by Nika Dixon
Marshall’s promise to keep her safe and protect her hung around his neck like a noose. He had no idea where she was, or if she was happy and well cared for and safe. The night Alexander died, she’d been taken from Marshall’s arms before she woke up and delivered to a police-protected hospital room in Pikes Falls, then carted off to God knew where before he could even say hello, goodbye, or I love you.
Now she was out there somewhere, trapped in a jurisdictional minefield, with everyone fighting over a piece of a pie that only she could dish up.
The longer he went without knowing how she was, the more he worried. Her life was her own now. She was truly rid of Alexander and everything he held over her. She could come and go and do and be whatever she wanted.
Where she wanted.
With whomever she wanted.
His only shining light was Lucy. His niece was having a hell of a time dealing with the aftermath of her ordeal, but despite the panic attacks and nightmares, Lucy’s one confidence was that wherever Emma was, she was just fine.
If Lucy could believe it, then hell, Marshall should be able to believe it, too. Except his conviction was too buried in adult life lessons for him to make it stick.
Shit happened. People died. People left.
On the opposite side of the fence, Devil snorted in agreement and dipped his head.
“Yeah, buddy.” He patted Devil’s neck. “Right?”
The horse moved away, following the fence toward the front of the house. In a few minutes, he would pass by going the other way on his way down to the barn, where he would turn and repeat the loop over and over and over. Every day for the past three weeks, he’d walked the same depressed path, stopping only whenever Marshall brought him apples. The grass along the fence was now a crushed dirt trail, a near-permanent marker of just how much she was missed—by man and beast.
Marshall leaned on the top rail, placed his chin on the back of his hands, and stared across the field at the mountains. She’d said the land could heal just about anything, but he couldn’t find any solace in the view.
She’d ruined that, too.
Danny’s white pickup turned onto their road then disappeared out of view when it passed in front of the house. A moment later, the white truck crunched to a stop in the loose gravel around the side of the house.
Marshall refused to see where his brother was going—the house, the barn—it didn’t matter. No sense getting his hopes up that the sheriff was here with anything but the same nonanswers.
Danny joined him at the fence. He put his foot up on the bottom rail and his hands on the top rail and stared out at the mountains in silence.
Marshall sighed, cursing himself for doing exactly what he’d told himself not to do—get his hopes up that Danny would have news.
“Here.” Danny flipped his arm toward Marshall. A large white card in his hand caught the breeze and fluttered.
Marshall refused to look. If he ignored it, then his brother would eventually take the hint and leave him to his misery.
“Don’t be an ass,” Danny snapped. “Take it.”
Marshall snatched for the card. It took him a few moments of deciphered reading to recognize that the paper he was pinching was a plane ticket to Chicago.
And it had his name on it.
He snapped his eyes up to Danny, who was grinning like an idiot.
Marshall’s heart skipped, then jumped with a speeding beat. “You found her?”
Danny nodded. “I found her.” He slapped a yellow sticky note on top of the ticket. Written across it was the name of a hotel and a room number.
“You found her.” Marshall started to smile.
“I found her.”
Marshall laughed, grabbed his brother in a hug. “You found her!”
“I found her!” Danny shouted back, pounding Marshall on the back.
“When? How?”
Danny shoved him toward the house. “Let’s just say we owe Davey a firstborn or something equally monumental. Dad’s packing you a bag. You have ten minutes then we’re out the door, so get your ass in gear.”
Marshall started forward, changed his mind, and spun back to grab Danny once more in a bear hug. Then he ran for the house. He dashed through the kitchen and nearly plowed into his father, who was carrying a packed duffel bag.
Hank shoved the bag at him. “You’ll need this.”
Marshall grabbed for it, not caring a single bit about having a change of clothes or a toothbrush or anything else. With a twist and turn he stepped around his father and headed back to the door.
“Hold up!” Hank ordered. “There’s one more thing.” He grabbed Marshall’s hand and set something small and cold into his palm. “I made your ma a promise that this would be yours someday. Now it is.”
