Hot Silver Nights: Silver Fox Romance Collection

by Ainsley Booth

  Oh no. “Was that what the siren was for?”

  “Yeah. I don’t know how badly she was hurt. Rick said the ambulance is on the way back to the hall. Ford is with him.”

  “Thanks for the call. I’ll run by the hospital and see how Gary is doing.”

  “Careful. The roads are slippery.”

  Gary didn’t have any family left in town, his parents retired to Florida and he didn’t have any brothers or sisters. She and Gary tended to ignore each other because it was just awkward, but they weren’t on bad terms. If he didn’t have anyone to wait with him, she could do that.

  She was anxious to talk with Ford, but that would have to wait.

  Diane rushed into the hospital. The roads were definitely slick but she made it without incident. She carried the vase of roses in with her. She could leave the groceries in a cold car, but not flowers. When she walked into the waiting room, her ex-husband was alone, pacing the small space. His back was stooped, his gray hair stood up at all angles.

  “Gary?”

  He straightened and whirled around. His expression of worry morphed into something darker. “Don’t you dare tell me this was some kind of bad luck!”

  Diane supposed she deserved his anger for the lousy things she’d blamed on bad luck during their marriage. She set the vase on a table in the corner and approached him slowly, as if he was a wounded animal. “No, I won’t tell you that. I’m so sorry this happened, and I pray that Laura will be okay, but it was just an accident. A stupid, unfortunate accident.”

  He seemed to deflate before her eyes, as if that burst of anger had been all that was holding him up. “How could this happen? I only just found her again. We’ve only had a couple of years together. I can’t lose her now.”

  She drew him down onto a padded chair. “Don’t think that way. You’re going to have lots of years together still.” She sincerely hoped so. “What do you know about her condition?”

  “They said she has some broken bones, but they rushed her into surgery because they were concerned about internal injuries. Oh God, I could lose her.”

  “She’s in the best place she can be, right? We have to trust the doctors.”

  “I guess so.”

  “Do you want me to call the kids?”

  “I’d rather wait until we know how…how she is.”

  “Okay. What about the other driver?”

  “What?”

  “The driver of the pickup.”

  Gary shrugged. “Bumps and bruises, I guess.” He burst to his feet. “God, I hate waiting.”

  “I know.” At first the thought of having a conversation about their marriage right now came from a desire to distract him for a few minutes, but then Diane knew she had things she had to say to him. “I’m sorry I wasn’t the best wife.”

  Gary sighed. “I’m sorry I hurt you.”

  She waved away his apology. “I guess it was a miracle we stayed together as long as we did. We married each other on the rebound, didn’t we?”

  He let out a short bark of a laugh. “Yeah. I was mad at Laura for taking that internship in Seattle.”

  “I was furious at Ford for dumping me for Irene.” That was all in the past now. “But we got a couple of great kids out of the deal, didn’t we?”

  “We sure did.”

  “It wasn’t all bad, was it?”

  “No, it wasn’t bad. It just wasn’t all that good.” He touched her shoulder tentatively. “Honestly, if Laura hadn’t come back to town, I wouldn’t have ended our marriage. I would have hung in there.”

  “But then you wouldn’t have felt that passion again.” Now that she’d been with Ford, she understood that.

  “Yeah.” The word ended on a sob and Diane gave him a hug.

  “It’ll be okay,” she murmured and patted his back. She was glad to have had this moment to clear the air with him, but she hoped like hell Laura would be okay.

  “Diane?” She turned from Gary to see Ford striding into the room and her heartbeat picked up. In the back of her mind, she noticed that his gait was getting smoother. Rick and Eve followed him in. “Any news?”

  “Still waiting,” she told them.

  Eve and Rick crossed to Gary, but Ford stopped in front of Diane. “I got your message.”

  “I got the roses. Thank you.” She took a breath. “But I don’t think we can make our own luck.”

  He frowned and took a step back. “I see.”

