Let It Be (Butler, Vermont #6) - Marie Force Page 0,47

next day. It was enough for him, and apparently her parents, who stood at their front door and waved them off as they left in Molly’s car to go home to their barn.

“You actually heard him say he wouldn’t come after us with the rifle?” Linc asked as he drove them through town on roads that had become familiar to him over the last couple of months, during which Butler had begun to feel like home.

“He promised,” Molly said with a lighthearted laugh that made him smile.

“I appreciate you thinking of that detail ahead of time.”

“I wanted to change your memories of this day, to give you something else to think about other than what happened earlier.”

“You certainly succeeded. I’ll never forget what you did for me today, Mol. Not for the rest of my life.”

“I did it for both of us.” She looked over at him, flashing the saucy grin he loved so much. “Selfishly, I couldn’t wait until January for us to be married or to be able to sleep together every night.”

“Mmm, that’s the best part of being married, or so I’m told.”

“I guess we’ll find out.”

“Starting tonight.” Despite the trauma he’d endured at the hands of his father earlier, Molly had made it so that incident wasn’t the headline of their day. She’d stepped up to give him exactly what he hadn’t known he needed, and now they had the freedom to be together all the time. Nothing had ever made him happier—or more certain that he’d done the right thing when confronted with his father’s ultimatum—than that did.

Linc drove them over the one-lane covered bridge, took a right turn onto Hells Peak Road and pulled into their driveway a few minutes later. “Home sweet home,” he said of their ramshackle barn that would someday be a showplace his wife would be proud of. He was determined to give her everything, including a home unlike any other where they could raise a family and make a life.

October was chilly in the mountains, and they didn’t yet have heat in the barn. That was the next thing on their endless to-do list to make the barn habitable for the winter. “What do you think of a campfire at the tent?” he asked.

“I think that sounds perfect.”

“It’s going to be cold out there tonight, Mol.”

“No, it won’t.”

“They said on the radio it’s supposed to get down to the low forties.”

“We won’t be cold.”

The certainty in her words sent a shiver of anticipation down his back. They used the bathroom inside and headed out to their backyard campground, where Linc built a fire he hoped would help keep them warm during the night.

Molly had acquired extra blankets somewhere and had brought them with her to add to their bed.

“My wife is always thinking ahead, isn’t she?” Linc asked, loving the way the word wife sounded.

“She does her best to take good care of her husband.”

“She’s the best wife he’s ever had.”

As always, her laughter lit up her face and sent another shiver of delight through him. Knowing he had the rest of his life to spend with her, that he had her to lean on when the going got tough, made the rest of what had happened that day worth it, or so he told himself. He wasn’t under any illusions that the days to come would be all sunshine and roses, or that the breach with his family wouldn’t hurt forever. But having her to help him through the loss would make it bearable. At least he’d still get to see his siblings. He’d make sure of that.

“Where’s my husband?” Molly asked from inside the tent.

“Right here.”

“Your wife is lonely.”

“We can’t have that.” He tossed two more logs on the fire and went to find his wife, nearly swallowing his tongue when he saw she was already in bed, under the quilts, her hair loose around her bare shoulders as she held herself up on one elbow.

“What’s going on under there?” he asked, tipping his head for a better look at his beautiful wife.

“Come find out.”

“Don’t mind if I do.”

“Just in case you didn’t get the invitation, the dress code for this party is naked.”

Linc was definitely going to swallow his tongue before she was finished with him. “Good to know.” He pulled and tugged at clothes and buttons and zippers with gleeful haste that had his beloved laughing her ass off.

“Quit laughing at me.”

“Quit being funny.”

He couldn’t believe this was actually happening, that after months of longing,