“Why Jay? You had the whole McKinnon clan to step in and be a father to Alex.”

  Her eyes blazed. “Don’t turn this into something it wasn’t. You were dead, Wade. Dead. You know, no passing GO. No collecting two hundred dollars. Game over for us. I realized pretty quickly that it didn’t matter who I married. No one was ever going to be you. So why not Jay?” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “I thought he’d be okay with Alex not being his son. I think it surprised even him that he wasn’t. He wanted more children. But deep down I knew it was because he wanted a child of his own.”

  She turned her back to him and picked up the few pieces of silverware left on the table and dropped them into the soapy water in the sink.

  “Anyway, he didn’t want to be in South Dakota anymore so he got a job in Casper. He didn’t tell me about the new job until he’d accepted it because he knew I wouldn’t want to go to Wyoming.”

  “But he did.”

  “It was away from here. He did the every-weekend-visit thing for a while. But the drive was tiring. Pretty soon every weekend stretched to every other weekend and then once a month.”

  Hearing her talk about a man who’d shared her bed was killing Wade. But he hung on every word Skylar said, hungry to understand why they’d drifted so far apart. If he had any chance at all of winning Skylar over again, he had to know what was haunting her now.

  “The hard truth of it is that I was relieved when Jay would leave. It was easier to be away from each other than to be together. I didn’t have to pretend when he was gone. That’s when I realized how unfair I was being to him.”

  Her heavy sigh should have made him feel bad, but Wade couldn’t help but think the reasons Skylar couldn’t make her marriage work was because she was still in love with him. That gave him hope, even if Skylar wouldn’t.

  “He wasn’t a bad man. It was all me. I failed our marriage. Anyway, he’s engaged to someone else now. I hear she’s a nice girl and my ex-mother-in-law loves her.” Skylar laughed, shaking her head.

  “What’s so funny? She didn’t like you?”

  “Not at all. Right from the beginning she’d made up her mind about me. And she was right. I can’t really blame her for that.”

  “You’re being too hard on yourself.”

  “No, I’m not.”

  Skylar laughed. He realized it was the first time since he’d been home that he’d heard a real laugh from her that wasn’t filled with cynicism.

  “She’s always referred to me as ‘the other woman’ in his life.” Her face changed and the humor that he’d seen moments ago evaporated. “I didn’t have a problem with the way she treated me. But she never warmed up to Alex. Kate has always been more of a grandmother to Alex than Jeannine was. It wasn’t just the distance. Who knows, maybe she knew it wasn’t going to last and she didn’t want to get attached. In any case, she hasn’t seen Alex since he was a baby. Alex only remembers them through pictures.”

  “Did you ever tell Alex about me?”

  “No.”

  “You just pretended I never existed?”

  “Jay asked about you once and I told him. But that was near the end of our marriage. He told me never to talk about it again. Let’s face it, there are a whole lot of McKinnons in Rudolph. It’s kind of hard to ignore them. I think that’s why he wanted to get away from here so badly.”

  Music from the show that Alex had been watching grew louder, signaling the end of the program.

  “I should get him ready for bed and then start my packing.

  “Surely you don’t need to do any packing tonight. What’s the rush?”

  “I have to. I just do.”

  They walked into the living room and found Alex propped up against the sofa. The half empty bowl of ice cream was now soupy and still sitting in his lap, although his hands were barely holding it in place. His head was drooped over and he was fast asleep.

  “The poor guy is wiped out,” Wade said, smiling down at him.

  “If I get him changed into pajamas now it’ll just wake him up and he’ll be up half the night.”

  “I’ll carry him to bed.”

  Skylar picked up the bowl of ice cream from Alex’s lap and rushed to the kitchen. Wade lightly brushed his hand over Alex’s head. The boy didn’t rouse at all. Scooping him up in his arms, he carried Alex down the hall to his bedroom. Skylar moved ahead of him, pulling the blanket back so Wade could set him down.”