  She grabbed his hand and tugged him over to the other side of the room. It was so small that the other people in the room would probably be able to hear them, but this couldn’t wait any longer. “Because I no longer believe in luck. There’s no such thing. Good luck. Bad luck. It’s just life. Didn’t you tell me that?”

  The corner of his mouth quirked up. “Yes, but I may have been wrong.”

  “Oh no, don’t do this to me. I’m finally admitting to you that there’s no luck. No need for good luck charms and lucky plants. No forces other than our own that affect our lives.”

  Ford took her into his arms and she sighed with the sense of relief, the sense of rightness that came from being folded in his embrace. “I don’t know, right now I feel damn lucky to be holding you again.”

  Diane’s heart swelled and one of those feelings, a real good feeling, buzzed through her body from head to toe. Okay, she’d keep the feelings. They came from inside of her, nowhere else.

  A movement out of the corner of her eye drew her attention. A group of other villagers streamed into the room. Gary was surrounded by supportive friends. She shouldn’t have been surprised. Best Bay was like one big family.

  Diane didn’t care if there were a dozen witnesses or if the rumor mill would have a field day about what happened between them in the hospital waiting room. She took Ford’s face in her hands and pulled him down for a long kiss. It was an apology. A commitment. A declaration. A sample of what was to come. A lot to put into one kiss, but Ford’s hum of satisfaction let her know he understood what she was saying.

  Ford’s lips brushed her ear. “I was about to beg,” he whispered.

  “I don’t want you to beg,” she whispered back. “Well…maybe later…in bed.”

  A man in scrubs stepped into the waiting room. The conversations cut off and a tense silence filled the room. Ford met her eyes with a concerned gaze and he reached for her hand. She held her breath while Gary talked with the doctor.

  Her ex turned back with an expression of joy on his face. “She’s going to be okay.” Relieved laughter spread through the room. Gary followed the doctor out of the waiting room and the crowd began to disperse. Ford squeezed her hand.

  “I rode here with Rick and Eve. Do you think I could get a ride home?”

  She slipped her arm around his waist and tried not to grin like a fool. “Want to come to my place? I have a car full of groceries, so I think I could pull some dinner together.”

  As they walked toward the door, Diane snagged the vase of flowers and stopped at the nurse’s station. She glanced at Ford. “I hope you don’t mind.” She placed the flowers on the counter. “Could you see these get to Laura Varney’s room?”

  “Of course.”

  Diane threaded her arm through Ford’s as they headed out into the cold dark night. “I kept the card.” When they reached her car, she turned to Ford. “You know I’m probably always going to have the tendency to over-react.”

  “That’s because you feel things so deeply. I can handle it.”

  She laughed and tossed him the keys. “I don’t think I’m going to be able to keep my hands to myself. It’ll probably be better if I’m not behind the wheel.”

  After Diane got in, Ford closed the passenger door and then climbed behind the wheel. “Don’t distract me too much.”

  She wouldn’t forget the road conditions were less than ideal. “Okay.” She pulled off her gloves and ran her fingers through his snow-wet hair. “Is this too distracting?”

  He glanced at her before he pulled out of
the parking lot. “No.”

  It was too bad they had to be bundled up against the cold, the only bare skin was on his face, and she wouldn’t touch him there while he was driving. She placed her hand on his thigh instead. His muscles twitched beneath her palm. “What about this? Too distracting?”

  It was too dark to see his reaction clearly but she thought she detected his jaw tightening. “No.”

  “Good.” She left her hand there. When they stopped at a traffic light, she slid it up to his groin. He moaned and she grinned. “Distracting?”

  “Di...”

  “Well, hurry home.”

  He grumbled. “I’m going as fast as I can.”

  She took her hand away and placed it in her lap. “I just love you and I can’t wait to show you how much.”

  “You mean I shouldn’t expect dinner right away?”

  “Hon, you won’t care about food once we get to bed.”

