“Cassie,” he said quietly. “Respect, but you two were too young to take that on. Man his age back then, all he wants is to get drunk and do it findin’ someone who’ll give him a blowjob after he’s done gettin’ shitfaced.”

This was absolutely true.

“Sayin’ that,” Deacon went on, “all a man’s gotta do is look at you, any age he is, and know he struck gold and has to get his shit together to keep it shiny, but more, keep it his. But he didn’t just look at you, he knew you, and doin’ that, no excuse for bein’ the way he was.”

The warmth I got from that settled so deep, I could ride it for weeks in the Arctic with not even a blanket.

“What I’m sayin’ is,” Deacon kept on quietly, “you are not a weight. Those cabins aren’t. Life isn’t. It’s just what it is. It’s part of livin’. It’s part of bein’ together. If it matters, if it’s good, nothin’ weighs it down.”

“I really wish you were here right now,” I blurted, and it was the truth, mostly because I wanted to kiss him and do it hard.

It was then Deacon said nothing.

This lasted some time, so I called, “Deacon?”

“Same here, Cassie.”

He wished he was with me.

And that felt warm too.

Needless to say, after that conversation, I thought we could do it, Deacon taking off, me staying home, us connecting from afar, learning about each other, helping what we had to grow, making it good, then connecting when he got back.

That was, until he left again. And when he did, he never picked up when I called and only twice phoned me back. These were short calls that lasted less than a minute and mostly were him saying he got my calls and couldn’t talk, but he’d call when he could.

But he never did.

And then it began to feel weird, me calling him a couple times a day so he’d see my number on his history and know I was thinking about him, wanting to speak with him, wanting to connect, but he never connected.

Then it didn’t feel weird, it felt humiliating, like I was the girl the guy picked up, had a good time with, thought it might be worth working at, then found she was needy and grasping. Calling all the time. Wanting to connect. Thinking about him way too much, as in creepy-much. All this until it was time to shut it down and shut her out because she was a creepy, stalker freak.

That didn’t feel good so I quit calling, hoping if I did, he’d call.

He didn’t.

He’d been gone nearly five weeks. And of that five weeks, I hadn’t heard from him in four, and hadn’t phoned him in three.

I didn’t know Deacon very well but in the times I was with him, the Deacon I thought I was coming to know wouldn’t leave me hanging for three weeks.

Unless he was going to leave me hanging forever.

Which I had no choice but to assume he was doing. Three weeks was a long time. His last “job” only lasted a week. This one was five. He had to be done with the job by now and moving on.

Moving on.

I just couldn’t believe he was doing it. Not without saying something. He didn’t have to come to Glacier Lily and lay it out for me. In fact, I was glad he didn’t.

But leaving me hanging?

Forever?

That didn’t seem very Deacon.

Which was another reminder that I didn’t know Deacon. I didn’t know what he did for a living. I didn’t know his full name. I didn’t know where he came from or how he became the man he was.

I knew he was thirty-eight, had slept with that same amount of women, (well, with me, one more), he was mellow, didn’t talk much, was great in bed, liked my cooking…

And that was all I knew.

This put me in a bad mood. A bad mood where I sat on my porch in the rain (though I’d do that anyway) staring at the trees, trying not to make a big deal of this. A hot guy, great sex, a feeling of hope it was the start of something beautiful, something that could be forever—women got that feeling all the time and found they were wrong.

I tried to make it that simple.

But I knew it wasn’t that simple.

I was staving off heartbreak…again. Doing it with the impending official adoption of the dog Deacon bought for me. I had pictures. The breeders e-mailed them to me weekly—the puppies rolling around, nursing from their momma, growing up, and playing.

I was in love with all of them and had no idea how I would choose when the time came two weeks from then when I’d have to.

I also had no idea how I would claim and care for a dog that would forever remind me of Deacon.

I closed my eyes tight on that thought, fighting the feelings that threatened to overwhelm me, and not in a warm way. In a devastated, I’m-an-idiot, I’d-picked-the-wrong-guy, when-was-I-gonna-learn way.

But I opened them when I heard the growl of an engine through the patter of rain.

I turned my head right to see who was there, and when I saw the rain slicked black Suburban through the gray dusk, I quit breathing.

I started again but only to do it erratically as I watched the driver’s side door open and Deacon unfold his long frame from the seat. I heard the door slam and remained still, my eyes on him negotiating the trees at the side of my house as he stalked to the porch.

My breath caught again when he arrived at the porch and I could see his eyes pinned to me, his face blank, the mask returned (not a good sign), but there was no escaping the heaviness that descended from whatever it was that was emanating from him.

This could have been why I couldn’t move.

Deacon could move. He put his hands to the porch railing, and even though the porch (and definitely the railing) was elevated several feet from the ground, he hauled himself up and threw his body over the rail, his boots hitting the deck with a definitive thud.

At this miraculous display of upper body strength, I swallowed a gasp.

I had no idea what he was doing there, and even if his expression was giving me nothing, I still understood from somewhere deep he didn’t want to be there.

But he was.

And I didn’t get that.

Though maybe I did. Maybe I was right. Maybe it was Deacon’s time to say good-bye, face to face.

Suddenly, I wished he’d left me hanging.

He stared down at me and I still didn’t move. Just had my neck twisted, my head tipped back, because his unfathomable eyes were locked to mine in a way I couldn’t escape.

“Thought you were more woman than any woman I’d met,” he declared, his voice low but cold, a voice I had for six years. A voice I thought was gone forever.