  Once he was under the covers, Skylar bent down and kissed his cheek. They quietly left the room and closed the door.

  “Thank you,” she said as they walked down the hallway. “And thank you for dinner. I think he had a good time.”

  “I had a good time. But then I always had a good time when I was with you.”

  She drew in a slow breath. “Yeah, well.”

  “I should probably go, too, then.”

  Leaving now was the last thing he wanted to do. But the day had been good. He didn’t want to push it too far and ruin what had been wonderful. So he followed Skylar as she walked him to the door. Still, there was one thing he had to know before he left.

  “Can I ask you something?”

  Her delicate eyebrows drew together. “Sure?”

  “Was it hard letting him go?”

  Her lips tilted on one side of her mouth. “You mean, Jay?”

  He nodded.

  She clearly struggled with her answer as she shifted in place. “The truth? No. Admitting that was harder than going through it. He got the job in Wyoming. He wanted me and Alex to go with him. I didn’t want to go. It was that simple.”

  “Was it Wyoming or him?”

  She closed her eyes for a brief moment, as if she were hiding from ghosts again.

  “I hear Wyoming is a beautiful place to live,” she said. “But it didn’t have what I wanted. It was never going to have what I wanted.”

  Relief washed through Wade.

  “Thank you for that.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Wade felt infinitely better as he stepped outside onto the porch. As he looked up at the sky, he said, “Would you look at that moon.”

  Curious, Skylar followed him out to the porch. The front yard was lit up from a near perfect full moon hanging high in the sky. And Skylar was truly breathtaking under the moonlit sky. But then, her beauty had always taken his breath away.

  * * *

  Skylar looked up at the sky, amazed at the brilliance of the moon. “Wow.”

  “I love looking up at the stars here in South Dakota. I missed that while I was away. But this moon is drowning out any stars we may have been able to see tonight.”

  A small ache formed in the center of her chest.

  “What are you thinking?” he asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “It’s not nothing. Tell me.”

  She shrugged as memories invaded her mind. “Do you remember when we were on the island and we’d sit out on that old lawn chair with the broken pieces that kept coming unwoven?”

  “The one I eventually fell backside first through?”

  She laughed, recalling the never ending quest they’d had to always repair it. “Yeah, that’s the one.”

  “I remember that well. I remember getting stuck with my behind on the cold ground and trying to pull myself out with my legs and arms. But the chair just kept breaking.”

  Tears filled her eyes as she laughed. “I can’t believe that chair held the two of us for so long and then the one time you sat in it alone, it broke.”

  His rich laugh stirred a longing deep in her belly that was familiar and yet terrified her.

  When their laughter calmed, she took a cleansing breath. “You used to say there was nothing like a Dakota sky.”

  He looked at her directly. His face was so handsome and sure. She’d always loved that confidence in him. She wished she had even an ounce of that now.

  “I’ve been all over this world and I can honestly say there isn’t,” he said. “There’s nothing like you either, Sky. There’s still no one else I’d rather be with.”

  He reached for her and to her surprise, she didn’t pull away. The memory of the first time Wade had brushed his lips against her after a long midnight walk on the beach consumed her. His had arms enveloped her, yet she could have slipped away from him at any time.

  She’d been nervous then. And now Skylar thought about how foolish she’d been to feel that way. Wade McKinnon was the most intoxicating man she’d ever met and she’d never had anything to fear with him. Especially when she was in his arms.

  She reached up and touched his face and traced his lips with her fingers. He kissed each fingertip as she moved them across his mouth. And when her hand settled on his cheek, he bent his head and brought his mouth over hers.

  She’d wanted this for so long it was hard to believe it was really happening. She was in Wade McKinnon’s arms again.

  Skylar abruptly pulled away from him. “This shouldn’t happen,” she said, out of breath from their kiss. She turned her face away from him with all the strength she had. “Alex is in the house.”

