Last Night's Kiss

by Shirley Hailstock

  Rosa took in a breath. She could smell Adam’s presence here. She closed her eyes, taking in the scent of him. She held it, hoping she’d be able to remember it when she was huddled around a fire in Finland or some other distant land.

  “Rosa?”

  She jumped as if she’d been caught doing something wrong. It was wrong. Adam had never invited her to his room. She was invading his privacy.

  “I thought I heard someone.”

  “I came to say good-bye.” She recovered, but her voice sounded a little strained. “I’m leaving for the airport in a little while. I wanted to tell you what a pleasure it was to meet you and spend some time with you.”

  She didn’t approach him, but he came closer to her.

  “Are you leaving?” He sounded hurt, like he didn’t know.

  “It’s time. I have to go back to my home and then to some jobs.”

  “I guessed you would.” He lowered his head. Rosa took a step toward him.

  “You’re going to be all right, Joel. You have Adam and your grandfather. The community here is wonderful. You’ll make new friends and fit right in. School will open soon. In a while you won’t even think about all that happened to you.”

  “I know. People have been very friendly so far.”

  “And you have my phone number and my family’s numbers in case you need to find me.”

  He nodded.

  “See you later, then?”

  “See ya.”

  Rosa turned and walked down the hallway. She was at the top of the stairs when Joel called her name.

  She turned and he came running down the hall. He hugged her. “Thank you,” he said. “I’m glad you were there when I came.”

  “Me, too,” Rosa said. She pushed back, her body full of emotion and love for the young boy. “You take care of Adam,” she told him. “He’s going to need a lot of understanding.”

  Joel laughed. “I will.”

  Rosa went down the stairs. Time had come to find Adam. He’d be the hardest to leave, but she had to do it. Medea told her Adam was back. He was outside in the barn. Taking a deep breath, she hugged Medea one last time and went out the door.

  The barn was only twenty feet from the main house, but it seemed to take her a lifetime to cross the yard. She heard voices before she got there. She recognized Adam and Bailey.

  “Listen to me. You can’t stay here. You can’t bury yourself on my account.”

  “Dad, there are things you can’t do anymore.”

  “Don’t you think I know that?”

  “Well, you don’t act like it. Look at you, gallivanting around here on horseback with your heart condition.”

  “I never had a heart attack on the horse. I had it in the truck and Rosa was there, not you. If you want to take that job, you can go. If you want Joel to stay here, he can. If you want him to go to D.C. with you, he can do that, too. It’s your decision, but don’t make it on my account. We already have a manager running the ranch. I’ll do what Joy and Rosa have got me started doing. I’ll finish writing and recording those memoirs. That will keep me busy.”

  “I’ll think about it, Dad.”

  “Really think about it?”

  “Really think about it.”

  A moment later, Bailey came out of the barn. When he saw Rosa, he stopped. “He’s all yours,” he said. “Maybe you can make him see sense.”

  Bailey stopped and hugged her, then continued toward the house.

  Adam came to the door. They looked at each other, neither speaking. Words had flown from Rosa’s head. She could think of nothing to say.

  “I brought the cameras back,” she finally said.

  “You could have left them.”

  “The keys. I’ll leave them with Liam on the way to the airport.”

  Rosa couldn’t believe she was talking about boxes and keys when this might be the last time she saw the man she was in love with.

  “I saw Joel,” she said. “I told him to take care of you. Kids like that. It makes them feel grown-up.”

  Rosa didn’t see Adam move, but in a flash he was in front of her, his arms around her, his mouth on her, hot and seeking. She melted into him, unable to do anything else. She carried nothing in her hands since she’d returned the camera box. Her arms went around his neck and she returned the kiss with as much ardor as Adam showed.

  It was like the first time he’d kissed her. The passion and emotion she felt then came to her now. The knowledge of her leaving was clear in the kiss. It was good-bye forever. She seared her mouth to his, accepting his invading tongue. The fire of his hands on her back as they roamed up and down her frame set her soul burning. She wanted it to go on forever, have the world stop at this moment and never resume its forward spin.

  But she knew that wouldn’t happen. Adam slid his mouth from hers and Rosa lay limply in his arms, her head on his shoulder, her breath shallow. After a moment, she found the strength to push herself back.

  “I have to go now.”

  He dropped his arms and stepped back. Rosa took a step back also. She couldn’t say good-bye. Her voice wouldn’t allow her to speak over the huge knot in her throat. She turned and began walking.

  At the fence, before she reached the road that would lead back to the rented house, she realized Adam hadn’t uttered a single word.

  Chapter 14

  Everything about New York seemed louder when Rosa arrived at her condo. While she wasn’t on a major thoroughfare, she heard noise she hadn’t noticed in the past. Rambling around the rooms, she thought of nothing but Adam for days. She was going crazy, wanting to call him, wanting to hear the sound of his voice. She’d pick up the phone and then return it to its cradle.

  She didn’t have to be in Finland for another week. Usually she savored this time, getting things in order, preparing for something new, but her past, the past summer, was on her mind. Unable to take it any longer, she called the airport and got the first flight to Dallas.

  Stephanie picked her up. “This was a surprise,” she said as Rosa threw her overnight bag in the back and got into the decorating van Stephanie used for her business. “Aren’t you leaving for Europe in a few days?”

  “Yes, but I needed some time with family.”

  “And would family’s name be Adam Osborne?”

  Rosa glanced sideways at her sister-in-law as she pulled into the traffic exiting the airport. Rosa saw right away she wasn’t going to be able to hide her feelings from her perceptive sisters-in-law. What one knew, they all knew. And that meant Luanne and Mark, her sister and brother-in-law, knew, too. And possibly her brothers. No, certainly her brothers.

