I—”

“Get out of it?” she asked, amused.

“Not exactly, mija.” He grinned. “How would I keep Jack from killing me.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, Mike, it’s not personal, but Jack isn’t in charge of what I do. He thinks he is. But he’s not.”

“Big brothers,” Mike said. “Very annoying people…” Then he sobered and said, “I am sorry about the divorce, Brie. And the trial. I don’t know many of the details, but Jack said it was a terrible experience for you.”

“Worse than terrible,” she said. She pulled her hair out of the collar of his jacket and shook it down her back, looking upward. He found himself hoping a few strands would remain when he reclaimed it. “There are a lot of scary people out there to put away, some worse than others. It was a hard one to lose…one of the biggest trials of my career—a serial ra**st—and I lost. He walked, and he’s guilty as hell. That’s not going to happen to me again.”

“What went wrong?”

“My witnesses, my victims ran like rabbits. I can’t prove it, but I suspect he threatened them. If I ever get another crack at him, I’m going to put him away for life. But that kind of criminal just pulls a territorial. He’s going to get out of town—it’s what they do.”

“It took a lot of strength to take that on,” he said in admiration. “You’re amazing.” He stood up and put out his hand to her. “You’re welcome to come back in a little while and break my heart, mija,” he said. “But right now, let’s go back to town. Let’s grab a cup of coffee and give the lovers another hour together.”

“Breaking a few hearts interests me,” she said, putting her hand in his to stand. But when they were both standing, she didn’t pull her hand away.

He should have let go and stooped to gather up their blanket, but he didn’t want to release her hand, small and soft but strong in his. He smiled at her. “I think the last time I had this feeling come over me when a girl held my hand, I was thirteen. You’ll be good at it, I think. Breaking hearts.” Still, she didn’t pull away, didn’t break the spell. It was he who finally let go, stooping to close up their basket, pick up the blanket. He handed her the folded blanket. “Thank you for today, Brie.”

“It was a nice day,” she said, her smile genuine. “You didn’t seem to have any trouble finding the right word.”

And, Mike thought, there are no words for what I’m starting to feel….

Paige walked out the bar’s back door with a plastic garbage bag in her hand, tied off tightly so as to not let a whiff of garbage escape to tempt the wildlife. She went across the wide dirt yard where she, John, Jack and often Rick liked to park their vehicles. The Dumpster sat under a big old tree and was used by everyone on the street, not just the bar. She lifted the heavy lid, but before she could toss the bag in, her wrist was grabbed in a vicelike grip and she was pulled around to the side, out of sight of the bar or the street. The garbage bag dropped to the ground and she felt something hard and cold under chin. She gasped, staring into the lethal eyes of her ex-husband, the business end of a rifle lifting her chin.