Page 24 of I’ll Be There (Montana Fire #4)

Conner pushed through the doors to the parking lot. Stood there, his heart thundering, a hammer in his chest. Overhead, the sky hung a wispy, clean blue.

Doesn’t your bride deserve her perfect day?

Yes, yes she did.

Reuben walked out behind him. “Pete said he just found her. She was at the donut shop.”

“Tell him to intercept her. Keep her there, with him.”

Conner spied his truck, parked next to Seth’s in the lot.

He jumped in the cab and realized he didn’t have his keys just as Micah came out of the building. Conner opened the door and Micah tossed the keys over. “We’ll take the lumberjack’s truck, get Pete, and meet you at the resort.”

Conner didn’t wait. He closed the door, turned the truck over, and skidded out of the lot.

He found Pete and Liza occupying a picnic table near the donut shop. Just Pete, seated on the table, eating a glazed raised, and Liza, laughing at something he said, tearing apart her own donut. He parked, leaped out, and heaven help him, he ran.

She turned as he reached the table.

He pulled her into his arms, crushing her, yes, breathing too hard, probably scaring her.

“Conner, are you—”

He held her away. “Who were you talking to?”

She stared at him, wide-eyed. “Um, Pete?”

“No...someone else. Some—tourist.”

“Oh, just some guy in town for the day. I gave him directions to the Devil’s Kettle and a few other places in town. Why?”

He cupped her face, meeting her eyes, and pressed her forehead to his. “Nothing. It’s fine. You’re safe, and it’s over. It’s just...over.”

She touched his chest. “Did you find out anything about your brother?”

He leaned back. “All I need to know.”

Then, he didn’t care that Pete was sitting there, or that the guys had just pulled up in the other truck.

He kissed her. A full on, everything’s-going-to-be-okay-now, because I’m-sticking-around kiss , the kind he should have given her two days ago. She responded, softening her lips, a tiny sigh, maybe of relief, escaping. And when he leaned back, her beautiful brown eyes shone.

“I’m so glad. You needed closure,” she said, pressing her hand to his cheek. “Ready to get married?”

“So ready.”

“Good. Because we really need to find a reception venue.”

He glanced at the guys, now opening the box of donuts Liza had left on the table. “These for us?” Reuben asked, almost an afterthought.

“Sure,” Liza said, laughing.

Conner managed a feeble grin, his body still sluicing with heat, adrenaline. “You need a venue, babe? I’m on it.”

“And then, Conner, you say ‘I do.’” Pastor Dan stood in front of the altar, holding his Bible open, looking at Conner for the words.

Liza gave Conner’s hand a squeeze as if for encouragement, but he stared down at her, his blue eyes holding hers, a tiny smile on his face.

He’d shaved for tonight’s rehearsal, leaving just the finest layer of golden whiskers on his chin.

He’d gotten a haircut, too, short enough for his hair to curl at the edges, calling her to weave her fingers through it.

Oh, her man cleaned up well. He wore a blue button-down, a pair of dress jeans, his cowboy boots.

And lined up behind him, a cadre of other gleaming smoke jumpers, with their wide shoulders that betrayed the hours slinging an axe or a saw, trim waists, strong legs honed from miles of hiking.

Pete wore his hair tatted back, also in a clean white shirt, a pair of chinos, and Converse, as if confused about his persona.

But Reuben appeared pure cowboy in a snap-button, red plaid, long-sleeved shirt, black jeans, black boots.

He too had trimmed his beard, gotten a cut.

And Jed. Wearing a pair of dress pants, a black shirt, the sleeves rolled up, his brown hair cut short.

He stood first in line, not the best man—Conner still hadn’t chosen any of them to step in for the witness spot—but the man who’d been there at the beginning, when Liza had walked into Conner’s life, holding a box of donuts.

Sitting in the first row, Jim Micah looked on, wearing an enigmatic expression. Liza supposed he might be remembering his own wedding.

“I do,” Conner whispered. Then he leaned down, as if to kiss her.

“Not yet!” Dan said.

A smile slid up one side of Conner’s face. “Sorry. I’m a little antsy.”

I do. She wanted to scream it, but managed to simply reply when Dan gave her the same instructions.

But, yes. I do...want to move to Montana with you.

