up at the sky, the stars white pinpricks in black velvet. They’d forgotten to look at the stars.
The door flew open. “The telescope,” Dylan blurted. “Venus will be bright tonight and the moon is so...” They both looked up. The moon was a huge orange ball overhead. “Big and...”
“Beautiful,” she finished. She saw the same yearning in his face that she knew was plastered over hers.
She did not need this. She had a plan for her life and it did not include this man or the town that had claimed him forever. She wouldn’t waste time wanting what could never be.
Even if they wanted to try, it wouldn’t work. They were too different. They’d hurt each other too deeply. She would never come first with him. And he would never rest easy with her. That was that.
“We don’t need a telescope to see that, do we?” she said softly.
“Guess not.” He was disappointed, but also relieved, she could tell. He knew it would be a mistake, too. That made her more certain than ever.
Until she sat in her car and noticed she could smell Dylan on her skin, that heady and arousing scent that made her crave him more than ever.
It took every ounce of willpower she had to drive away.
* * *
DYLAN STARED AT the door he’d just shut against the sight of Tara beneath a golden moon. Venus will be bright. What an idiot.
Duster whined, his eyes full of accusation.
“How do you think I feel?” he said. He’d wanted her with everything in him. Kissing her had been heaven...her sweet lips soft and giving and knowing. The electricity had been the same, the rush of heat and need.
And that was bad. He didn’t want that in his life. Couldn’t cope with it. Wanting her would take over his life. And he knew Tara could turn on him in a heartbeat. Even knowing she’d suffered without him, missed him, didn’t change the deeper truth—she disapproved of him, his choices, his life. Sooner or later, it would come up again. She would leave him in the emotional dust. He did not want to yearn again for an impossible love.
Love didn’t have to be crazy and all-consuming. In fact, it couldn’t be if you wanted it to last a lifetime.
He was still reeling from realizing that Candee had been right—he had kept Tara in his heart, burning candles to her memory, like a fool.
Candee had paid the price for his refusal to see the truth. He’d fought for their marriage. He’d watched his parents tear theirs up like so much paper. But he’d sabotaged his without knowing. He’d been in total denial.
He was ashamed, angry at himself.
He realized he could go right back to how he’d been with Tara.
For all they’d matured, too much remained the same. Tara was still mercurial and complicated. He still felt the need to protect her, to rescue her, whether she needed it or not.
That’s what helping her “investigate her case” was all about, for God’s sake. He was done managing people. He’d managed his father for ten years. It was enough. The complications with the Wharton contract were giving him fits, delaying his release from the company and his father.
Dylan had no time to relive old loves. That imprint thing made sense. He needed to get past that, and quick, if he ever expected to make a life with a woman—a solid, steady life, not the crazy, white-water raft trip he’d have with Tara. And he intended to do that. It was all part of his plan.
He carried the dishes in from the patio, pausing to stare at the sky. It was a good night for stargazing. He remembered trading places at the eyepiece—fingers tangling, faces inches apart, her hair falling against his face, the smell of her...
Not worth it. Not even close.
He cleaned up and headed to bed. Duster leaped up like a dog half his age. “She made you feel young again, didn’t she?” he said. She’d done the same to him and that wasn’t good for either of them. Like the huge orange moon overhead, he didn’t need a telescope to see that.
* * *
“IT’S A HOSPITAL ROOM, not a beauty parlor,” Judith groused, bracing the vase of flowers against the canvas bag on the passenger-seat floor. Tara had filled the bag with cosmetics, nail polish, hair gear and a portable iPod player.
“It can’t hurt and it could help wake her up.”
“I think you’re crazy, but it’ll probably cheer up your mother.