Ash’s gun that afternoon while she’d napped—after they’d made love. He’d unloaded it because they were alone in the canyons, and he’d been about to propose.
One didn’t propose to Ash without taking proper precautions.
A man didn’t love a woman as long as he’d loved Ash and lay his heart on the line without being fairly sure of himself. But one never knew what Ash would say or do—and so he had to be prepared for a refusal.
He’d planned his seduction carefully. Make love, disarm her, then proffer the best argument he had for hitting up the closest altar.
He’d even had a diamond-and-sapphire ring in his pocket to mark the occasion, if she was inclined to accept his offer of a partnership between them. A joining of the Callahan and Phillips families at long last. A merger between them, a professional alliance—the smoothest lasso he could design to draw Ash over to his side without her kicking and screaming. Ash was a practical woman; since a great many of the Callahan families were living at the Hell’s Colony compound in Texas that he and his three siblings, Kendall, Gage and Shaman owned, it made sense to go easy on the emotions and heavy on practical.
But he’d never gotten to the proposal. Wolf had ambushed them, and Ash had shot him—or she thought she had. Xav had fired, too, and in the silence that fell as Wolf crumpled to the ground, Xav had taken her gun, fully intending to leave behind no trace of her involvement. There was no reason for her to be blamed.
Ash had sent him away, telling him this was a family matter, a fact with which he couldn’t argue. She was stone-cold in her demand, and he’d departed, fully cognizant that Ash was calling her family to clean up, and no doubt for advice. As an employee of Rancho Diablo, Xav knew very well how the Callahans worked. They’d get there in a flash, and little sister would be up to her delicate shell-shaped ears in backup and support. The Callahans wouldn’t let anything happen to Ash—and so he went off to ponder what he’d done over a beer.
He’d been stunned that he’d killed the uncle of the woman to whom he’d been about to propose. On the other hand, better he do it than Ash. As he knew too well, Chief Running Bear had forbidden his family to harm his son Wolf. Doing so would bring the family curse on them.
He’d wanted badly to protect Ash from that.
He’d fired so fast he wasn’t sure Ash knew that he had.
But when the dust settled in the ensuing weeks, he’d waited for Ash to seek him out, as she had many times over the years. When she hadn’t come, he’d gone looking for her at Rancho Diablo.
To his chagrin, he’d learned that his wild-at-heart angel hadn’t been seen since that fateful day. And it turned out Galen’s medical expertise had brought Wolf back from the brink. The old scoundrel had recovered and had slowly returned to taunting the Callahans. Yet Ash hadn’t been seen or heard from by her family again—except last month when she’d sent a text to her family to wish them happy holidays.
It was that holiday message that had nearly broken Fiona. Fiona had summoned him, sending him off to find her beloved niece.
He’d accepted the mission gladly, knowing it wasn’t going to be a cakewalk. Ash wasn’t easy to track. She used only cash. There were no phone calls, no computer emails to track. It was as if she’d disappeared—which she’d obviously intended to do.
In the end, he’d gone to Running Bear for direction, only to be amazed that Running Bear hadn’t heard from Ash, either. Those two shared the same untamed spirit.
But Xav got a pointer or two from Running Bear that sent him on a path to find her. Now he shifted on the white-painted porch, hearing footsteps inside, hoping his journey wasn’t a dead end. It had been too many months since he’d held the love of his life in his arms.
A middle-aged woman opened the door, a questioning frown on her face. “Yes?”
“Hi.” He gave her his most friendly smile. “I’m Xav Phillips, from Diablo, New Mexico. I’m looking for a woman named Ashlyn Callahan.”
The woman shook her head, glancing over her shoulder when a baby’s cry burst in the background. “I’m sorry, no. I’ve never heard of her.”
He couldn’t say what made him linger on the porch. Maybe it was because he’d come so far and was so disappointed to find his search turning up a dead end again. Another baby’s cries joined the first, sending up a wail of epic proportions between them, which made the woman anxiously begin to back away.
“Excuse me,” she said, “good luck finding whomever you’re looking for.”
She closed the door. Xav hesitated, then leaned his ear against the wood. He heard soft voices inside comforting the babies, and then unbelievably, he heard a voice he’d know any day, any night, whether he was awake, asleep or even in a coma.
“Sweet baby, don’t fuss. My little prince,” he heard Ash say, and in a flash, he slid over to the enormous glass window framing the Christmas tree so he could peer cautiously inside the house.
Behind the large, ruffle-branched Christmas tree, four white bassinets lay together in a room decorated for the holidays amid beautifully wrapped gifts. He held his breath, watching Ash comfort a tiny infant boy. Ash’s shock of pale hair had grown into a waterfall of silver liquid she wore in a ponytail. Xav grew warm all over despite the cold, and Cupid’s arrow shot right into his heart, the same way it had every time he’d ever gotten within two miles of her.
He was head over heels in love with her, and nine long months apart had done nothing to diminish those emotions. The ring in his pocket practically burned, reminding him how long he’d waited to ask her to marry him.
She put the baby down and picked up another, a sweet, pink-pajamaed little girl, and Xav’s heart felt like it splatted on the ground. She acted as if these were her children, so loving and gentle was she as she held them. Xav was poleaxed with new thoughts of making Ash a mother. Motherhood and Ash weren’t a combination he’d ever really put together in his head, but watching her with these children made him realize his original proposal wasn’t the one he wanted to offer her.
He didn’t want to fall back on a business arrangement to save his ego.
No, he was going all in. He was going to tell her the truth about the shot she’d allegedly fired at Wolf, because clearly that was why she was hiding out here, helping the older lady babysit her family’s babies. Or maybe she ran a babysitting service. It didn’t matter. The point was, Ash was in hiding and he was going to tell her the truth: she was not the hunted one. She was not destined to bring destruction to Rancho Diablo and her family.
And then he was going to ask her to be his wife. His real true wife, to have and to hold, in sickness and health, in good times and better times, forever.
Xav hadn’t realized he’d moved away from the protection of the twinkling Christmas tree in order to spy better, but Ash’s suddenly astonished eyes jolted him out of his reverie. She stared at him over the pink blanket-wrapped baby, her lips parted with shock to see him standing among the evergreen bushes at the window. And then, to his complete dismay, Ash snapped the curtains closed.
A screeching siren split the air. Someone had hit some kind of panic button inside the house, which meant police would be on the way. He was certain Ash had recognized him, but just to be certain she didn’t think he was an intruder, he leaped up on the porch and pushed the door open.
“Hi,
