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“Isabelle.” He stopped and turned toward her, his hand sneaking into her hair, his mouth brushing a soft kiss over hers before he pulled away. “You’re so confident about everything. It kills me that you’re waiting for me to leave.”
Tears suddenly burned her eyes, her nose, her throat. She shook her head, trying to deny them.
“Do you want me to leave?” he asked softly.
She could barely speak. “No,” she managed to whisper, terrified as she said it. If he wanted to go, she wouldn’t stop him. You couldn’t stop a person from leaving.
“Good. Because I love you, and I’m going to stay, and if you didn’t want that, it would break me.”
One tear escaped her control and slipped down her face to his thumb, but she swallowed the rest of her tears. When she was sure she wouldn’t sob, she took a deep breath. “I love you, too. I want you to stay. With me.”
Everything inside her twisted up with terror that she’d said such a thing. But Tom just pressed another kiss to her mouth and smiled. He took her hand and they walked again as if she hadn’t just given voice to her most terrible hope.
“I hope you don’t regret saying that,” he said.
She did. She regretted it, but only because it was true.
Tom cleared his throat again. “Because I was thinking that I could retire in a year and move here. I can check into work at the sheriff’s department or maybe even the park service. They need a lot more law enforcement than you’d think.”
“Here?” she asked. “So we’d live together?”
“I’d get my own place. You’ve got your work. You need space.”
She did, but... It was easy with him around. Surprisingly easy. Sweet in a way she hadn’t expected. In a year...anything might be possible. But she couldn’t say that to him, could she? What if he didn’t want to move in? What if he was hoping she wouldn’t ask?
She looked at him, his face beautiful in the falling light, his eyes tight with worry when he glanced at her. What if she could just say what she wanted?
“It’s just an idea,” he said. “We’ve got a whole year to think about it.” He was giving her an out. He knew she’d been mapping out escape routes for fourteen years.
She didn’t want to escape from Tom. “I own quite a few acres, you know. I’ve always liked the idea of building a little studio.”
He frowned as if he didn’t understand.
“I could have my own space to paint. To be alone. But I’d only be a few feet away from the house.”
“Oh.”
They turned up her driveway, still strolling as if her heart hadn’t gone wild with panic.
“Bear might not approve,” Tom said, his tone still careful, but he was smiling now.
The panic slowly filtered from her blood, replaced with a relief that made her muscles ache. “He’ll have a year to get used to the idea,” she said.
“So will you.”
She wasn’t sure she needed a year. In fact, that seemed like an awfully long time. “I miss you when you’re gone,” she admitted.
“Yeah? I’m pretty lovesick when you’re not around, Isabelle.”
The twilight had erased the years from his face, and his smile was full of boyish chagrin. She could see what he must have looked like twenty years before. That sticky, scary love was a warm mess inside her.
“Come on,” she said, tugging him up the porch steps. “I have something that might make that better.”
“Oh?” The hopeful rise of his eyebrows made her laugh.
“It’s not a blow job. Not yet, anyway. Just come on.”
He didn’t balk when she led him toward her studio, which was good progress. He’d told her more about his brother’s death, about finding his body and being terrified but still unwilling to leave him alone. She warned him now when she was starting a new commission. He only needed the heads-up and he was fine, but she’d covered up her newest work, just in case.