The words had formed in her chest sometime after Conner had tracked her down at the donut shop, most likely as she watched him—and his team of superstars—save the day.

As usual. Starting with the powwow at the Evergreen resort where Grace declared the bingo tent the only reception solution.

Conner had mustered the men into action, and by noon they’d erected the massive tent in the parking lot behind Pierre’s Pizza.

Grace pulled strings—she had so many to choose from after working at Pierre’s her entire high school career and beyond—and secured permission to use the pizza kitchen where they would cook the pulled pork and store the homemade buns and a hundred freshly made cupcakes from World’s Best.

The guys hauled tables from the community center and the church and didn’t complain for a moment when Grace taught them how to set them with the burlap tablecloths.

She’d somehow found more doilies, which she handed to Reuben, and instructed him to put one at each place setting.

She taught Pete how to fold the dark cream linen napkins, tuck a sprig of lavender in the fold, and set each napkin on the doily.

Jed added matching cream votive candles at each place setting while Mona showed Micah, Romeo, and Darek how to arrange the centerpiece vases filled with pinecones and twinkly lights.

Tomorrow, they would also hold a triad of cream hydrangeas, due to arrive tonight.

With strings of wispy organza and twinkly lights spanning the ceiling, somehow Grace had turned the parking lot of a pizza place into never-never land.

Liza wanted to weep with the beauty, the magic of the day. The perfection.

And somehow, during the transformation, the thought had come to her, swept her up, wound through her.

Fortified her. She loved Conner enough to return to Montana with him.

To live in the beautiful home he’d built for her.

To pray for his safety when he climbed into an airplane and threw himself into the furnaces of the north woods.

To wait for him, casting him into God’s hands.

Herself into God’s hands.

Let my heart’s desire be Yours, Lord.

“So then I’ll pronounce you man and wife, and you’ll be able to kiss the bride,” Pastor Dan said, and Liza recognized the spark in Conner’s eye a second before he bent down and kissed her. Nothing of the kiss he’d given her this morning, but enough to stir anticipation inside her.

She closed her eyes, relishing his touch. She’d find a moment alone tonight and tell him. Her wedding gift, perhaps.

He leaned close to her ear. “Tomorrow,” he whispered.

“I’ll introduce you, and down the aisle you’ll go. Easy,” Pastor Dan said.

Conner took her hand, led her off the stage, then back up the aisle.

“Now, we party?” Jed said, just a few steps behind them.

“We reserved Pierre’s Pizza,” Liza said, glancing behind her. “We’ll meet you there.”

Now. She should tell him right now . The words welled up inside her as they entered the foyer, especially when he kept tugging her along until they reached the library. He pulled her inside, then rounded on her.

“What?”

“You,” he said, and she took a breath as he closed the gap between them, pressing her up against the wall.

And then, yes, he was kissing her. Not the sweet church kiss he’d given her on stage but a kiss that bespoke exactly the look he’d worn in his eyes. Desire. Longing. He cupped his hand behind her neck, pulled her to himself, and drank her in, as if desperate for the nourishment of her touch.

He smelled of sunshine, the cool wind of the lake on his skin, and the fresh soap he’d used. She touched his beard, caressing her fingers into it. His breathing deepened and all of a sudden, he broke away, his eyes in hers, something unreadable in them.

“Conner? Are you okay?”

He had braced one arm over her shoulder against the wall, and now he leaned down, touched his forehead to hers. “I can’t lose you, Liza. You’re my family now. My only family.”

“Of course you won’t lose me,” she said, drawing her thumbs through his soft beard. “I’m yours, today...and especially tomorrow.” She smiled.

He didn’t. Just swallowed, such a hollowness rushing over his face, it left her emptied.

“You’re scaring me. What’s going on?”

He closed his eyes, but gathered her to himself. His heart hammered against her body. He buried his face in her shoulder.

So she just held on. “I can’t lose you either,” she whispered. “I fell in love with you the first moment I met you. I just never dreamed you’d love me back.”

He released her then, caught her face between his hands. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Of course not.” She winked at him.

He laughed and kissed her again, this time sweetly, as if she’d somehow swept away whatever darkness had gripped him. “We gotta go. Aren’t we throwing a party or something?”

Okay, so she’d tell him later. Plenty of time—the rest of their lives, in fact.