  “Adam has issues of his own to work through.”

  “Fell hard, did you?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” Rosa said.

  “Okay.” Stephanie immediately stopped asking questions. Rosa liked that about her. Initially the two of them had not been friends, mainly because of Rosa protecting her brother Owen from what she thought might be heartache. Now she knew no one could protect another person from love.

  “How is everyone? I saw Owen and Dean,” Rosa said to fill the air with something other than her thoughts of Adam.

  “Yes, they told me they came to visit you this summer and met Adam.”

  “They only stayed a short while. We had dinner together and then they were gone.”

  “Everyone else is fine. Luanne, Mark, and the baby were here a week ago. He’s getting very big. Erin and Digger came for the art gallery exhibit. They brought Samantha, who’s quite a young lady now.” Since Stephanie and Owen met at a private showing at the Women’s Museum, they go back each year.

  They didn’t talk anymore until Stephanie parked in the driveway of the house where Rosa had grown up. Not much about it had changed since her last visit. Owen had redone the inside, but the outside and the main rooms were the same. Rosa felt good that something in her life remained constant and unchanging.

  “Do you have to go back to work?”


  Stephanie got out of the van and opened the door to get Rosa’s suitcase.

  “It’s nearly closing now and my assistant, Marian, is closing up today. But I do have to run to the grocery store and pick up some things for dinner.”

  “We could have stopped on the way. I can go with you.”

  “Oh no, you go on in and unpack. I’ll be right back.”

  Rosa took her suitcase and walked up the steps to the front door. She saw Clare almost as soon as she closed the door. Clare was the carving on the newel post that Digger had done when he was thirteen. They all rubbed it when leaving the house for good luck.

  Rosa approached Clare and rubbed her head. “Maybe you’ll be lucky for me coming, too,” she said aloud. It was a superstition of the family, rubbing Clare for good luck.

  “She was for me.”

  Rosa’s eyes flashed up at the sound of the voice. Adam stood in the doorway leading to the living room. She blinked to make sure she was seeing reality and not some poltergeist that her mind had created.

  “Adam?” she said tentatively.

  “I couldn’t live without you,” he said.

  “Adam,” she repeated.

  “I’m here. I’m real.”

  Rosa started running. Tears streamed from her eyes as she crashed into him. Her arms circling his neck, their mouths merging.

  “How did you know I’d be here?” she asked several moments later when she came up for air.

  “You didn’t answer your home phone. Joel gave me your cell number, only he got it wrong and I called here. Stephanie told me you were on your way. I got on the first plane.”

  “Why?”

  “Rosa, I’m in love with you.”

  “But your dad? Joel?”

  “I had a talk with Dad. And I understand what you told me. I can’t live his life and he can’t live mine. I want to be with you, wherever you are.”

  “I’m going to be traveling for the next couple of years. I have contracts to fulfill. I’m not accepting any more. After they’re finished, I’m quitting. It’s time. People like Tommie can take over. I’ll recommend her.”

  Adam kissed her. “I’m glad to hear that. I’m taking the job in D.C. Wanna move there and marry me?”

  “What?”

  “I know you understand the question.”

  “Yes…I mean no.”

  “Come on, sit down and I’ll explain it.”

  Rosa was familiar with the room. The piano her mother used to play. The photos of all her brothers and sister at various stages of growth. The furniture was different than it had been when she was growing up, but Owen and Stephanie, an architect and a designer, lived here now, and the room had taken on a new look. She sat on the sofa. Adam sat next to her, his arm around her shoulders.

  “I’ll be taking Joel and moving into the company condo until I can find a place, a house. The anchor’s position starts next month.”

  “What about Bailey?”

  “I offered to have him come and stay with us, but only a bulldozer will get him out of Montana. We have a manager overseeing the ranch. He might even turn it into a going concern again. Medea promises to keep Dad in line.”

  Rosa laughed. She knew the housekeeper was capable of keeping that promise.

  “I also have Joy Stapleton-Jones looking in on him.”

  “How’d he feel about that?”

  “He suggested it. She’s been in love with him for forty years. Finally they might get together. I didn’t want to wait that long for us.”

  Rosa leaned back and kissed him again.

  “So, what do you say? Will you marry me?”

  “Yes,” Rosa said. She turned into his arms and kissed him soundly.

  “You know Vida told me she suggested a double wedding to you. What do you say we tell her to go ahead and make it happen?”

  “I think that’s the best idea I’ve ever heard.”

  Dear Reader,

  Last Night’s Kiss is the fifth and final book in the Claytons series. When the previous book, On My Terms, was released, the mail was overwhelming for the series. Thank you all for loving the Claytons and for wanting more. I’m happy to say the Claytons are enjoying a worldwide audience. Translated editions of my books are available in Spain, Iceland, and Chile, and omnibus editions are available in England and Australia.

  There will be other clans and other series for you to fall in love with. I’m developing one now, but can’t spill the details just yet.

  Thanks again and y’all come back for more adventures in love. If you’d like to hear more about Last Night’s Kiss, and other books I’ve written or upcoming releases, please send a business-size, self-addressed, stamped envelope to me at the following address:

  Shirley Hailstock

  P.O. Box 513

  Plainsboro, NJ 08536

  You can also visit my Web page at the following address. Also, take a moment to join my e-newsletter. http://www.geocities.com/shailstock.

  Sincerely yours,

  Shirley Hailstock

  DAFINA BOOKS are published by

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  850 Third Avenue

  New York, NY 10022

  Copyright © 2008 by Shirley Hailstock

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  Dafina and the Dafina logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.

  ISBN: 0-7582-3619-0

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Copyright

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14