Dylan ground his teeth. “Might be a little more to it than looking pretty…”

“Yeah, yeah… What have you been doing since Stu and I left?”

“Nothing much…”

“But what?”

Dylan didn’t answer.

“Had someone on the back of your bike, did you?” Lang asked, laughter in his voice.

Dylan sighed. “I think I’ll probably head out tomorrow. I’ll let you know if I’m coming back to Payne or going straight to L.A....”

“Stay awhile, D,” he said. “Stay until that doubt is gone from your voice.”

“She’s got a couple of kids, man…”

“You’re great with kids,” Lang said. “And even though you’ve been whistling that old ‘I’m a bad relationship risk’ tune for years, I’ve never seen any evidence of it. You haven’t tripped over the right girl to lock down with, maybe, but your relationships are solid. In fact, if I die, you have permission to marry Sue Ann.”

He laughed in spite of himself. “She wouldn’t have me.”

“There’s nothing for you to hurry back here for, D. You’ve carried this company on your shoulders for a long time and it’s all about to change. Time to chill. Think about the future.”

“I’ll check in when I’m on the road,” he said. “Thanks for holding down the fort.”

“Hey, no problem, buddy. My fort and all my little Indians are here.”

His fort and all his little Indians… Fortunately, Lang knew exactly how lucky he was, so there was no recrimination there. Envy, yes. Since Dylan was a little kid and had that pretend television family, he’d longed for those kinds of ties. And ever since he was a teenager he had known it wasn’t likely to ever happen that way.

But, he wanted to be in only one place—right beside Katie, in her arms. Fearing that, fearing how much he wanted that, he avoided her. The hardest thing right now was knowing he had promised to say goodbye. He wasn’t sure he could get through that. He thought it was probably far safer to run.

He scrolled through his emails on his phone while he was still up high and had service. Several were from Jay, and they all said approximately the same thing. Still talking to people and lining up details for a potential deal—don’t give up on me. I’m getting closer. I’m determined to make this work.

No surprise there—Jay Romney had been in touch with him at least once a year for the past ten years.

He responded to the email. I’m standing by. D.

And then there was an email from his grandmother. She didn’t usually bother with emails. It was short and to the point. I’m tired of being sent to voice mail. Lang finally answered the company phone and while he pretended not to know where you are, he indicated it could be about a girl. If you don’t want me to hunt you down, call me. A.

Okay, now this created a problem. It wasn’t like him to not talk to his grandmother and he hadn’t realized she’d left a lot of voice mails. And he hadn’t discussed a potential movie deal with her for a very good reason—she’d want to give him whatever money he needed. True, if she thought he wanted a film career, she might even encourage him, but she was far too intuitive. If she knew he was too proud to take her money and a movie was the only thing he could think of, she’d push.

But he was without choice. So he called her.

“Gran…”

“Well, finally! So, Lang said you were riding through this little town and you met a girl and you stayed on for a while.”

Dylan was going to kill him. “I stayed to check out the small flying operations in the area. I want to know how they’re holding it together in a down economy with these high fuel costs and I’m throwing out the net for charter contracts. It’s business, Gran.”

“Is she a nice girl?”

He groaned. “I met a girl, that’s accurate. I took her and her children to McDonald’s, took her on a few bike rides, bought her a couple of hamburgers—not a real big deal. There is something else I meant to mention, but since nothing is firm…”

“What?”

“I’ve had a conversation with Jay Romney about work. If it’s the right project and the right terms…”

“Now that stuns me,” she said. There was silence, which was very strange for Adele. “I guess you’ve thought it through…”

“Jay has been in touch now and then over the years, always throwing out the invitation. And now, while business is down and Lang can handle things, it’s not a bad way to earn a little money.”

“The good news is, I think you can trust Jay,” Adele said. “But you haven’t shown an interest in acting since you started flying.”

“I’m motivated,” he said. “Business being what it is, and all.”

“Hmm. Listen, remember what we’ve always talked about…change can be good. What feels like a disaster can be your new opportunity. That’s how you got into flying in the first place—crisis pushed you. Stay positive. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel.”

“It’s probably the train,” he muttered.

She laughed at him. “Sometimes you’re older than I am. Call me tomorrow. I want to talk to you and if you don’t call me, I’ll send out a search party. Or, I’ll just fly to Montana and camp out until you get there.”

“I’ll call,” he said, somewhat surprised that the offer of an easy way out hadn’t come.

“Incidentally, I’m fine,” she said curtly.

He moaned. He could be such a self-absorbed ass**le. “I’m sorry, Gran. I’ve had so much on my mind. Are you really? Fine?”

“Never better, Dylan. Talk to you tomorrow.”

She disconnected.

He sat on top of that hill for a long time, staring out at the ocean. It was a while before he accepted the only conclusion he could have come to. He wasn’t going to be able to sleep at night unless he saw her one more time. He had to keep his word and say a proper goodbye to Katie. And if he was going to do that, he was going to make it memorable.