  “And we’re outside on the porch. He can’t see us. Besides, lots of married couples kiss in front of their kids. They make love when their children are asleep in the next bedroom. It’s not scandalous.”

  “We’re not married.”

  “We were planning to get married. Just say the word and we can pick up where we left off, Sky. I’m ready.”

  “I’m not. Don’t make this complicated, Wade. This is already confusing enough for me.”

  “I want you, Sky. Not just to make love with you. Although I very much want that, I know it’s probably too soon. I just want you next to me when we sleep. I want to feel your warm skin. Leaving you the other night nearly killed me.” He bent his head and nuzzled her neck, brushing his lips lightly against her skin.

  “Please stop. You and I know from experience it won’t end there.”

  He smiled devilishly. “Would that be such a bad thing?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why? We’ve made love before. Many times. We made a baby. We’re wonderful together. You can’t deny that.”

  He’d leaned over and whispered the last words against her ear, tickling her senses, making her lightheaded as if she’d been drugged by him. He’d always had that way with her. Damn him!

  “Wade, please stop.”

  Instead of pouting, as Jay used to do when she’d refused him, Wade simply leaned against the porch rail and draped his arm on her shoulder.

  “In my mind, we’ve made love a thousand times,” she confessed. “But that’s where it has to stay. I can’t allow myself to go there again, Wade.”

  “Why not? I can see it every time you look at me. You still love me.”

  Moisture filled her eyes. “Yeah, I do. That’s the sad thing. I wish I had gotten over you.”

  “Then I don’t understand why you’re holding back.”

  “Wade, we can’t just pick up where we left off.”

  She cleared her throat and slipped her hands into the pockets of her denim jeans to keep from reaching out and touching him.

  “Why not?”

  “You don’t want to hear this.”

  “If it gets us to the place we need to be, then yeah, I do. It’s okay. You’re safe with me. You can tell me anything.”

  Skylar shook her head. Thinking these thoughts in her mind were horrible enough. Confessing them seemed so much worse.

  “Just say it.”

  Skylar swallowed to rid herself of the lump in her throat. “I wasn’t the wife I should have been. Not in the way it mattered anyway. Every time Jay wanted me, I...”

  She felt his body tense, but he didn’t turn away. She almost wished he would.

  “It wasn’t like with us. When I had sex with Jay, it was just that. Just sex.”

  Wade shifted uncomfortably, as she knew he would.

  “Forget it,” she said, waving a hand as if that would wipe a slate board clean of all the things she’d just said. “This is what I mean. Too much has gone on.”

  Before Skylar could go into the house, Wade caught her arm.

  “Don’t go yet. I want to know. I want to understand this.”

  The night had turned cooler and the breeze floating across her skin caused raised goose bumps on her arms.

  She took a deep breath and blurted out the very thing that had been haunting her for so long. “I thought of you. Not all the time. Alex kept me busy. My work at the diner, too. But you’d creep into my mind at the most odd times. Sometimes…during the most intimate of times.”

  She looked at his face and saw his jaw tighten, telling her he understood her meaning.

  “I thought that if I kept my fantasy to myself, it wouldn’t matter. But Jay must have known. How could he not have known? I gave him the shell of who I was.”

  Wade dragged his fingers through his short-cropped hair.

  With a heavy sigh, he said, “It doesn’t have to be a fantasy anymore. I’m right here.”

  “That’s the problem. I don’t know how to separate the two anymore. It wasn’t fair to Jay for me to be thinking of you when I was in his arms. I don’t want to be in your arms and remember what it was like with Jay.”

  “It won’t be that way with us.”

  She took a step back toward the kitchen door and just stared at him. Every feature of his face had haunted her for years.

  “Are you sure about that? Everything about my time in South Dakota is filled with all these memories that didn’t include you. I can’t piece what we had together overseas to fit my life here. How can I be with you and not have Jay intrude on what should have always been just us. Look at what it’s like with Alex. Jay never wanted to be his daddy but he’s still here in Alex’s life even if he’s not physically here.”