  He laughed, put his hand on her thigh and squeezed. The car swerved slightly and she almost didn’t care when tingles danced over her skin.

  “Hold onto the wheel!”

  “Don’t worry. We’re here.”

  “Already?” She’d been so focused on him, on her arousal and her joy, she didn’t realize they’d reached her street.

  Luck? Fate? The power of love? Whatever it was, they had their second chance. They carried in the groceries and then closed the bedroom door against the world to begin the rest of their lives together.

  Check out the first book in the series: Choose Me

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  About the Author

  Natasha Moore fell in love with the written word as soon as she could read. She writes sexy contemporary and erotic romance because she believes that stories of love and hope are important, and that there’s nothing better than a happy ending. She’s a snowbird, spending the winters in sunny Florida and the rest of the year in beautiful New York State with her real life hero who is happy to tell everyone that he’s her inspiration.

  www.natashamoore.com

  natasha@natashamoore.com

  Retrosexual - Ainsley Booth & Sadie Haller

  A Frisky Beavers Story

  Foreword

  Stew:

  I haven’t been the most attentive husband lately.

  Adrienne:

  He’s the chief of staff to a brand new prime minister. I get it.

  But…

  Stew:

  Yeah. That “but”. That’s the problem. I’ve got a lot on my plate, but none of it is more important than my marriage.

  FOOTNOTES:

  * No hipsters or metrosexuals were harmed in the making of this book

  * This story takes place at the beginning of Prime Minister (Frisky Beavers #1), but can be read as a standalone silver fox story

  The Frisky Beavers series:

  Prime Minister

  Dr. Bad Boy

  Full Mountie (releases April 4, 2017)

  Visit www.friskybeavers.com to learn more!

  Chapter 1

  STEW

  “Don’t work too hard,” she says to me as she kisses me goodbye in the morning.

  It’s still dark.

  We both know I’m not going to take her advice. So I kiss her instead, and I’m not quick about it. I love my wife. Not only because she packs my lunch every day, but because she pads to the front door with me—me in a suit that won’t stay un-rumpled for more than an hour, her in a bathrobe I bought her three Christmases ago. And yes, I know a bathrobe is a terrible present for one’s wife.

  She’s hard to shop for.

  I’m also not talented in that regard.

  But I can kiss her, so I do. A long, slow goodbye, my fingers tangled in her hair, my lips soft against hers.

  I love the taste of Adrienne like this, all warm and undone. “Stay up for me tonight,” I whisper against her mouth.

  She stiffens. “You won’t be home for dinner?”

  So much for a nice kiss goodbye. I sigh and wince as she pulls away. “Did I say I would be? I can try.”

  “The kids haven’t seen you in three days.” She bites her lip and raises her eyebrows, expecting me to fill in the blanks.

  I was travelling with the prime minister over the weekend, and we got home late last night. And I’m sneaking out at the crack of dawn because right now, my job is trumping my role as Dad.

  But it’s a big week.

  We’ve got a slate of new interns starting today, hand-picked from graduate programs across the country. They’re going to work closely with leaders, including the newly elected prime minister, to ensure that all voices are represented at the table, including our country’s youth.

  And before they arrive, I’ve got the PM’s daily briefing and a metric ton of other work to clear off my plate so I can spend most of the day orienting the intern assigned to the PMO in between all the usual fires I’ll need to put out.

  On the other hand, my kids haven’t seen me for three days. And my wife is glaring at me. “Right. Okay, I’ll be home for dinner.”

  She shakes her head. “Don’t promise me that if you don’t think…”

  She’s right. I swear under my breath. “I’m sorry. I don’t know when I’ll be home. But I hear you, and I’ll do my best.”

  Compromise and honesty might not be sexy, but they’ve served us in good stead. We had no idea what was going to happen when the last government toppled and the election was called.

