by Paula Graves
“Where are you now?” J.D. asked.
“In Rick’s Expedition. We’re on our way to the hospital.”
“See you when you get here.”
They went back into the waiting room. “All the Coopers accounted for,” J.D. told Massey with a grin.
“I wasn’t betting against y’all,” Massey replied. He looked at Mike. “You hungry, Mike? I saw a vending machine down the hall. My treat.”
Mike looked at his father, as if for permission. J.D. nodded, and Mike headed off with Massey.
J.D. turned to Natalie. “I think Massey wanted to give us some alone time.”
She looked up at him, trying to read his mind. She hadn’t really bought his dismissive tone on their last phone call—she knew he’d been trying to protect her from Cordero and his men. But did that really change anything? He was still a man who’d held a torch for his dead wife for over a decade. Solving her murder might not change anything.
“I don’t want to say goodbye to you,” he said bluntly.
Or, maybe, she thought, solving Brenda’s murder had changed everything. “So don’t.”
“I have to go back to Gossamer Ridge. My whole family’s there. My brother’s getting married and my parents depend on me to keep things running at the Marina. And Mike’s starting high school this fall and he’s really looking forward to it—”
“I’m not asking you to give up your life,” she said softly.
“Are you asking anything at all?”
It was an excellent question, she realized. What did she really want from J.D.? A house, a two-car garage, two kids and a collie in the fenced-in backyard?
“I want you to want to be with me more than you want anything else in the world,” she blurted aloud, realizing with immediate mortification what a huge commitment she’d just asked him to make.
“Okay,” he answered. “Anything else?”
She stared at him. “That’s it? No negotiation?”
His mouth curved in slow, sexy grin. “You don’t negotiate with someone who’s giving you everything you want, sugar.” He bent and kissed her, a slow, sweet kiss that deepened so gradually that she was halfway to unconsciousness before she realized just what a spectacle they were making of themselves in the middle of the Ridley County Hospital waiting room.
She tugged until he let her go, but only far enough to wrap his arms around her waist. She traced the broad contour of his chest through his T-shirt. “I’ve been thinking about leaving Terrebonne for a while. Even before Carrie’s murder. Guess this is as good an excuse as I’ll ever get.”
“How soon can you move?”
She laughed. “I don’t know. There are things to take care of.” Her laughter faded. “Soon. I promise.”
He stroked her hair. “This Saturday?”
“For a visit or for good?” she asked.
“Your choice.” He dropped a kiss on her temple and whispered in her ear. “Either way, you have a bouquet to catch.”
Epilogue
Brenda’s grave was sheltered by the boughs of an old oak that grew near the edge of Piney Grove Cemetery. J.D. knelt by the granite marker and brushed the leaves away from the base, then ran his fingers across the etched letters of Brenda’s name.
“We got him, baby. He’s in jail and he’s not getting out.”
He dropped his hand away from the silent stone, feeling strangely alone. So many times, when he’d visited this place, he’d felt Brenda’s presence like a warm breath against his cheek; but all he felt now was a light summer breeze drifting over him.
She was gone. She’d been gone for years, in a better place than this screwed-up world he still lived in. Only his thirst for vengeance had kept her alive for J.D.
But he’d found justice for her. It was done.
He could finally let her go.
“We thought we’d find you here.”
J.D. turned to find his daughter, Cissy, standing a few feet away, her arm around her brother’s, Mike’s, shoulders. He smiled at his children, his chest aching from a bittersweet concoction of love and regret. “Just came by to tell her it’s over.”
“Is it?” Cissy crossed to him, putting her arm around his waist. “Really over? For you, I mean.”
He hugged her tightly. “Yeah.”
“And you’re ready to move on?”
J.D. glanced at Mike, who was wincing a little at his sister’s question. J.D. had told his daughter about Natalie, knowing if he didn’t, Mike would beat him to it. He hadn’t been sure how his daughter would take the idea of a new woman in his life, but he should have known better. Cissy was thrilled for him and eager to meet Natalie.
“I’m ready,” he said aloud, smiling at his daughter.
She gave him a quick squeeze, and even Mike managed a smile. J.D. knew his son liked Natalie a lot more than he liked the idea of his father having a romantic relationship. He’d get over it. Eventually.
Cissy looked at her watch. “We’d better get a move on. It’s almost two.”
J.D. gave a start. He hadn’t realized it was getting so late. Natalie should be arriving any time now, and he needed to get to the lake house to meet her.
He put his arms around both his children, drawing them with him as they left the cemetery behind. “Come on. We have a wedding to attend.”
IT MIGHT BE AARON’S wedding day, but the groom wasn’t the only Cooper brother as jumpy as a rabbit. J.D. hadn’t heard from Natalie since she’d called as she was leaving Terrebonne for the long drive north that morning. Even with Cordero out of the way, Hamilton Gray and Travis Rayburn remained threats. Catching Gray had closed the door on Brenda’s murder, but it hadn’t ended the danger. For now Gray was tucked away in the Ridley County Jail, but he was a wealthy man with a long reach who now hated Natalie with all the obsession he’d felt for Brenda.
