A Rugged Ranchin' Dad

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Except for Stone.

Dahlia couldn’t look up without finding his gaze pinned on her tonight. Sometimes she didn’t even need to look up. She’d always been able to sense his presence. Now, she caught Stone watching her with that cool, expressionless gaze that masked his emotions, and her stomach tightened in anguish.

It tightened even more when he spoke to her.

“Would you like to take a walk in the rose garden?” Stone’s voice was low and for her ears alone. “I know how much you like to look at the roses in the moonlight.”

Surprise couldn’t begin to explain the way she felt inside. How long had it been since he’d asked her to go for a walk with him? And alone in the moonlight?

Not for a year, at least.

Dahlia nodded and they moved around the crowd of family and friends, until they reached the path that led to her garden. The first year she married Stone, Dahlia had planted ten yellow rosebushes. And each year after that she’d planted ten more, until now she had ninety rosebushes of all colors, bordered by neatly trimmed hedgerows—a living testament to the way their marriage had thrived and bloomed over the years.

She stared in silence at the ten rosebushes she’d planted this past spring. The magnificent yellow roses, with their delicate pink shadings at the edge of the petals, reminded her of Brooke.

Stone led her to the bench and she sat down to gaze up at the stars. Music filled the air, and she had a sudden, vivid memory of dancing out here on summer nights. She could almost feel Stone’s arms around her, close and warm, the scent of roses drifting through the air.

The night sky dark and soft.

The million stars slowly appearing one by one.

And the two of them so much in love it hurt even to think of being separated for a night.

They would dance for hours, alone in their own, private little world. A world built on love and trust and sharing more than a bed. They’d shared their lives with each other, both the good and the bad.

Until last year.

Dahlia watched Stone as he seated himself next to her and wondered what he was thinking by dragging her away from the party this way. She didn’t mind, it was something he used to do all the time—but why now? And why tonight?

Her gaze raked curiously over his face, and she found herself thinking his eyes were the soft gray of a well-worn dime as longing ravaged his face.

“The roses are beautiful,” she told him nervously. “Who’s been taking care of them while I was in the hospital?”

“I have.”

Another surprise. Dahlia smiled tentatively at him, and he shrugged. But she noticed a grin was forming.

“I weeded and watered them, sprayed for bugs and deadheaded the blooms that had faded,” he explained.

Dahlia’s smile widened. “You did a great job,” she told him softly. She was so touched by his effort to care for something she loved so much, she could barely speak.

Lately, Stone hadn’t paid much attention to the things she held dear to her heart. And yet, he’d taken care of her rose garden. Why the sudden change? she wondered. And why, oh why, couldn’t he make the same effort with Field?

Stone seemed to hesitate, and then he slid his hand into hers. “I wanted you to come home and find the rose garden had been tended to in your absence.”

“Thank you.” She listened for a moment, listened to the muted laughter of the others, the music in the distance. She tried not to flinch at those long, searching looks of his, which slid along her nerve endings like stroking fingers. But it was so very hard to respond to them, to open her heart to him again.

He’d closed himself off from her after Brooke’s death. Slammed the lid down hard on everything good in their lives. Consumed with guilt, he had trashed their plans for their new house and another baby, and then decided to send his sweet, precious son away from her.

It was as though her wishes were no longer important—or real—to him. As though she no longer mattered.

And sometimes...sometimes when she was able to come out of her own pain and grief, she had to wonder if he even still loved her.

“Let’s dance,” Stone suggested. He got to his feet, leaving Dahlia to gaze blankly up at him.

He wanted to dance? With her? Out here in the moonlight as they used to do?

Stone pulled her gently to her feet and into his arms. His hands slid easily around her waist, leaving her no choice but to place hers on his shoulders. She tensed as he drew her closer, the months of being alone, of sleeping alone, making the physical contact with him awkward, yet sweetly erotic.

It was as though they were strangers, and Dahlia hadn’t felt this aware of him, in quite this way, since the very early days of their relationship. When she was first beginning to know him. When Stone was still raw and hurting from his ex-wife’s desertion and trying desperately not to fall in love again.

When, as an only child of an Air Force pilot, Dahlia hadn’t had much experience with concepts like roots or security or permanence. She’d lived in eighteen places her first twelve years of life. By the time she was in second grade, she’d learned not to make friends because it hurt too much to say goodbye.

It felt almost like the first time Stone had held her, she kept thinking as they moved slowly to the music. When he’d been scared of losing his heart all over again, and she’d never allowed herself to get close enough to put hers at risk. When the sexual attraction, bursting to life between them, had mingled with their mutual fear and distrust.

Dahlia couldn’t suppress the tremor that slid through her, and Stone asked, “Are you cold?”

She shook her head. She was far from feeling cold. Stone’s hands had always had the tendency to stray and tonight was no different. And neither was the path of fire his hands left wherever they touched.

Stroking her back.

Kneading gently under her shoulder blades.

Drifting slightly below her waist to rub the small of her back.

Dahlia took a deep, slow breath and buried her face in his shoulder, breathing in the smell of freshly washed denim and warm male flesh. The classical music stopped for an instant, and then the haunting sound of jazz pulsated toward them, the horns slow and seductive and stirring.

Without thinking, just feeling, she moved against him to the beat of the music. Her arms slid down to hang limply at her sides, while she moved the lower half of her body into the lean, hardening strength of him.

And then she gazed up into deepening, darkening gray eyes.

Stone’s arms tightened convulsively around her waist, bringing her up hard and close to him. Dahlia moved back only slightly, still holding his gaze, moving with the soulstirring beat, away from him—and into him. Keeping time to the music and losing herself in the seductive rhythm of the horn solo on the CD.

It had been so long...too long...since she’d felt this good. This alive. This...happy.

And she let the memories and the look and feel of Stone fill her mind and heart. The familiar scent and feel of him overwhelmed her with a wild sense of being thrown back in time.

Before the distance between them had grown into an impasse.

Before the pain...and the guilt.

Before their lives had been blown all to hell on that terrible August morning a year ago.

She could see the same need in Stone’s eyes that was stumbling to life in her. The strength of that need, that raw lightning bolt of desire, was a live thing, flashing, twisting, spinning between them and drawing both of them closer to the edge.

A fresh trembling, terrifying need raced through her.

Hot...

Hungry.

Her movements slowed. Held against the hot steel of Stone’s body, she stared up at him as one song ended and another began. This, too, was slow. Romantic. And time, instead of thrusting her backward through the years to a better, stronger relationship with him, had now stopped completely.

Leaving them frozen.

Somewhere alone. Without fear. Without history—or a future.

All that mattered was this one shining moment, this tiny slice of time that had everything to do with what was happening now, at this very second. And when Stone kissed her, she knew without a doubt he wanted her. Just as fiercely, just as primitively, as she wanted him. He kissed her hungrily, moving against her with coaxing, then demanding, urgent, restless movements.

And she kissed him back, wanting to savor the moment, wanting it to last, wanting to carry the memory of it into another life.

Stone was stunned to feel himself losing it as her hands rushed over him, pulling him closer. His control was unraveling, the need tearing at him until he was ready to ignore the fact that she’d just been released from the hospital. All he could think of was being buried in the heat and softness of her, over and over and over again until morning.

Hot, driving need made his hands impatient, his mouth hungry and demanding as their hands slowly rediscovered and aroused, under cover of darkness. But in full view of the moon and the stars high above them.