His mother’s gold engagement ring glinted in the light.
Marshall couldn’t get his words to work. He’d talked himself through giving Emma such a ring a thousand times over the past three weeks, and for each dream of making it happen, he’d talked himself out of it with just as much gusto.
How could he ask her to marry him when he didn’t even know if she loved him?
Did he love her? Hell, yes. But she’d been locked in a room for fifteen years. She’d finally found freedom, and at the first opportunity, he was going to try and tie her to a lifetime commitment?
He couldn’t do it.
He tried to give the ring back, but his father refused to take it.
Hank backed down the hallway toward his bedroom. “Do you remember why we bought the Cutty farm?”
“What?” Marshall stared at his father, wondering what the hell the Cutty farm had to do with anything. Danny was waiting. Emma was waiting. He needed to go.
“Answer the question, boy. Why did we buy the Cutty farm?”
Marshall rocked his head back and forth. “Because it was a good investment.”
“And what were we going to do with the house?”
Marshall followed his dad into the bedroom. “Fix it up.”
Hank opened his dresser drawer. “And do you remember what you were going to do with the porch?”
“Widen it. Wrap it around. Make room for a porch swing and some chairs. Look, Dad, I need to go—”
“And the trees in the back?”
“Chop ’em down.”
Hank lifted a book from the drawer and placed it on the end of the bed, directly in front of Marshall. Emma’s sketchbook.
“Why?” Hank asked. “Why chop ’em?”
Marshall stared at the art book. “So you could see the mountains.”
Hank flipped the cover up and slowly turned the pages, pausing just long enough for Marshall to recognize everything she had put to paper. The animals were in full representation—Tink, Daisy, Castor, even Drift and Devil had their portraits included. There were landscape views of the ranch. Sunsets and sunrises. Rocks and hillsides. Everything had life and color and beauty.
Just like her.
Hank paused, a page half lifted. “What color were you going to paint it?”
“What?”
“What color were you going to paint it?” Hank repeated slowly. “The house.”
“Yellow.”
Hank let the page fall over, exposing the next sketch.
It was Marshall’s vision—exactly as he’d pictured it done.
The Cutty house, cleaned up and painted yellow, with a wide wraparound porch. The giant oak tree sat in the side yard, a tire swing dangling over the lawn.
The next page showed a sketched window frame with a mountain view. It was a view from the window in the spare bedroom, if he followed through with his plan for clearing the trees away from the side of the house. If you looked out that same spot now, all you’d see would be branches from the crab-apple tree and the overgrown cedars.
Hank moved to a half-finished picture shaping up to be a beautiful room filled with art supplies. The angle of the room and shape of the windowsill reminded him of the study on the lower
floor.
Marshall wondered why she hadn’t finished the picture. She’d always said she never left a drawing unfinished.
When his father skipped to the next page, Marshall was shocked to see a portrait of himself. And damn it if he didn’t look happy.
His heart cracked. The weight of his mother’s ring burned his palm. He looked at the sparkling stone and the gold setting. “I don’t understand. Why now? Why not…”
“Michelle?”
His mother had been gone for years. Why had Hank kept the ring all this time? Why hadn’t he brought it out for Michelle? Marshall sure as hell had planned to ask her to marry him—and probably would have by Valentine’s Day…if she’d still been alive.
“Hell, boy. I know you loved Michelle. But Emma. Well, now, that girl…she loves you back. And the only one who can’t see it is you.”
Marshall swallowed down the lump in his throat.
Hank turned the pages back to the picture of the yellow house. “This one is yours. It’s already done. In your head. With or without her, it was going to happen eventually.” Then he turned back to the sketch of the half-finished art room. “But this… Well, the way I figure it, this one is hers. Only, she can’t finish it because you haven’t made up your damn mind. Hell, you still call it the Cutty place, when you damn well know it’s the Marshall Boyer place. It’s your name on the damn papers, boy.”
