he pulled out a small box from his pocket, then held it out for her.
Fear came to her eyes.
Shaking his head at her, he explained, “I bought these because … I know the bracelet means a lot to you, and I wanted a piece of me with you. I didn’t mean to buy them like I meant to buy the brothers’ watches. I bought them spur-of-the-moment because I was missing you.”
She gave him a gentle smile. “Then I’ll accept your gift.” Pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth, she jiggled the present in front of his face. “Let me guess.” She jiggled the small box again. “They’re charms.”
“Good guess.” He mockingly laughed. Then he nervously watched as she opened the box, waiting for her reaction.
“Aw … they’re beautiful.” Kissing him, the second kiss started spinning out of control when she leaned against his chest, her head naturally going to his shoulder.
Breaking off the kiss, he straightened her on his lap. “Behave. Viper will be here in five minutes.”
Her face fell. “So soon? I thought we would have at least an hour. Silas just left, and I was ….”
At seeing her blush at what he was sure she had been about to say, Reaper decided to tease her. “You thought you’d get a little nookie after Silas left?” He gave her an unapologetic, I-told-so smirk. “You should have taken my suggestion and sneaked down to my room after he went to bed last night.”
“Your room doesn’t have a door,” she reminded him.
“Which is one of the chores I have to take care of today if you will go ahead and open my present so I can leave.”
Ginny stared at the unopened present in her hand. “If I don’t open it, will you just please stay here with me?” she whispered.
Taking her chin, he lifted her eyes to his. “The most I’ll be gone is a couple of hours. I wouldn’t go if I didn’t have to.” Releasing her chin, he then took the box back and opened it for her. Taking out the charms, he placed the star, then the moon, and finally the pair of diamond angel wings into her palm. Closing her fingers around the charms, he lifted her fist to his lips. “The next charm I’m going to buy you is a four-leaf clover, to remind you of our first date.”
“Our first date?”
He shrugged. “I refuse to think of Dirty Dan’s as our first date.”
“You’d rather be reminded of us having to sneak out before morning to bury a mirror?”
“Yes, I would. I’d rather completely forget about Marty, and you’re going to help me do that by not mentioning he’s moving to Treepoint.”
“But—”
“No, butts … unless it’s yours,” he joked, tapping her on the side of her bottom to get her to stand up when they heard the sound of Viper’s car outside.
Taking her hand, they walked to the door. Raising her wrist, he stared down at the bracelet, looking at the charms. A new one had been added that he hadn’t seen in Nashville.
“When did you get this one?” Reaper touched the fragile gold sand dollar.
“T.A. gave it to me.” Ginny didn’t lift her eyes from the bracelet.
“Why’d T.A. give you a charm? It looks expensive.”
“She gave it to me for singing at her wedding.”
“That was nice of her.”
“She’s a nice person.”
The loud honk from the yard had them going outside.
Uncaring of Viper watching, he placed a kiss on her lips. “When I come back, I’ll be bringing that door.”
“You going to tell Silas why you’re wanting to put that door up?” she teased.
“I’ll leave that up to you,” he said, going down the steps. Seeing her expression, he came right back up the steps. “I’ll talk to him, okay?” Rubbing a thumb over her trembling bottom lip, he pulled Ginny into his body. “If it’s going to make you uncomfortable, when I come back, we’ll talk it over and find another place for us to stay. Now, will you behave, or am I going to have to shove that horn up Viper’s ass?”
“I’ll behave.”
The tight hug she gave him made him feel better about leaving.
Waving at Matthew and Isaac as they were going inside their shop, he got inside Viper’s SUV.
“We’re late,” Viper snapped at him before Reaper could shut the door.
“I got that message two honks ago,” Reaper snapped back.
“I told you we couldn’t be late to the meeting with the FBI when I talked to you this morning. Now we’re not going