She chokes on a laugh. “You think he would have let me?”

Excellent point. “No. But if you absolutely had to, if you knew it was best for both of you, could you have done it?”

“No.”

I wasn’t expecting her to answer so easily. “Why?”

Ginger hums in her throat, the way she does when she’s thinking. “Love comes in many forms. It’s not always sweet. Or comfortable. Sometimes it’s selfish and consuming. Volatile.” Derek’s gentle singing in the background has stopped. “It makes choices for you. It demands you obey it, not taking no for an answer. And it’s usually right. It knows you better than you know yourself.” Ginger’s voice has gone soft. It sounds like she’s sitting right beside me on the bench. “It turns you inside out. Occasionally, it hurts, but in the best way imaginable. To remind you of how powerful it is. To keep you feeling alive.” She pauses. “I could have tried to walk away, but the love would have just come with me. Above all, love is stubborn as hell.”

“Shit. Good answer,” I manage in the understatement of the year. “I was just asking for a friend, of course.”

“Of course.”

Shaking my head at myself, I search for something to change the subject. When I remember what I wanted to tell her, I slap my hand to my forehead. “Hey, get this. Our great-great-grandmother was a nun.”

“Shut. Up.”

“I can’t believe I forgot to tell you.” After gaining my feet, I start walking once more in the direction of the park. “I went to the Heritage Center the day you had the baby. We actually have an ancestor who saw fit to take a vow of celibacy. They gave me documentation as proof of her virgin status.”

“Good thing, because I need to see it with my own two eyes.”

“You will.” My steps falter a little. “I’ll be home next week.”

“Dolly can’t wait to meet you.” She clears her throat. “I, uh, wouldn’t mind seeing your scrawny butt either.”

“Hey, I make up for my scrawniness in attitude.”

“Amen to that.” Ginger pauses a moment. “Listen. You know I don’t like to give advice, but seeing as I’m sleep-deprived and my tits are now a twenty-four-hour feeding station, I feel like I’ve earned the right to say my piece.”

I nod, as if she can see me. “Fair enough. Shoot.”

“I get the sense that maybe you’re in a difficult spot.” Slowly, she blows out a breath. “But there will be a moment, Wip. It’ll come when you’re not looking for it, but it will smack you upside your head. You’ll realize everything is bigger than you. Already planned out like a road map. It happened to me, and I shied away because I was scared. This moment, it can be the worst of your life, or the best. Just make it your best. Let it be your best. Okay?”

I can’t speak around the lump in my throat, so I just mumble an acknowledgment. Ginger seems satisfied with that, however.

“I love you, Wip. You call me or Derek if you need anything.”

“Love you, too,” I whisper, then hang up. I walk back toward my bench and sit down. It’s the middle of the night before I stand on stiff legs and walk back toward the inn.

…

I wake up the next morning to the liquid sound of Kitty pouring tea into my cup. Weird. She usually knocks. Too tired to question the anomaly, I bury my face into the feather pillow and attempt to reenter the dream I’d been having about giant, dancing coffee makers in top hats. When my bed dips and I feel a breeze against my bare legs, I frown. A solid form presses against my back, pulling me up against it. My eyes pop open, my lips part on a gasp. That ain’t Kitty.

“Shane?”

“You were expecting another man to crawl into your bed?”

“Of course not. I keep a very strict schedule.” I suck in a breath when he starts circling a finger around my belly button. My nipples tighten, and I’m jolted into awareness of my skin. Every inch of it being cradled by the soft sheets, everywhere it presses against Shane’s warm flesh, the juncture of my thighs.

“Where did you go last night?”

“For a walk.” My eyelids flutter as he cups my breasts. “Needed some air.”

“Next time, I come with you.”

I shake my head on the pillow. “How do you know there’ll be a next t—”

Shane flips me over onto my back, mouth silencing mine in one swift, move. It’s more than an urgency to kiss me, he didn’t want me to finish what I was saying, even though it was true. There might not be another walk, another chance to take him with me. So that’s how we’re playing it? Avoidance? When his hips fit between the notch of my thighs and pushes forward, I decide I can live with that for now. As long as he doesn’t stop touching me, I can pretend just about anything.

Finally, he breaks the kiss, speaking gruffly near my ear. “Soft, warm girl. Will you let me bury myself inside you this morning?”

Those words make me moan a little, make me drop my hands to his ass and pull him closer. “You’re naked in my bed. That’s as far from a rejection as you can get.”

“I want the words.” His mouth traces a path down my naked chest. It reminds me I went to bed without clothes on. I must have expected to be woken this way. “Every time you say yes, it feels like a victory. Better than the rush of winning any race or having some trophy handed to me. Are you hearing me?”

“Yes,” I manage breathily as he draws on my nipple hard.

He lifts his head to trap me in his gaze. “Are you?”

I’m not sure what I see in his eyes, but it makes my heart trip over itself, then pound so loud I can hear it. I’m terrified of that look, of the determination behind it. No. No, I thought we were avoiding. I curl a hand around his neck and try to draw him down for a kiss, but he resists.

“At least give me my victory, Willa. Tell me I can have you.”

“I can do better than that.” I’m thankful that he seems to be letting me off the hook for now. Whatever he was trying to communicate, it’s obvious I’m not ready for it. There’s guilt, too, that I’m leaving him hanging, even if I don’t know what his change in attitude is all about. I don’t know another way to make my denial up to him, so I push him onto his back. Giving him a moment to look over my naked body above him, I lean down and drag my tongue down his chest, his belly. I grip him in my hand, stroke until he chokes my name.