He found his daughter first. She walked around like she owned the place. Her nose sat firmly in the air, even as she danced. When she tilted a tall glass with what he assumed was champagne, his mouth watered.
Everyone, it seemed, held a glass of something in their hands.
And why not? They were adults. He was a fucking adult and yet he was treated like a child, limited to a diet of milk and water.
Ziggy narrowed his gaze when he found little JoAnne Ward.
She didn’t look like a cop now. Busty and round enough in the right places to forget the little girl she’d once been.
Sheryl was too thin, he decided. Too easy to climb on and bend.
He needed a challenge. Something to get him living again. Because River Bend was just a bigger jail. A jail with a tiny girl running the joint.
The woman in question suddenly stopped talking to whomever she was with and turned his way.
He sank farther into the shadows and didn’t divert his focus until she returned to her conversation.
“The whole town is here,” he whispered to himself.
He backed away from his perch and stretched. It was a nice night for a walk, he decided . . . and an empty town was a quiet place to visit.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Even though they didn’t leave the inn until after one in the morning and stumbling into bed resulted in a rush of limbs and kisses and then finally sleep around two thirty, Zoe’s eyes opened at just before seven.
Stupid internal clock.
She tried to roll over but Luke’s knee kept her pinned to the bed.
She couldn’t feel her toes, which was probably part of the reason she woke. Moving a grown man who wasn’t awake was a little like pushing against a mule who’d found a patch of green grass.
The push, the nudge, the wiggle . . . none of it worked.
Changing tactics, she ran a fingernail over his bare hip in hopes of tickling him enough to roll off.
His chest rumbled. “Starting something?”
She flattened her hand. “You’re awake?”
Luke shifted his hips, and a warm part of his anatomy told her just how awake he was.
“A warm, wiggling, naked woman in my bed has a way of getting me up early.”
Her hand brushed his erection. “You’re insatiable.”
Caging her hips in his hands, he pulled her on top of him.
Her toes started to tingle. “I have morning breath,” she offered in a weak protest.
Luke opened his eyes and offered a cheeky grin. “So do I.”
Some time later, fresh from the shower, Zoe padded around Luke’s kitchen with a steamy cup of coffee. He needed a grinder, she decided . . . and maybe a latte machine.
She chopped an onion to add to the eggs before pulling out a piece of paper and a pen from the obligatory kitchen junk drawer.
By the time Luke joined her, the eggs were cooked, the toast was jumping out of the overactive toaster, and Zoe was on her second cup of coffee.
He nuzzled her neck before pouring a cup for himself. “Good morning,” he said into his cup.
“Brat.” She laughed and set their plates on the table.
Luke found her list and started to read. “What’s this?”
“Kitchen must-haves. Your knives suck and I almost burned our breakfast.”
He took a forkful of her eggs and moaned. “If this is burned, don’t ever let me cook for you.”
She took a bite and removed the list from his hand. The window in front of his sink pushed out just far enough for a few herbs. With the closer proximity to water, Luke would be more inclined to make sure the plants didn’t starve.
He glanced at what she’d written and said, “So you rearrange my kitchen and fill it with things I have no idea how to use.”
“You have a problem with that?”
“Nope, nope.” He took another bite. “Hell to the no.”
“So when are Wyatt and Mel leaving this morning?”
“Their flight leaves at noon.”
“Did they need a ride? I didn’t hear anything about the arrangements.”
“No, his parents were flying out around the same time. They’re taking Hope to Disneyland before flying back to San Francisco.”
Zoe put jam on her toast, took a taste, and then scribbled on the long list of things the kitchen needed. “She’ll love that. Take her mind off her parents basking away in Fiji.”
“What is there to do in Fiji, anyway?” Luke asked.
She’d never been, but she knew people who had. Zoe pointed to the right. “You eat.” She pointed to the left. “Have sex . . .” With a back-and-forth wave, she continued, “Sit on the beach, have sex on the beach, eat a little more. You know, the basics.”
“I like the sound of that.”
She did, too. “We should go sometime.”
His grin told her he liked the idea.
Luke finished his plate and eyed what she’d left on hers. She pushed it his way and he dug in.
“So, the wedding is over.”
“Happily ever after,” Zoe said. “I think they’re gonna make it, too.”
“They make a great couple. Mel deserved a good guy.”
“I couldn’t agree more.”
“Remember what I told you I would revisit after the wedding?”
She blinked a few times.
“Me moving to Texas.”
The thought didn’t hit her as hard, hearing it now. “You like Texas that much?”
“It has its good points.” He let his eyes linger over her, making sure she knew what he was talking about.