Marshall traced his hand across the edge of the half-finished picture. The longer he stared at it, the more he could see it as it could be. The back room of the house faced south, giving her the perfect spot to have the longest hours of daylight. He’d initially considered leaving it as a den, but now that he had the start of her dream to hold on to, he could see it as she might.
He looked down at the ring in his palm, holding it over the picture of the art room.
Her dream…was his dream?
Hank pushed Marshall’s fingers closed over the ring. “I’m not one for fancy lovey-dovey talk. That was your mother’s expertise. I’m going to just come out and say it. Get yer thick-headed ass out of whatever hole you’ve gotten yourself stuck in, get on that damn plane, find our Emma, and bring her home where she belongs.”
Continuing on with his bizarre desire to hug everyone, Marshall threw his arms around his dad’s shoulders. “Thanks, Dad.”
A truck horn beeped, long and impatient.
Hank patted him on the back, then shoved him away with an embarrassed bluster. “Your brother’s waiting. Now git!”
“I’m gittin’!” Tucking the ring deep into his front pocket, he grabbed his duffel and ran out the front door.
Danny was parked out front, the engine running. Marshall tossed his bag into the back and hopped into the passenger seat. Danny stomped on the gas, spitting gravel back onto the stairs.
Sam’s truck pulled into the end of the lane before they could exit. The two trucks stopped side by side, Sam’s window beside Danny’s.
“You off to the airport?” Sam asked.
Marshall made a face. “You know, too?”
Sam grinned. “Hell, by now the whole damn town knows.”
“Come to see us off?” Danny asked.
Sam rolled his eyes. “Drift got out. Thought maybe he was over here moping with Devil. Three weeks now that damn dog has had his furry ass planted at the back door, whining and carrying on. Then today before sunup he started clawing at the door and barking his fool head off. I let him out, figuring it was rabbits, but he took off. Wondered if maybe he might be over here.”
“Haven’t seen him,” Danny answered, glancing over at Marshall.
Marshall shook his head. “Me, neither. Maybe check the barn. He might be out with Kent.”
Sam bobbed his head. “Yeah. Sounds good. I, um…” Sam’s sentence trailed off, and he stared past them both, his eyes widening in surprise.
Marshall turned to see what Sam was stuttering about.
With the gait and grace of a purebred racehorse, Devil ran full speed down the dirt road past the front of the farm. Mane flying and tail straight back, he raced past the front of Danny’s truck and continued on down the road to Absolution.
Flat on his heels, head down and going for all he was worth, sped Drift.
The duo took the dip down to the creek at full speed and carried on up the hill on the other side.
While the three men stared in astonishment at the disappearing dust cloud kicked up by the bizarre race, a flash of white bounded across the field by the house, making a beeline for the creek bed.
“Um…did I just see that?” Sam asked slowly.
Danny jerked his head around and stared at Marshall.
Marshall tipped his head with a frown. “Yes?”
“Has to be,” Danny insisted.
“Has to be what?” Sam demanded.
With his heart racing a happy, excited beat, Marshall pounded his hand on the dash. “Go, go, go!”
“Hoo-ya!” Grinning like a maniac, Danny spun the wheel and headed after the racing animals.
“Hey!” Sam shouted.
Marshall laughed along with his brother as Sam did a fast U-turn to follow them.
At the top of the next hill, Devil stood silhouetted against the blue sky, framed next to a barefoot woman in a bright-yellow sundress, while Drift jumped and barked a dizzying circle around her.
Danny parked in the middle of the road.
Sam squealed to a stop at an odd angle beside them. Slamming the door of his truck, he walked up to Danny’s window. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” he muttered, shaking his head at the white flash popping up out the ditch.
Tink bounded up to the road then trotted to Emma, her tail in the air.
“You Boyers sure have a weird-ass group of animals,” Sam muttered.
“Your dog,” Danny pointed out.
“Shit. That’s right.”
Marshall gazed at the woman in the midst of the farm-raised zoo. Pain flashed through him to see the cast on her arm. But the happy realization that she was here—that she was free—shoved everything away except for the lung-squeezing fear that she would say no.