  No idea that Gavin Strong fever would sweep the nation, and my candidate—the thirty-nine-year-old bachelor from Vancouver, the fighter, the hockey player, the man of the people…okay, I knew he had a certain appeal.

  Both personable and incredibly capable, my boss is a smart, switched-on guy. But smart and switched-on don’t always resonate with the voters.

  I knew we’d do well.

  I had no idea we’d sweep to power.

  Or that I’d end up the chief of staff to the nation’s leader, and my wife would suddenly be solo-parenting our three kids.

  I tug her close. “I love you. I will do my best. And if you fall asleep before I get home tonight, I won’t wake you up.”

  “You can wake me up,” she whispers, brushing her mouth against mine. “We can be quick.”

  “One day…”

  She laughs. “I know. One day.”

  The new intern is a PhD candidate from the University of Ottawa, Ellie Montague. She seems smart, and by mid-morning, I’m pretty sure she’s regretting taking the three month position because it’s what I call a Gavin’s Not Happy day.

  Don’t get me wrong. My boss not being happy is a good thing. It means he’s zeroed in on a problem and he’s going to fix it.

  This is why we’re in government. This is why I never see my wife and kids—because we’re going to fix shit.

  It just comes with a good dose of yelling when incompetence is uncovered.

  Today’s furor is over fundraising and lobbyists. It’s a legit concern, one on which we want to distinguish ourselves in a big way from our predecessors, but we’ve got a private event in five weeks that could need to be chopped if the PM decides to take a hard line on influencers.

  So after Gavin lays down the law—pivot the fundraiser or ditch it completely, because we will not be in the pockets of the wealthy—I pull the new girl into my office for a working lunch.

  “Sorry about this.” I gesture to the stacks of briefing books on my desk. “I suppose I should take you out to lunch for your first day, but this is the pace at which we work.”

  “It’s fine,” Ellie says, giving me a smile that quickly fades to a serious look. “What do you need me to do?”

  There’s something about this one. I think she means it, like she really wants to make a difference. Of course, she’s still got stars in her eyes about the PM—they all do, it’s a fact of life. But she’s doing her best to lock that down, and I respect that.

  I pull out my lunch. Adrienne made ham and Swiss on rye, extra-tall, so I ca
n spare half. “You want some?”

  Ellie gives me a surprised look. “Sure.”

  “Feeding you is the least I can do.”

  She laughs. “Not literally.”

  “Okay, it’s the least my wife would allow me to do.” I point to Adrienne’s picture on my desk. “She made the sandwich, so it’s divided by her rules.”

  “That’s sweet.” She says it like she knows she’s supposed to, but it really is. That’s my wife. I’m a lucky man, but the bar is set high.

  I dig two cans of Diet Coke from the box under my desk and hand her one. She cracks it open with one hand while she reaches for the file on the fundraiser.

  We eat in silence. Five minutes of chewing and thinking, and for the last half-minute, Ellie’s forehead pulls tighter with each quiet tick of the second hand on my clock.

  I lean back in my chair. “What do you have?”

  “One problem with him saying that over and over again is that he’s rich, too,” she points out, licking mustard off her fingers. “And everyone knows it. Don’t get me wrong—most people like that about him. But he’s hardly one of us with the sandwiches from home.”

  I snort. “Don’t let him hear you say that.”

  “He’s a man of the people in many other ways. He knows how much a loaf of bread costs, that’s all that matters. But he’s also comfortable with these donors, right? What if it wasn’t a fundraiser for the party? What if it was…like a kick-off for a community challenge?”

  “Keep talking.” I root around in my lunch bag for the best part. “Chocolate chip cookie?”

  She shakes her head. “But I’ll take another pop if you’ve got one.”

  I toss her another Coke.

  She takes a sip, then leans in. “He shouldn’t shut himself off from business leaders. He needs to stay connected to them, and show them who’s boss. Canadians just want to know that he’s not in their pockets. They’ll be thrilled if he can turn it around, make them bend to his will.”