Bed of Lies (46 page)

He nodded, a hint of a grin playing at the corners of his mouth.

She loved to kiss that spot on his cheeks, where the dimples were. She loved to kiss any little part of him at all, and she liked sitting in this corner of his house, by the fireplace. At Christmas it put her right beside the tree. She could nearly disappear here, and it was familiar and comforting, and he'd noticed.

And made his mother move the tree for her, so it would be the same way it had been all those years ago, when she was a lost little girl and he was watching out for her, trying to make things easier for her. Just being there when she needed him.

"Open the box, Julie."

Her hands started to tremble. Tears filled her eyes. Still, she kept telling herself it wasn't a ring. It was too heavy. "You're sure... It's not even Christmas...."

"You'll need it for Christmas," he said.

For Christmas?
What did she need for Christmas that came in a box this size?

"Go ahead," he told her.

She took a breath and unwrapped it, finding a little cube-shaped white box. Puzzled, she opened the lid. He took it from her, then tipped the box upside-down so that a bundle of something wrapped in white tissue paper fell into her cupped hands. She peeled back layer after layer. Whatever was inside must be fragile. Someone had gone to great lengths to protect it. Finally, she undid the last layer.

It was a star-shaped ornament. A beautiful star made of beveled glass. Zach's mother made them. It was one of their most sacred traditions.

"You know what this means," Zach said.

Julie nodded, crying now. "I thought it was going to be something else, but this? This is even better."

Because she knew exactly what this meant to him, to his family. The little glass star had her name etched into it and a date, from the year she was seven.

"You've always been a part of us," he said.

Julie nodded, simply unable to say a word.

Zach turned the ornament around in her hand, and on the other side was a different date, a different name.

Julie McRae.

The date was next year's.

In Zach's family, everyone had an ornament. Handmade, just like this one, with their names on it and the dates they'd become a part of the family. They gathered together on Christmas Day and one by one hung their ornaments and those of family members long passed away.

She'd seen them do it so many times, and it never failed to evoke a longing that sometimes felt like it might choke her, right there on the spot. "I've always wanted one of these," she whispered.

She'd always wanted to belong. Right here.

"There's another one. For Peter. He'll be a part of this, too."

Julie nodded, still crying. Zach would do it this way.

"I want them hanging on the tree with all the others on Christmas Day," he said.

Julie nodded. "I'd... I'd... Oh, Zach."

"I have the other little box, too," he said, pulling out one that surely had a ring in it. "Did I give you enough time?"

"Yes." She cried again, throwing her arms around him, as he did the same, holding on so tight.

"You believe me now? Finally? You believe in us? Forever?"

"Yes."

She believed in every good thing in the world, all coming to her, with a man so strong and sure, absolutely unwavering in his faith in them and his determination.

Being in his arms was the best place on earth.

The End

Read more about the McRae's

Page forward for excerpts from

Five Days Grace

Twelve Days

Edge of Heaven

Excerpt from

Five Days Grace

The McRae’s Series

Book Four

by

Teresa Hill

USA Today Bestselling Author

The dog cried the whole way, sticking so close he nearly tripped Aidan three times, the last in the cabin doorway. They came inside as a single muddle of man, dog and a giant bag of dog food, which Aidan gingerly lowered to the floor by the door.

Tink whined and danced around on wet, muddy feet, while Aidan toed off his heavy boots, shrugged out of his wet jacket and hung it on a hook on the back of the door.

Outside, the storm was even louder, cracks of lightning, the rolling boom of thunder, pounding rain sounding like hell itself on the cabin's tin roof.

And then, just before he was about to flick on the light, out of the corner of his eye, Aidan saw something out of place.

No, he realized, a lot of things out of place.

He slowly panned right until he could see the whole room, a small, rustic, combination living room/kitchen.

Someone had ransacked the place, quickly, sloppily.

Aidan reached above the kitchen cabinet to his right, where he'd stashed a loaded Sig Sauer, telling himself to breathe, to remember both that he was still a little revved up by the accident and that he wasn't in a war zone anymore. Moving silently, he clicked off the safety, taking aim on the doorway that led to two bedrooms and a small bathroom at the back of the cabin.

There was a lock on the cabin door, a totally ineffective one, but Aidan used it anyway, every time he left. He'd put the key in the lock when he returned a moment ago, had turned the key, but had the lock already been disengaged? He honestly couldn't remember. He'd been juggling dog food and dog, and there'd been lightning, rain and incessant dog noises.

So he wasn't really sure if the door had been unlocked or not, but there was a little, niggling feeling in the back of his head that someone else was here, and no one else was supposed to be.

Only four other people even knew where he was, his shrink, his commanding officer, his brother and the guy who'd loaned him the cabin. None of them would just drop by or let themselves in, except for Zach, but surely the man wouldn't tear his own cabin apart.

Burglar? Aiden had a hard time thinking so. The place looked like a wreck from the outside. It was okay on the inside, but certainly nothing fancy. Surely there were more promising places to rob.

More likely, someone who was hungry and just looking to get out of the rain, maybe stay a while, probably not cause any trouble. So it was highly unlikely he'd need the Sig, but he'd been shot before. He wasn't going to take chances on being gunned down in a tiny town in southwestern Ohio.

Of course, it was possible that someone had come looking for him, someone who wanted to hurt him, but he really didn't think so. There'd been vague threats, but he'd been sure his CO had made more of them than was warranted to get Aidan out of the hospital before he really went nuts.

Still, he'd nearly died three and a half months ago, still wasn't a hundred percent recovered, so he wasn't interested in a fight of any kind, not when he could simply pull out the Sig and knew well how to use it.

He eased around the corner to press his back against the wall that led to the bedrooms and bathroom. As small as the place was, it couldn't take that long for even the sloppiest, most amateur thief to toss it, and there was only one exit. When the guy walked back into this room, Aidan would have a gun pressed against the guy's back before he knew what was happening.

Minutes ticked by, the dog whining and dancing around, making the biggest damned mess on the floor, and sometimes over the noise of the storm, Aidan thought he might have heard someone else crying, too.

Finally, he heard footsteps.

A shadow appeared, halting a step inside the room and staring at the dog. For once, the damned thing proved useful.

Aidan stepped to the left, pressed the gun to the shadow's back and hooked an elbow across the guy's throat. "Don't move."

He barely got the words out before he heard a scream, a distinctly feminine scream, and if that weren't enough to convince him that his would-be thief was female, her height and small frame would have.

He planned to wait out the screaming, so she could hear him when he spoke, so he could back this down, slow and easy. He really didn't want to hurt her. But the dog either took exception to the whole thing or got scared and wanted to huddle against their legs. The girl elbowed Aidan hard in his gut, managing to catch a still-healing incision from his surgery.

Fuck, that hurt.

She lunged away from him, tripping over the dog, and he went right after her, not willing to let her go while also trying to protect her as they fell. The dog howled in outrage or maybe fear, and scampered out of the way. Aidan and the girl landed hard on the floor, although he managed to twist sideways with her and take most of the blow on his right side, the rebuilt hip hurting like a son of a bitch. She landed half on top of him and half on the floor, struggling like mad.

Did she not realize that if he wanted to, he could have killed her three times over already?

Rolling her over, he pinned her facedown on the floor, straddling her hips as he sat, purposely putting all his weight on top of her. He pulled one of her arms behind her back, hard enough that if she tried to move too much, it was going to hurt, but if she just relaxed and stayed there, it wouldn't.