Danny punched him in the shoulder. “You getting out, or what?”
Chapter Sixty-Two
Emma was losing the battle with her inner courage. The second Marshall stepped out of his brother’s truck, she wanted to run to him, but instead, she forced herself to watch and wait. Three weeks was a long time. What if he’d changed his mind? What if he didn’t remember his promise?
The closer he came, the faster her heart raced.
Why was she so nervous? She hadn’t had any problem talking to him before. Heck, he’d seen her naked, for goodness’ sake! This should be easy. It was just words.
“Hi,” she said when he stopped a few feet in front of her.
“Hi,” he answered back.
She took a tentative step closer. “How’s Lucy?”
“Good. Strong. She’ll be over the moon to see you.”
“Good. That’s…good.”
“How are you?” He took a step closer.
“I’m okay. I just—I, um…” She stared at the ground. How the hell was she going to make this work? She’d recited it a hundred times in her head during her federally escorted flight back to Pikes Falls, then her police-escorted two-hour drive to Absolution. Every word was memorized, every nuance, every properly placed smile.
But one look at Marshall Boyer, and she’d forgotten every damn word.
He leaned closer. “Em?”
She looked up. “Yes?”
“Are you okay?”
She sucked in a deep breath, then let it out with a whoosh. “I wanted to ask you something.”
The corner of his mount quirked up. “You came all the way from Chicago, barefoot, to ask me a question?”
She bobbed her head. “Yes.”
“Okay.”
Her brow furrowed. “Okay?” How was it okay? She hadn’t even asked the question yet.
He snorted.
“Okay. Ask your question.”
“Oh.” Right. Of course.
“Em?”
“Uh-huh?”
“What’s the question?”
“Well…remember when you said I could stay…here…until I got on my feet?”
“Yes.”
She plunged forward. “Did you mean it? That I can stay? Until I get on my feet?”
When he shook his head, her heart dropped into her stomach.
“No,” he said firmly. “I don’t want you to stay until you get on your feet.”
The tentative door she’d opened to her heart slammed closed. “Oh. Okay, I—”
“Em.” He gently slid his fingers beneath her plaster cast and lifted her arm, letting it rest on his forearm. Then he gripped the fingers of her good hand. “I don’t want you to stay until you get on your feet, honey. I just want you to stay.”
“I don’t understand.” She frowned. “I can’t stay?”
“Do you want to?”
Panicked, she threw the question back at him. “Do you want me to?”
“Would you just ask her already!” Danny shouted from over by the trucks.
She glanced behind him to where Danny and Sam were standing. They waved gleefully. She would have waved back, but Marshall was still holding her fingers.
“Ignore them,” he muttered.
“Ignore what?”
He rolled his eyes and said loudly, “This would be so much easier without a peanut gallery.”
There was a chorus of snickers from the duo behind him.
“What would be easier?” She was completely confused. He’d told her she couldn’t stay, but she could stay. Which was it?
He let go of her.
She stared at her free fingers, fearing she had her answer. Then he went down on one knee. She looked down to see what he’d dropped, but there wasn’t anything on the ground around her but gravel and dirt. Then her eyes locked on the sparkling glint of a diamond shining in the morning sun.
“Hat!” Danny shouted.
Marshall yanked his hat off his head, but the hand holding the ring never twitched. “I love this land, Em. But it’s empty without you. Nothing here, nothing anywhere in the world, is worth anything to me anymore without you in it. If you need to stay until you get on your feet, then stay. A day, a month, a year, I’ll take it. I’ll take whatever you are willing to give. No locks. No demands. Stay as long as you want. As long as you need. And when you need to go, we’ll go. No matter where. No matter how long. City. Country. Island. I don’t care. I love you, Em. From the moment you crashed into my life, my heart was yours.” He took a deep breath and smiled up at her hopefully. “Miss Emmaline Katz, would you do me the immense pleasure of becoming my wife?”