Sierra Falls (Sierra Falls 1)

Because Billy had a ring to pick up in Silver City.

He’d cut the timing close, but he wanted everything to be perfect—perfect size, perfect fit—when he presented it to Sorrow. And man, that ring was just right.

He’d known the moment he saw it in the jewelry store window. It was an antique, a diamond surrounded by tiny sapphires in an engraved platinum setting. It was delicate and exquisite, but strong and solid, too. Not over the top. Nothing pretentious or splashy—a classic.

Just like Sorrow.

As Sorrow Crabtree’s great-great-great-granddaughter and namesake, she’d been asked to join some of the other women in donning period dresses for the late afternoon supper show. A number of townsfolk had gotten into the spirit, dressing up like pioneers and prospectors from gold rush days. Everyone had migrated from the picnic grounds to the hall to enjoy the rousing music and saloon dance numbers just like the elder Sorrow might have performed.

Little did the audience know, they were about to get an even better show than they’d bargained for.

Unable to resist Sorrow and her enthusiasm in the days before the festival, he’d found an old-time sheriff’s costume online. And, he had to admit, he felt like quite the badass clinking around the festival in his new spurs.

They’d talked around marriage, so he had an inkling he’d find a willing partner. Lately, though, he’d been avoiding the subject. Not because he was no longer interested, but because he’d wanted to keep his surprise.

His smile was wide, watching her laugh and fake her way through the old-time dance hall moves. For someone whose sense of responsibility and commitment to hard work and family was so hardwired, Sorrow sure did know how to experience joy. And the pleasure she took in her cooking was just the start of it. She embraced life with an easy, natural immediacy that’d paved the way for him to engage in his own life once more.

To engage his heart.

The number ended, and for a moment he lost sight of her amidst the milling, cheering crowd. He searched for her, and he knew a funny spurt of discontent until his eyes found her again, standing at the edge of the stage.

The buzzing of the audience came to him as though through a tunnel. She was the reason he was there, happily wearing a silly getup with a diamond ring in his pocket.

He watched her, feeling calmed and contented by the very sight of her. Someone in the crowd had shouted something, and she was smiling down, one part of a three-way conversation that included June Harlan at the piano. Sorrow was openhearted, generous, thoughtful, down-to-earth, and quick to smile…everyone in town loved her. How he got to be the lucky man who got to keep her was beyond him.

And she was the one. His heart was clear of all doubts on that score. He wondered if, in the deepest part of his soul, he hadn’t known it all along. Sorrow had renewed that part of him he’d lost after Keri’s death—that inner wellspring that he’d thought had died had simply been temporarily dried out, now replenished by her presence in his life.

She was the gift he thought he’d never receive—a chance at a second chapter. And this time, it was a love more profound than any he’d ever known, because he understood now just how precious, how valuable was such a treasure.

He couldn’t stand it any longer. He went to her, parting the crowd as he made his way across the floor. The clink of his spurs amused him, widening the smile on his face.

He leapt up onto the stage and took her hand, distantly aware how the room had begun to hush.

She beamed. “Hey, stranger! There you are. I’ve been wondering—”

As he got down on one knee, the crowd gasped and the words froze on her lips.

An elderly voice exclaimed, “I knew it!” It’d been one of the Kidd sisters—Pearl maybe. Laughs followed. Other voices chimed in, cheering him on.

He didn’t give any of them a second thought. His eyes were only for his Sorrow. The silence became complete.

He smiled up at her, so pretty and flus

hed from her dancing. Tendrils of curling blond hair had sprung free, framing her face. She was a vision.

She met his eyes, looking a combination of bewildered and thrilled. He could see from the tight bodice of her old-fashioned dress how her breath stuttered, caught.

He sighed as something unclenched in his own chest—she would say yes. She would be his, forever.

Calm and sure, he gave her hands a squeeze. He cleared his throat. “Sorrow Ann Bailey, would you do me the honor of becoming my bride?”

Whoops and whistles exploded through the hall. He heard Bear somewhere in the crowd boasting how he had a lawman in the family now.

She laughed and cried, nodding away, her eyes serious but her expression light. She was radiant—joyful and tearful and so perfectly herself. “Yes, yes,” she repeated. “Yes. ”

That one word reverberated through his soul. He’d thought to be discreet—he was the town sheriff after all—but he couldn’t help it. He stood and sealed it with a kiss.

The crowd erupted in cheers.