“Relax,” his brother Luke murmured, clapping his shoulder. “She’ll be here soon. If she’s anything like you’ve described her, she can handle whatever Gray can throw her way at this point.”
Yes, Natalie was tough and capable, but J.D. couldn’t be sure just how much power and influence Gray still might be able to wield from jail.
Before he could answer Luke, the door to the study opened, and Gabe burst in, his pretty brunette girlfriend, Alicia, in tow. Alicia held out her left hand, flashing a bright diamond on the ring finger. Her smile was even brighter. “She said yes!” Gabe exclaimed.
Luke hugged Gabe, while J.D. kissed Alicia’s cheek. “Run while you can,” he murmured in her ear.
“Hey!” Gabe smacked J.D.’s arm. “Don’t scare her away.”
“J.D., after the wedding, can I pick your brain about Hamilton Gray?” Alicia asked.
Gabe tugged her toward the door. “No shop talk today, Dr. Solano.”
“Soon to be Dr. Cooper,” Luke added.
“He might become Mr. Solano,” Alicia said tartly.
Over her head, Gabe shook his head. No, I won’t, he mouthed. They left at a sprint, the study door rocking back against the wall as they brushed past.
J.D. laughed. “I don’t know which one of them is going to be harder to keep up with.”
“Good thing they’ve got each other.” Luke grabbed the tie out of J.D.’s hand. “Here, let me do this for you.”
“I think that’s my job.”
The sound of Natalie’s voice in the open doorway made J.D.’s heart skip a beat. She looked like a vision, making him blink a couple of times to make sure he hadn’t conjured her up out of sheer desperation to see her.
She was dressed in something green and frothy that seemed to dance over her slender curves, vibrant and alive. Her smile lit up the room like sunshine, and J.D. wanted to bathe in her glow for the rest of his life. “You made it.”
She crossed to him, holding her hands out. “I made it.”
He clasped her hands in his, then pulled her into a tight hug. “I started to worry when I didn’t hear from you.”
“I was on the pho
ne with my father most of the drive. He’s very involved in making sure none of Cordero’s remaining thugs give Bayside Oil any trouble.” She lifted her face for a kiss.
He obliged her with fierce hunger, breaking away only when his brother’s loud throat-clearing filtered through his brain. He shot his brother a sheepish grin.
Natalie smiled at Luke as she started to tie J.D.’s tie. “Good to see you again, Luke.”
“There’s a whole heap of Coopers you haven’t met yet,” Luke warned her. “Including Cissy. I saw her outside, and she was a nervous wreck about meeting her daddy’s new squeeze.”
Natalie chuckled. “I’m a nervous wreck about meeting her.”
“Don’t be.” J.D. wrapped his arm around her waist. “She already loves you for saving Mike’s life.”
“We all do,” Luke added, his expression going serious.
“He saved me first.” Natalie’s arm tightened around J.D.’s waist. “He’s a brave kid. Crazy, but brave.”
Abby, Luke’s pretty brunette wife, stuck her head in the door. “Wedding’s ready to start, y’all.”
J.D. twined his fingers with Natalie’s as they followed Luke and Abby to the backyard, where the flattest part now contained rows of chairs for the wedding guests. Aaron and Melissa had opted for a small wedding—mostly family, though Melissa’s parents and a few people from Melissa’s law firm attended, and a few of Aaron’s fellow deputies had managed to align their day off with the wedding.
Aaron’s fellow deputy, and brother-in-law, Riley Patterson, was the best man; and Melissa had chosen their sister-in-law—and Riley’s wife—Hannah as matron of honor, but that was the extent of the wedding party.
“I thought you said most of the guests would be Coopers,” Natalie whispered as she and J.D. settled in their seats behind his father and mother. “This would be a lot of Coopers.”
J.D. grinned. “Well, my Uncle Roy and his wife, Jean, have six kids themselves. You met Rick in Terrebonne.” He pointed out Rick’s dark head in the crowd. “That’s his eldest brother, Jesse, over there by the hydrangea—” J.D. craned his neck to find the rest of his cousins, but processional music started playing on the stereo system on his parents’ deck above, forcing him to pay attention to the wedding.
It was the first time he was able to sit through one of his siblings’ weddings without aching with regret for Brenda’s loss: he realized with surprise after the smiling bride and groom kissed to seal their union. In line to congratulate the happy couple, he turned and caught Natalie’s hand in his. She gazed up at him with a sexy spark of heat she seemed to throw off every time he touched her.
“Alicia said yes to Gabe today,” he told her.
Natalie smiled. “I’ll be sure to congratulate them, too.”
“They’ll be marrying soon—and you know what that means.”
She shook her head. “What?”
“I’ll be the only single Cooper.” He shook his head. “Not a distinction I’m going to like very much.”
Her lips curved. “No?”
“No.” He kissed her knuckles, grinning as her eyes darkened. “I’ll be looking for a wife. Know any prospects?”
Her smile broadened to a grin. “I just might.”
Behind him, his brother Jake muttered, “Get a room.”
Laughing, J.D. and Natalie moved forward together, hand in hand.
ISBN: 978-1-4592-0602-1
COOPER VENGEANCE
Copyright © 2011 by Paula Graves
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