One Perfect Moment

“Or she can just take a little walk down Sycamore Lane. Three blocks past the traffic light and to the left—you’ll probably bump right into Harper at Gray Taylor’s house. They’re having a barbecue tonight.”

And the luck just continued to flow, Ava thought with a smile.

“Oh no, I wouldn’t want to intrude on a family gathering. I can just call tomorrow to schedule an appointment.”

“Nonsense,” Mr. Otis said. “Nana Lou baked some cookies for Jack and Lily. I told her I’d run them over there, but you can deliver them in my place. Gives you the perfect opportunity to meet up with Harper.”

It certainly did. Almost too perfect, but Ava decided she would take it. This wasn’t LA or New York; people here were just friendly, she reminded herself. Nobody was going to be suspicious if a stranger just showed up with a plate of cookies. At least she hoped not.

“Tell Harper I sent you to her,” Craig added. “I’ll take a rain check for dinner.”

Ava found herself liking Craig Presley because she could definitely relate to his tenacity.

“I sure will,” she said. “Thanks, Craig, and you, too, Mr. Otis.”

Craig headed out, leaving Ava and Otis alone.

“Like Craig said before, no thanks necessary, ma’am,” Otis replied with a shake of his head. “I’ll just run out to the kitchen to get those cookies for you. Then I’ll take your bags up to your room.”

“That would be great,” Ava told him. “Oh, wait, don’t you need to swipe my credit card, get my ID or have me sign something?”

Otis chuckled. “I can get all that when you come back. If you’re thinking of getting a place here, we definitely don’t want to put that off.”

No, Ava did not want to put off the beginning of her second phase of research. She smiled and thanked Otis once more. She hadn’t been in Temptation for more than an hour, and already she was on her way to getting this story done.

Gage had been in Temptation for two days and he was already dressed down in basketball shorts, a T-shirt and tennis shoes. Garrek’s fiancée, Harper, hit the volleyball with a force Gage wasn’t expecting, and he ran backward in order to save the shot. He tripped over something and fell back instead.

And then she was there.

“Hello, Dr. Taylor,” she said with that smile that never failed to take his breath away.

She stared down at him, dark hair framing her pretty face, a light pink gloss on her soft lips. And Gage thought he must be dreaming.

“Ava?”

He moved quickly, coming to stand in front of her.

“I think you were trying to catch this,” she said and gave a light kick to the ball he’d been after.

Gage put his foot on the ball to stop it from rolling, but did not take his eyes off her. She looked amazing, her long legs clad in cream-colored pants, the formfitting peach blouse and all that thick hair hanging past her shoulders. He’d forgotten how sexy she was.

“Yeah, thanks,” he said and then asked, “What are you doing here?”

“Delivering cookies,” she replied and held up a plate covered in foil.

“All the way from New York or LA or wherever you live?” he asked.

It may have seemed like an odd statement since this was the last woman he’d had sex with. In a perfect world, he would have known more about her besides her last name and professional occupation. But in Gage’s world, it was the norm. He didn’t need to know much about the women he slept with, because he never intended there to be anything beyond the physical. It was easier that way.

“I’m ah...on a kind of retreat,” she replied. “A writing retreat.”

He nodded, noting the plausibility of her response, but still wondering how, of all the places in the world, Ava Cannon would turn up in Temptation.

“And a cookie delivery service?”

She looked down at the plate and then up to him again.

“They’re from someone named Nana Lou. Mr. Otis at the B and B said she promised to make them for Jack and Lily.”

Gage frowned. “Who?”

He’d come to Temptation to be with his family and so hadn’t met many people living in the town.

“Nana Lou is like our grandmother, but not really. She bakes the best double chocolate chip cookies ever,” Lily said.

The precocious seven-year-old girl appeared, leaning against Gage’s leg.

“You’re hogging the ball, Uncle Gage,” she continued before bending down to take the ball he still had under his foot.

“You must be Lily,” Ava said, her attention shifting to the little girl Gage had been thoroughly enchanted by in the last couple of days.

He’d come back to Temptation to meet Gray’s new family and had been amazed at how much he adored the children. Sure, he delivered babies for a living, and he studied ways to help every woman wishing to have a baby fulfill her dream. But Gage didn’t think of becoming a father himself. Still, not even the smiling faces of youth, or the pure sweetness of babies, had been able to erase the thoughts of his one night with Ava. In fact, it had been all those things combined that kept Gage from thinking about his career situation.

“I am Lily, and this is my Uncle Gage. I have another uncle—his name’s Garrek—but he’s away flying planes right now.”

“Oh, that sounds cool. These cookies smell amazing, Lily. Do you think I could try one?” Ava asked.

“Sure. Mommy won’t let me and Jack have more than one for dessert. But Jack doesn’t like to share, so you should take yours now.”

“Hey, guys, Morgan is calling us in for dinner,” Harper said as she joined them. “Oh. Hi,” she added to Ava.

“Hello,” Ava replied. “I’m Ava Cannon. I’m in town for a writing retreat and was told to deliver these cookies.”

“And she’s Uncle Gage’s friend,” Lily added.

Gage didn’t know what to say. Hence the reason he’d been standing there watching the exchange between his niece and his ex-boss-slash-one-night-stand.