  “Don’t we owe it to ourselves to try?”

  “What we had was beautiful. It was special. So much so that it ruined my marriage to Jay. I don’t want the ghost of my life with Jay to turn what we had ugly like that. And I’m so afraid it will. There are too many things I can’t wipe from my mind. That’s why I have to leave. You belong here, Wade. Not me.”

  She turned and ran into the house before he could reach for her again. She knew that Wade would. And when he did, he’d win her over. At least for tonight.

  # # #

  Chapter Eight

  They’d spent the week trying to be “normal”. But it quickly became apparent to Skylar that normal was never going to be a part of her life again. At least not while she was in Rudolph.

  She’d finally gotten up the nerve to call her college roommate, Cara, and to her surprise, she learned that Cara had gotten married over Labor Day weekend. Although happy for her friend, Skylar couldn’t deny the twinge of jealousy she’d felt when she’d learned that the man Cara had married was an old friend who’d reappeared in her life after seventeen years apart. She listened to her friend talk about their romantic and “odd” reunion that Cara’s mother had orchestrated. But in the end, Cara realized her mother had been right and Devin Michaels was the only man that Cara had ever loved.

  Skylar understood exactly what Cara was saying.

  She was happy for her friend. But now the idea of staying in Boston for a while would need to be revisited. At least for a little while.

  She and Wade had fallen into a routine of seeing each other at the diner when Wade would eat meals there and then on the days when Skylar would pick up Alex and Keith from school. Skylar found that she looked forward to seeing Wade, even though she didn’t like feeling that way. She tried to keep their time together all about Alex. But she couldn’t deny that Wade, in his charming way, was getting under her skin.

  And when she was alone at night in her bed. She’d think of him again until memories of her time living there with Jay would intrude on her mind and she’d force thoughts of Wade into the past.

  The next Friday, Wade wasn’t at the school when she picked the boys up. She tried to squash her disappointment as she looked around the parking lot. But when Alex and Keith got out of school and it was clear Wade wasn’t coming, she piled the boys into her car and drove over to Logan’s ranch. She was surprised to see Wade’s car sitting in the driveway.

  After parking the car, she climbed out of the driver’s seat and opened the back door so the boys could get out. Logan came out of the house with an armful of camping supplies in his arms. Wade suddenly appeared from Logan’s barn carrying several fishing poles and a tackle box.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  “We’re going on an overnight fishing trip,” Wade said.

  “Where?”

  “We’re going camping?” Keith asked, running over to Logan.

  “Sure are. Right here in the back of the ranch. There’s a nice level spot near the river. I finally had a chance to clean out all the debris from the storm. We’ll have ourselves a nice campfire and roast marshmallows.”

  “And make S’mores?” Alex asked.

  “He’s got your sweet tooth,” Wade commented. “Is it okay with you if he camps out with us?”

  Alex glanced up at her with pleading eyes.

  “Of course. It sounds like fun. But I don’t have any of your clothes.”

  Logan dropped the camping gear he’d been carrying into the back of his truck. “He’s the same size as Keith so he can wear his clothes. I have extra sleeping bags. He’ll be fine.”

  Feeling a little disappointed that she wasn’t going to share in the fun activities planned, she said, “I guess I’ll spend the night packing and cleaning.”

  “He’s going to be fine,” Wade said.

  “Oh, I know.” She looked at Wade for a long moment and then added, “Well, have fun.”

  The boys were already climbing onto the back of the truck with excitement. She gave Alex a quick kiss and then waved to the boys as she climbed into her car and drove home. Alone.

  * * *

  The only thing to make this overnight complete would be to have Skylar and Poppy join them. But Wade wasn’t about to complain. He had some real time with his son and he’d hoped that their time together would be the start of a real father and son relationship that had been missing in Alex’s life.