Twenty minutes later, Mark hesitated before he climbed out of his SUV to open the metal gate. Why was he suddenly second-guessing himself? He’d waited until they were on a stretch of road with no houses and no traffic before he pulled over for Dani to get in the front seat. After that they hadn’t met five cars. No one could possibly know she was with him.
Mark climbed out of the SUV and turned in a full circle, scanning for anything out of the ordinary. Everything looked fine. He jogged to the metal gate and keyed in the code on the lock, then dragged the gate across the dirt road before he jogged back to Dani.
This should work fine. No one knew they were here except Alex. But what if it didn’t?
The passenger door opened. “You okay?” Dani asked.
“Yeah. Coming.” He hopped back in the SUV. “Wish I’d asked you to drive through,” he said as he pulled through the gate and stopped.
“I’ll get the gate this time,” she said.
“Wait!”
But it was too late—she’d hopped out before he could stop her. He scrambled out, scanning the area again. And again, everything seemed fine.
Dani frowned when she saw he’d gotten out of the truck. “Did you think I couldn’t do it?”
“Didn’t think that at all.” He couldn’t shake the anxiousness that had settled on his shoulders.
“Then why are you checking the lock?”
“Sometimes it doesn’t catch.”
Once they were back in his SUV, he relaxed a little and drove to the far side of his uncle’s land. “One day I hope my uncle gets an automatic gate.”
“Do you come out here often?”
“Not really. When I do, it’s usually to see my aunt and uncle. The entrance to their house is about a quarter mile up the road—don’t have to go through the gate for that.”
He wound around the pasture road to the river and was surprised to see saplings growing where only grass had been in the past. “My uncle must’ve quit bush hogging along the riverbank.”
“How long has it been since you’ve been down here?”
He rubbed the back of his neck. “A couple of years, or five.”
“A place can change in that length of time.”
His uncle was getting older. Mark made a mental note to check and see if he needed help with the farm. He parked the SUV at the edge of the trees and let Gem out of her harness after they got out. She sat and looked expectantly at Mark. “Free,” he said, and she bounded toward the trees and river. “She remembers being here,” he said, laughing. “Let’s see if we can catch up with her.”
The sun was warm, and the scent of damp earth and green grass floated on a breeze out of the south.
“It’s so peaceful here,” Dani said when they’d been walking a few minutes. “Thank you.”
“Maybe you can enjoy a little bit of tranquility since it doesn’t look like there’ll be any rock skipping.” He swept his hand to the left. “There used to be a sandy beach here. We’d bring our girlfriends and have picnics, spend the day, maybe even have a bonfire after it got dark.”
“So, you haven’t always been anti-dating?”
Mark bristled. “I’m not—” The twinkle in her eye stopped him short, and he chuckled. “You like to push my buttons, don’t you?”
“Hmm. Maybe. What do we do here?” she asked when they came to a ditch with water.
“This.” He jumped it, then held out his hand.
“No way. You’d probably let go and I’d fall in.”
“Me?”
“Yes, you.” She laughed and jumped it as well. Then she looked around. “How do you get to the river? There’s water everywhere.”
He hadn’t realized that the recent rains had overflowed the banks of the river, leaving ponds of water. “We probably should go back to the SUV.”
“We can walk the log.” She pointed to a tree that had fallen across the water in front of them. “Last one across is a rotten egg.”
Dani hopped up on the fallen tree, and using her arms for balance, she practically flew to the other side of the water. “Coming?” she asked, looking back at him.
Mark followed suit, and when he reached her, she asked, “Where’s the river?”
“Probably two sloughs over. I think we’d better head back. We can come again when it dries up.”
“It’s a date!” Then she froze. “I mean, we can come back.”
He softened his voice. “I like the idea of a date.”
Dani raised her gaze. The way she looked at him made it hard to breathe. She wasn’t tough and adventurous in a military sense like Jolie, not that Dani wasn’t tough. And she was beautiful in a girl-next-door way.
She was . . . Dani. At that moment, he knew if he let his fears keep him from loving her, he would miss something very valuable. But what if . . . Whenever I am afraid, I will trust in you.
Mark sighed and tucked the verse in his heart. Then he smiled at a streak of mud on her cheek and gently tried to wipe it off.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her voice breathy.
“Trying to clean the mud on your face.”
“Where?” She raised her hand to her cheek.
He captured it with his hand and pulled her closer. “I got it,” he said softly.
“Don’t start something you can’t finish,” she whispered.
“I’m not.” Mark lowered his head and gently kissed her fingers, then the palm of her hand, then he brushed her lips with his. Dani slid her arms around his neck. With a groan he deepened the kiss, sending a shock wave through him. All awareness of time and their surroundings disappeared as Dani leaned into the kiss.
Suddenly they were falling . . .