I laughed out loud. “It takes trees to convince you?”
He stopped and I turned to look up into his face.
What I saw there made my heart turn over.
“Dwight? Sweetheart?”
He put his arms around me and his voice had a sud-
den rough huskiness. “I used to try and imagine what
it would be like if hell froze solid and I actually got you
to marry me.”
“And?”
“And this is better than I ever imagined.”
Our lips met in the moonlight.
“Much better,” he said and kissed me again.
Despite the cool night air, I began to feel warm all
over.
Dwight never needed to have a diagram drawn for
him. “Why don’t we take this inside?” he murmured
and whistled for the dog.
128
C H A P T E R
15
Flame Smith
Monday Morning, March 6
% Flame Smith was tired, angry, and fighting a dull
headache, the direct result of driving east with the
morning sun in her eyes for three hours. All weekend
she had waited at Buck Harris’s mountain lodge, willing
him to pull up in the drive and honk the horn exuber-
antly upon seeing her car there.
It never happened and she was now so furious with
Buck that had she met him as she drove down the wind-
ing private road, she would have rammed her Jeep into his
BMW hard enough that the hood would be smashed all
the way back to the steering wheel in such neat little even
pleats that he would be playing it like an accordion.
The image gave her a sour pleasure. So did the image
of chasing him back down the mountain with the .357
Magnum she kept in the console beside her.
129
MARGARET MARON
In her forty-odd years, she had been chased by many
men. Had even let a few catch her. Usually on her terms.
Wasn’t that why God had given her a mane of fiery red
curls, flawless skin with a light dusting of freckles across
an upturned nose in the middle of a lovely face, a nicely
proportioned body with a twenty-inch waist, and a low
