He smiled proudly. “Good. I thought you’d like them. Next, I got you these...” He opened the passenger door and handed her a plain brown paper bag.
When she peeked inside, she blinked, uncertain for a moment what she was seeing.
“Flower bulbs,” he said, clarifying what she suspected. “The lady at the nursery said it’s a mix of hyacinths, tulips, crocuses and daffodils. She said now’s the time to plant them so they’ll bloom next spring.”
“But—” she glanced to the concrete sidewalk in front of her office “—where—?”
He pulled out the home listings again and tapped it. “The house on Bonita has a big flower bed all the way along the front porch.”
Her heart lashed her ribs with a staccato tattoo as the meaning behind his gifts crystallized.
Rocking chairs on a front porch, a flower bed...
“And since I know you’re not a baker...” He reached in the back seat again, then handed her another sack with a bakery insignia on the side. Three boxes were nestled inside and the top one read Country Wheat—Ready to Bake.
“The directions say you just thaw and let the dough rise and bake for fifty minutes. I got sourdough white, whole wheat and cinnamon swirl.”
Moisture dripped onto her cheeks. “So my kitchen will smell like fresh-baked bread,” she squeaked through her tears.
“That was the dream, right? Your goal for the perfect home?” His bright smile dimmed when she continued sniffling softly. “Summer? What’s wrong? I thought you’d love all this.” He swept an arm toward the chairs on the back of his truck. “You said this was what you’d longed for since you were a kid.”
She bobbed her head and wiped her nose. “I did say that. And I do love that you remembered. That you tried to—” Her voice broke, and she had to pause and take a deep, calming breath. “The thing is, Nolan, in the last couple of weeks I’ve discovered a flaw in my dream.”
“A flaw?” He set the bag of frozen bread dough on the seat and faced her with a deep furrow in his brow. “What flaw?”
“I realized that the dream home I wanted wasn’t about rocking chairs or flower beds.”
His shoulders drooped, and he heaved a disappointed-sounding sigh. “Oh.”
“It’s not even about Whisperwood...or any one place, for that matter.”
His mouth firmed in a line of frustration. “I don’t get it. You said that you wanted roots and—”
“I know. But I realized that the home I really wanted, the real dream wasn’t about where the house was or what went on the porch or in the yard. The home I wanted to build was about who lived in the house with me. Roots, family, love. That’s what home is.”
The shadows of disappointment lifted, and he nodded. “I see.”
“My dream now is about...who.” Her throat tried to close with knots of emotion, but she shoved the rising melancholy down. This was her chance to tell him what her heart had always known. Raising her chin, she rasped, “It’s about...you.”
Nolan fell back a step, and he sucked in a sharp breath. “Oh.”
She dug her fingers into the front of his coat to keep him from backing any farther away. “I didn’t tell you that to pressure you or make you feel guilty or awkward. I...maybe I shouldn’t have even told you at all.”
“Summer—”
“I mean, I know you have your own plans for the future. You have a job that you love, that you just got back after fighting for it, and you have to travel for the FBI, so—”
“I left the FBI.”
She had to let his words replay in her head to be sure she’d heard him right. A low buzz started in her ears, and her pulse thumped harder as a hope she was afraid to acknowledge swelled in her chest. “But you told me once that you had worked too hard to get where you were with the FBI to walk away,” she said, her confusion rife in her tone.
“As I recall, what I said was I wouldn’t walk away without good reason. And you, my dear, are a damn good reason.”
“Me?” She was afraid to move, afraid to breathe and break the spell. She tried to quell the surge of expectant excitement that coiled inside her, ready to spring.
Nolan rolled his eyes and mimicked her, like he used to when they were kids. “Me?”
His wide, warm palms framed her cold cheeks. “Yes, you, you goof. It’s always been you, even when I was too dense to recognize the truth. I love you, Tadpole. And not just as my best friend, though you are that. You’re the reason I bought the truck. It’s more practical for ranch life. For Whisperwood. I want to make Whisperwood my home because you’re here. I love you. Will you let me be the reason your house is a home? Will you marry me?”
Joy sprang inside her, and, with a squeal of happiness, she leaped into his arms. “Oh my God, yes! Yes, yes, a thousand times yes!”
Epilogue
One month later
“To Emily Virginia Colton!” Hays shouted as he raised his glass of champagne to the family members assembled in the ranch house living room—a tight fit now considering all the new members of the clan.
