forward, grabbing for his brother.
Kent hit the water hard.
Kyle thrust out his hand farther. “Grab it!”
He skimmed the tips of Kent’s fingers. The water carried Kent away. Kent latched on to a root on the riverbank. Kyle threw himself against the bank for a third attempt to save his brother. The sandy bank crumbled beneath him. Gravity pulled him forward and he smacked headfirst into the turbulent water, casting both of them into the current.
Ellen shrieked. “Do something!”
The swift river tugged furiously at both brothers like a predator tearing at prey.
“Kyle, Kyle!” Ellen chased the water along the bank. “Do something, Garth! Help them!”
Garth knew his strengths and weaknesses. He took one look at the water, at his friends being whirled and spun downriver, and knew there was nothing he could do. He wasn’t going to mess with power like that.
“Don’t just stand there.” Ellen grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him toward the shore. “Do something. They’re drowning!”
“I’ll get help.” He turned and headed for the truck.
Ellen pummeled his back. “Help them! You’ve got to help them before it’s too late!”
A look over his shoulder showed him the river, bleeding red under the setting sun, had swallowed them both. Besides, he couldn’t swim. “It’s already too late.”
That stopped the pounding, but did nothing to erase the fury narrowing her eyes and curling her lips. For the first time, he saw an underlying strength in Ellen he hadn’t known existed. “Help them, you gutless wonder, or I’ll tell your secret.”
He sneered. “I don’t have a secret.”
“Alice Addison.”
She knew. He didn’t know how, but she knew.
He had plans, big plans.
He was getting out of this one-stoplight town. He was getting that business degree that would tell the world he was somebody. He was going to the top. Nothing was going to stop him.
Nothing.
He grabbed for Ellen….
Chapter One
Gabenburg, Texas. Present.
The house was cool, cozy and inviting, and a deep sense of contentment filled him as he silently slid the glass door closed.
He was home where he belonged.
The rich aroma of simmering chili tantalized. The anticipated sweet tartness of the cherry pie sitting on the counter made his mouth water. The woman at the stove, adding a dash of cumin to what he already knew was perfection, was more enticing still.
She hummed a tuneless song as she stirred. His mouth quirked in wry amusement. Taryn couldn’t carry a tune to save her life, but if she was humming while she cooked, he knew everything was right. She couldn’t have been home long since she still wore the white T-shirt and white cotton pants that were her uniform at the bakery she owned.
Without taking his gaze off his wife’s back or the pleasing curves that had been on his mind all day, he quietly made his way across the kitchen. With a groan that was part surrender and part captivation, he wrapped his arms around her waist and dropped a greedy kiss on the side of her neck. She smelled like sugar and flour and roses heavy with dew. The combination never failed to make him hungry.
As expected, she jumped and whirled in his arms. “What are you doing here? I wasn’t expecting you for another half hour.”
The open welcome in her eyes, in her smile, deepened his sense of contentment, allowing him to shed the last of the weariness that had dogged him for the last hour of his twelve-hour shift at the sheriff’s office.
Chance Conover grinned and pretended to look around the kitchen as if he’d walked into the wrong house. In truth, he’d tuned everything out but the woman in his arms. “Don’t I live here?”
“I’m not ready for you.”
Taryn plopped the spoon she was holding back into the pot and frowned her displeasure. But the effect was negated by the fact she stood on her tiptoes to kiss him back. Caught in a ponytail, the ends of her long brown hair tickled his arms. He loved the silky feel of her hair on his skin, of her body against his. After a long day at work, he wanted nothing more than to lose himself in her.
“Well, sweetheart, I’m ready for you.” He kissed her again, long and slow, savoring the heady taste of her, reveling in her ardent response.
Made a man grateful to have a woman like Taryn waiting for him at the end of a long day. She made him feel like a somebody, not the nobody who’d washed up bruised and battered on the shore of the Red Thunder River fifteen years ago. She made him feel real and solid. She made him feel needed.
A man couldn’t ask for more.
“You weren’t supposed to see until I was ready.”
He held her at arm’s length and caged her gaze with his. He loved her eyes, the way they sparkled with life, the way they shone with love for him. “Well, now, I like what I see.”
She blushed and batted her fingers against his shoulder. “You’re impossible!”
Turning her head, she looked at the small round table in the middle of the kitchen floor. “It was supposed to be a surprise.”
For the first time since he’d walked into the kitchen, he noticed the scene set for seduction. On crisp white linen, silverware gleamed in the late-afternoon light. The fancy cream and gold china that had once belonged to Taryn’s mother scintillated. Red candles in their crystal holders were ready to be lit. The fragrance of pink roses from the garden competed with the chili’s spice.
“What’s the occasion?”
Coyly, she fingered the gold sheriff’s star on his uniform shirt. “It’s Friday night. Do we need an occasion?”
Her soft smile and the deepening blue of her eyes were having their usual combustible effect on him. A wave of craving clawed at his insides. Even though Taryn’s chili was his favorite meal and her cherry pie was to die for, right now he’d skip the food for nourishment of the sensual kind. “You want me to leave and come back later?”
She hesitated, then shook her head. “We can eat later.”
With swift ease, he scooped her into his arms and started toward the bedroom down the hall. “I promise I’ll be hungry.”
“I had everything planned.” A hint of disappointment colored her voice. She shrugged it away and a Mona Lisa smile soon graced her lips. “I may have a bit of news.”
“What kind of news?” Her full, pouty lips distracted him, so he kissed them and set a sweeping tide of desire surging through him. That he still wanted her this fiercely after seven years of marriage amazed him.
“It’s