“Hi, Ava. I’m Harper Presley.”

“Oh, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Harper. I met your cousin Craig when I was checking in to the B and B. He gave me your card.”

“Really?” Harper asked. “Do you have a house that needs to be renovated?”

“No,” Gage replied quickly. “She’s just here to write.”

Harper, with her sandy-brown hair pulled back from her face, arched a brow as she looked at him.

“You two know each other?” she asked.

Before Gage could answer, his legs almost buckled once more as a laughing seven-year-old ran into him.

“Come on, Uncle Gage, you’re gonna make us lose,” Jack said.

“You already lost. He fell, and the lady got the ball. That means the girls win. Right, Aunt Harper?” Lily asked.

“I’m calling interference,” Gage told Jack. “We’ll need a rematch.”

Lily pouted, and to Gage’s chagrin, Ava knelt down until she was face-to-face with his niece.

“Boys always try to cheat. I think he fell on purpose so he could ask for a rematch,” she said.

A mutinous Lily nodded her agreement. “I think so, too.”

Harper chuckled. “Okay, we’ll have a rematch, but Morgan has dinner ready. You two run along and wash your face and hands so we can eat.”

Thankful to Harper for getting rid of the children, Gage turned his attention back to Ava. It was close to six o’clock in the evening, and the sun was beginning to set; still, the last fading rays cast Ava’s creamed-coffee-toned skin in a golden hue that looked surreal. Or maybe it was because this was the first time he’d seen her outside of the sultry dreams that plagued him each night in the last few weeks.

“Why don’t you join us for dinner, Ava? Gray and Morgan always cook a ton, and since you’re a friend of Gage’s, you should definitely be here to help us celebrate his homecoming,” Harper said.

The gratitude Gage had just felt toward his soon-to-be sister-in-law dissipated as he turned from Ava to look at Harper with a frown.

“I’d love to,” Ava happily replied.

“Great, Gage will bring you up to the house,” Harper said. “I’ll just go and tell Gray and Morgan to set another place at the table.”

When Harper was about to walk away, Ava spoke again. “I really appreciate the offer. I’ve been traveling all day, and I don’t even know if my room at the bed-and-breakfast is ready yet. I just dropped my bags off and came straight here.”

Gage touched her elbow to stop her from following behind Harper.

“Why would you come here? How did you know where here was?” he asked, because no matter how his body was reacting to seeing her again, his mind was still suspicious.

Old habits were hard to break.

A breeze swept by, and Ava eased her arm from his grasp. She pushed her blowing hair behind her ears. And Gage thought he’d never seen anyone as pretty as she was at this moment.

“Small towns are great for writing retreats. Meeting Craig at the B and B and Mr. Otis having cookies that needed to be delivered were coincidences,” she said.

Gage watched her lips moving as she spoke and listened to the slightly husky timbre of her voice. Not only did he listen, but he felt as if that voice, her words, somehow touched a part of him. It was ridiculous, he knew, yet...he decided to believe her. It wasn’t that big of a deal. She could go wherever she wanted without needing his permission. Just because she ended up here, at the same time he was, didn’t mean anything. He needed to stop being so suspicious all the time.

“I would have never expected you to be here,” he replied.

“It’s work,” she said. “Everything I do is about my work.”

Gage could definitely relate to that. In contrast to her writing retreat, however, he had been taking the last couple of days to think about things other than his career. She was one of those things, even though he’d called himself a thousand fools for thinking about a one-time fling weeks later.

“But I can go if it’s weird for you,” she continued.

Was it weird for him?

Considering he hadn’t expected to see her again until it was time to start shooting the second season of the show, maybe. Realizing that his body had already begun reacting to seeing her—via the beginning of an erection as his gaze dipped from her big brown eyes to the unmistakable curve of her full breasts in that tight blouse—hell no, this wasn’t weird at all.

“It’s cool,” he replied. “But we’d better get going. From what I understand, my sister-in-law, Morgan, does everything based on a schedule these days. Something about having a set of twins in elementary school in addition to a set of newborn twins and coveting any sleep she can get.”

“Two sets of twins?” Ava asked with an incredulous look on her face.

Gage nodded and smiled. He ignored the burst of pride that spread throughout his chest as he looked toward the house and the back porch, where his family had begun to assemble at the table to eat the celebratory meal. Gage never talked about his family to anyone because he liked to believe they belonged to only him. Not a part of the world, the way his father had tried to make the sextuplets.

“Yes,” he continued and began walking toward the house. “My older brother Gray is married to Morgan, an elementary school teacher. They have a boy and a girl, Jack and Lily, who you just met. Ryan and Emma are the new babies. Do you like babies, Ava?”

She shrugged as she walked beside him.

“I never thought about it,” she said and then looked at him with a sinfully delicious smile. “I like how babies are made, though.”

The semi-erection that Gage had been trying to ignore grew instantly as he recalled her smiling up at him that night he’d moved between her legs and thrust his length deep inside of her. She’d told him how much she liked it that night, and Gage would swear that the smile she was giving him now was meant as a reminder.

“Yeah,” he said grinning back at her. “So do I.”

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