“Cheers!” they all chanted and clinked their glasses. From the couch where she sat cradling her newborn daughter, Bellamy smiled at Donovan beside her and kissed the baby’s head.
Nolan cast his glance around at all of his cousins, their spouses and children—and, most important, at Summer beside him. Happiness, more intoxicating and bubbly than the champagne in his flute, swelled inside him. Family. Love. A bright future. He was rich in every way that mattered.
“To Maggie and Jonah finally setting a date!” Forrest called out, lifting his glass.
“Hear, hear!” Nolan said as everyone drank to the engaged couple.
Beside him, Summer raised her glass. “To Davies and Colton Investigations!”
“Soon to be Colton and Colton Investigations,” Nolan amended, giving his fiancée a wink.
“To your new partnership,” Dallas said, “and I don’t just mean your PI gig.”
“Yes! Cheers!” Avery said, raising her sparkling cider to toast.
His family cheered and drank to them, and Nolan pulled Summer close for a kiss.
“And to the twins’ excellent two-month doctor checkup,” Summer said, returning a toast to her best girlfriend.
Avery bobbed a nod of thanks, adding, “And to them both sleeping for five hours straight last night so Mama and Daddy could get some rest!”
“Funny, I don’t remember us resting,” Dallas said and waggled his eyebrow seductively.
“To Dallas gettin—” Jonah started before Maggie elbowed him in the ribs with a wide-eyed look.
The Coltons laughed and raised their glasses again.
“To Forrest’s new permanent position with the Whisperwood PD!” Donovan said, and hearing his master’s raised voice, Alex gave a happy bark.
The room reverberated with “Cheers!”
“Whew!” Rae said, swaying a bit before she took a seat on the couch beside the new parents. “I think I’m going to be sloshed before we finish toasting all the good news in the family!”
Amid the chuckles, Josephine said, “So be it! After the last few trying, trauma-filled months this family has had, we deserve a spate of good news to toast.”
“To getting sloshed with good news!” Forrest shouted as he drained his champagne glass and refilled it. A rousing chorus of “Hear, hear!” and “I’ll drink to that!” lifted around Nolan.
“To...” Jonah said, then hesitated. “Hell, there’s got to be something else we can toast. I feel like we’re just getting started.”
Moving to the center of the room, Hays raised both his empty hand and his glass of bubbly. “To the Coltons. May our family’s love, laughter and joy continue for years to come!”
All the flutes clinked in salute. “To the Coltons!”
* * *
Don�
�t miss other books in Beth Cornelison’s
McCall Adventure Ranch miniseries:
Rancher’s Hostage Rescue
Rancher’s Covert Christmas
Rancher’s Deadly Reunion
Rancher’s High-Stakes Rescue
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Under the Agent’s Protection
by Jennifer D. Bokal
Prologue
Wyatt Thornton cocked back his arm as far as he could, then released his grip. The stick somersaulted through the air. Kicking up the remnants of last winter’s snow, his dog, Gus, barked happily and gave chase. The land, these miles of foothills in the Rocky Mountains, belonged to Wyatt. It was more than a home, it was a refuge—his place of escape, where the world hardly knew he existed.
A place he could truly be alone.
Gus returned and dropped the slobbery branch at Wyatt’s feet. After ruffling the Lab’s ears, Wyatt once again picked up the stick. This time, he threw it harder, sending it sailing through the clear blue sky. With another excited bark, Gus raced after it, disappearing into the woods.
Turning his face to the sun, Wyatt closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. He’d never gotten used to the sweet, fresh Wyoming air—not when compared to the miasma of exhaust fumes, cigarettes and sunscreen he had lived with for more than a decade in Las Vegas. The scents of the Strip, everyone used to joke. After exhaling fully, Wyatt again inhaled. A primal wail shot through the silent morning and his breath caught in his chest.
“Gus?”
Heart pounding and legs pumping, Wyatt rushed between the shadows cast by the towering trees.
“Gus,” he called. “Where are you, boy?”
He heard a yelp in the distance and his chest contracted. All the dangers that might have befallen his faithful companion came to him in one horrifying rush. A newly awake and hungry bear. An unseen ditch and the dog’s broken paw. Poor footing on a slope that ended with Gus maimed at the bottom of a ravine.