Seven

Conner had taken the boys to the river to try a little fishing on Sunday, leaving Katie to sit on the front porch with Leslie and a couple of glasses of iced tea. “You can talk about it if you want to,” Leslie said.

“Oh, it was just a little crush,” she said. “I’ll get over it.”

“You’re so quiet,” Leslie said. “It must have been more than a little crush. At least a medium-size crush.”

Katie shrugged. “I first laid eyes on him just over two weeks ago, so no more than medium. For sure,” she said. But she didn’t sound convincing even to herself. “It’s all a fantasy, Leslie. There wasn’t anything real about it. But you want to know what bothers me? It’s so silly—I asked him to say goodbye before leaving the area. He said he would, but I guess he didn’t.”

“Damn, I wish I’d been paying attention when we were all in the bar! I can’t figure out which one he was.”

One corner of Katie’s mouth lifted. “He was the cute, dark-haired one with the outstanding butt.”

“I’m having an even harder time now,” Leslie said. “Since Conner came into my life, I haven’t noticed any other outstanding butts. Tell me the first thing that happened to make you think you had a little crush…”

“The second I saw him I couldn’t breathe for a minute, like a full minute. Then when I saw him at Jack’s it made me feel all tickly inside, but it was just one of those things. Seeing a cute, sexy guy and thinking, wow. I didn’t expect to ever see him again, but his friends all left, he stayed behind, he found the cabin and we talked. We went on a few bike rides. More talking. He kissed me. But boy…”

“He stayed? He found you? He kissed you?”

“Uh-huh. It kind of started when he happened to be in town one day when I picked up the boys from summer program and he took us to McDonald’s for dinner. Nothing much happened, except the boys were a little wilder than usual. And…well…” Her voice trailed off.

“And? Well? That’s when he kissed you?”

“No, not in front of the boys. One day when I dropped the boys off at summer program, he took me out on his bike—all day. He bought breakfast and lunch, drove us all over the place on some of the craziest roads—God, was that fun! I hadn’t been on a motorcycle in a long time. We did that again and again. I hadn’t held on to a cute, dangerous guy for several hours in such a long time. Charlie might’ve been my last cute, dangerous guy.”

“No kidding?” Leslie asked. “In over five years?”

“Pathetic, huh? I’ve been out on some dates, but no bells.”

“We don’t know that it’s all over already. He might find your little cabin again.”

“That’s probably not a great idea,” Katie said. “See, he’s thirty-five, has never married, likes to play the field, has no intention of ever settling down, likes kids fine but doesn’t want any, and— Okay, the bottom line here is—he’s ready Freddy and I am not a one-night stand. So I hope he’s gone. I do. Because I don’t know if I can say no to him again.”

Leslie sat up straighter. “Again? Did you leave out some parts here? Because a few bike rides, hamburgers and chitchat is all real nice, but…”

“We made out like a couple of teenagers on prom night. I nearly got nailed in broad daylight on a hilltop. It was awesome. And I’m not sure if I’m glad I held off or if I totally regret it.”

“Wow!” Leslie said. She fanned her face. “That’s what you left out. And that was it? He said goodbye and went back to wherever he came from and you’ll never see him again?”

“Sort of. But you know what? I had some fun, I have to remember that. He’s fun. Why are the bad boys always the fun ones, huh? I made him laugh even when he was trying to be serious, so he had fun, too. I have to remember that it was a good experience, didn’t get out of hand and it was about time there was a little something going on with a guy. But the hard part is that there was no goodbye. No closure. The one thing I didn’t want to be was completely forgettable.”

Leslie thought about this a second. “Maybe he’s still around?”

“Hmm. With some other girl, a little more willing than me, up on that hilltop? He said he’d be in touch. It’s been four days.”

“Does he seem like that kind of guy? A guy who would strike out with you and just find himself an easier target?”

“I don’t know, Les,” she said. “I can’t say I really know him. I got a strong sense of him, but that doesn’t mean I know him. The only thing he was really firm about is that he’ll never marry and have kids.” She gave a little shrug. “Anyone I get involved with has to take us all on.”

“Whoops. I guess you eliminated him first.”

“I told him he hadn’t done anything for me that qualified as a date yet.”

And Leslie spewed her tea as she burst out laughing. Katie couldn’t help but join her. “Well, at least he’ll have something to think about on his way out of town.”

“Totally,” Katie agreed.

And then there was the slow rumble of a motorcycle. They exchanged looks and they both went completely still. It seemed to growl through the town without ever accelerating or stopping. Neither of them could move. And then it came down Leslie’s street, stopping behind Katie’s SUV.

He casually braked, stabilized and dismounted, walking slowly toward the porch with his helmet in the crook of his arm, grinning pleasantly. “I thought that might be your car,” he said. “I checked at your place, but you weren’t there. Because you’re here, I guess.” He approached the porch and put one booted foot on the step. Katie loved those pointy-toed cowboy boots.