Good Gone Bad (The Fallen Men 3)

“You’re right,” I said, reaching out to touch his harshly stubbled cheek.

He shrugged a shoulder. “Honestly, I’m surprised my smart girl isn’t used to that by now.”

I hit him in the shoulder, but couldn’t stop smiling as I looked back down at the beautiful creature in my lap.

“Hello handsome,” I cooed. “He’s a him, right?”

Danner chuckled, “Yeah.”

“Good, you know I love my men.”

“Yeah,” he said in a way that drew my gaze to his, the green of his eyes glowing with love so bright they shone neon. “I know my girl loves her men.”

“What should we name him?” I asked, rubbing my hands over his crazy soft ears.

“Why don’t you check the collar?” he suggested.

I lifted the dog close again, this time higher so I could look at the collar under his fur. Something shining caught my eyes and I frowned as I parted the black coat to investigate.

A small gold plate said “Saint,” the perfect name, but that wasn’t what made me gasp, fresh tears rolling out to join the dried ones on my cheeks.

It was the sight of a huge gold ring molded into a perfect rose that hung from the dog tag.

When I looked over at Danner again, he’d shifted onto one knee, his forearms in the bed so he could lean over and work at taking the ring off the collar. He called out to Alexa to play “Like Real People Do” by Hozier as he worked and then he said, “Love you, Harleigh Rose, love you in a way that I know I’ll never stop doin’ it, just like I haven’t stopped doin’ it in one way or another since I met you. Some men want women that are all sugar and sweetness, dependable and staid, but I’ve always preferred the kind of woman that’s roses and thorns, strength and sass, that’s so wild at heart I never know what I’m going to get. You make me feel alive, Harleigh Rose, filled with a love and purpose so strong it eclipses any other reason I may have to love living.”

“Yes,” I shouted through the ugly tears that had seized control of my body, curling the puppy in one arm so I could throw myself at my man with the other. “Yes, fucking yes, of course.”

“Haven’t even asked the question yet, rebel Rose,” Danner griped playfully against my hair.

I pulled away from him only to readjust so I could say the words against his lips. “You ask me today, tomorrow, yesterday, any of the days since I met you when I was six years old and didn’t even know the meaning of love, I’d’ve said yes to you Lion Danner.”

“Yeah,” he said, sweet and long and slow, the way he did when I told him something worth savoring.

Then he kissed me.

He kissed me in a way that said safety and security, sexy and sensual, love and loved. He kissed me like he played music for me, more eloquently than words could accurately express.

“Yeah,” I repeated in his tone when he pulled away to place the fucking awesome gold rose on my ring finger and I officially became engaged to the love of my life. “Yeah.”

Eight years later

Bang, bang bang.

Gunfire rang out across the four acres of land behind our house, the leaves rattling on the trees as birds took flight and a few of the horses we kept let out high whinnies of protest. Saint only stared at me, laying under my feet where I sat on the back porch, ass to the swinging chair Cressida bought for our last wedding anniversary. My dog was unfazed by the sound of the shots, he knew his people were home safe and sound, that the only thing to fear was the very real possibility that my wife was turning our kids into gun nuts.

I patted my dog on the head, took a pull of my cold Vancouver Island lager and looked to my family congregated to the far back left of the porch. Harleigh Rose was bent nearly double so she could speak to a six-year-old Cash about gun safety, our little girl, too young to handle the gun herself, stood with them, a pout on her tear-streaked face, still holding onto her tantrum like only the daughter of Harleigh Rose could do.

“You’re askin’ for it, showin’ ’em how to use a gun,” Lysander said as he emerged from the house, two newly cracked open beers between his fingers. “Not sure I know any other kid sleeps with a plastic gun like it was a stuffed animal the way Taz does.”

“Yeah,” I agreed, endlessly amused by the fact that Tasmin insisted on sleeping with a bright pink water gun we’d bought her for her fourth birthday. “She’s a little badass-in-training.”

“Not sure I envy ya, man,” he said, leaning against the railing, one foot crossed over the other, thick arms folded over his chest.