He stopped and listened. The silence was total, not even interrupted by the whisper of a breeze.
“Gus? Where are you?”
His call was answered with a bark. The noise ricocheted off the hills, coming from everywhere and nowhere at once. Wyatt stopped and focused.
The first bark was followed by another, this one louder and definitely from his right. Wyatt’s pulse spiked, and he followed the sound up a hill. The soft ground crumbled underfoot, and he scrambled on hands and knees to the top of the rise. One hundred yards in the distance stood the old schoolhouse, the farthest point on his land.
Made up of a single room, the century-old stone foundation was still intact. There was a hole in the ceiling where part of the roof had collapsed in the corner. Gus stood on the threshold, whole and healthy. He barked, and his tail was a wagging blur.
Wyatt wiped his hands on the seat of his pants, while his racing heartbeat slowed. “There you are,” he said between breaths as he half jogged to the schoolhouse. “Come here.”
Gus barked again. With a whine, the dog looked over his shoulder.
“What is it, boy?” Wyatt asked.
Gus darted into the dilapidated building. Wyatt approached and stopped short, recognizing the smell of decay. It was like the rot of a slaughterhouse, but stronger.
Swallowing down his deepest sense of revulsion, he stepped slowly into the structure.
Gus stood near a far corner and pawed at the floor. Behind the dog was the unmistakable form of a corpse.
“Easy, boy,” Wyatt said to his dog. With a slap to his thigh, he added, “Come here.”
With one last look at the lump on the floor, Gus moved to his master’s side.
No matter how long he’d been out of the game, the skills Wyatt had developed over years of training rose to the surface. He began to catalogue all the details—some obvious, others more subtle.
The deceased was male and Caucasian. His age appeared to be between 25 and 40—quite a range, but a wild animal had gotten to his face and throat, making a more exact guess impossible. Wyatt looked around for blood splatter on the walls or floor.
There was nothing.
Wyatt moved in for a closer look, kneeling next to the body.
Dressed in a flannel shirt, down-filled coat and lined denim jeans, John Doe wore the same outfit as three quarters of the state of Wyoming. What made him interesting were the accessories—his hiking boots were high-quality and retailed for over 700 dollars per pair. Wyatt knew that fact as he had a pair himself. The treads were worn, and the tops were scarred with scuff marks. John Doe also wore a top-of-the-line smartwatch. The screen was blank.
But there was no visible sign of trauma. No blackened bullet hole to the chest. No knife wound to the side, crusted over with blood. It was almost as if this man had wandered into the abandoned schoolhouse and died.
No, Wyatt thought, correcting his thinking, there was no almost about it.
Cardiac arrest? Perhaps.
Wyatt began to question the scenario before him. Perhaps John Doe—a wealthy tourist, no doubt—had lost his way while hiking in the mountainous terrain. Maybe he’d sought shelter from the frigid temperatures in the old schoolhouse. But in the mountains, it wouldn’t have been enough.
The lack of snow was deceptive. The last few nights the temperature had dropped into the low twenties, maybe even high teens. Either way, it was cold enough for someone to die from exposure. It happened all the time, so much so that it was hardly news anymore.
Then again, there were other things that Wyatt would’ve expected to see and didn’t. He touched the flagstone floor. It was smooth, cold and inexplicably spotless. Wyatt inspected the corpse’s hands. The fingernails were clean and smooth. It meant that John Doe had hardly struggled in the wild to survive.
No footprints.
No injuries.
No clues.
He pulled a wallet from the man’s back pocket and checked for ID. There was an Illinois driver’s license in the name of Axl Baker. Conflicting feelings of trepidation and adrenaline dropped into Wyatt’s gut. It was the same feeling he had at the beginning of every new case. And even though the scene felt familiar, this time it was different. This time, Wyatt would have nothing more to do with the dead guy on the floor.
Because Wyatt Thornton had le
ft the FBI for a good reason. And nothing, not even an unexplained death, could force him back to work.
Copyright © 2019 by Jennifer D. Bokal
ISBN-13: 9781488041488
Colton 911: Deadly Texas Reunion
Copyright © 2019 by Harlequin Books S.A.
Special thanks and acknowledgment are given to Beth Cornelison for her contribution to the Colton 911 miniseries.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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Colton 911--Deadly Texas Reunion Page 23