Tempted Again (31 page)

“It’s by Florence and the Machine. Jess burned a CD of songs for me.” She curled up on the couch and patted
the space beside her. “Tell me about the case. Can I get you something to drink?”

He shook his head and sat beside her. She was close enough to see the lines at the edges of those special eyes of his.

“Despite what you see on TV, most cases aren’t solved this quickly,” Connor said.

“I’m glad this one was, for Jose’s sake. Who did it?”

“The mayor’s granddaughter’s boyfriend. She’s a senior in high school and he’s a nineteen-year-old. He got drunk and wanted to impress her by trying to get Jose in trouble for getting the poetry award she thought should have been hers.”

“He’s nineteen, huh? That’s the age you were when I was a senior in high school,” she said.

“That’s right.”

She wanted to say more but didn’t know how to express what she was feeling. Just that morning she’d been thinking that she wasn’t foolish enough to believe that Connor was the One yet here she was at the end of the same day thinking otherwise. Was she brave enough to admit Connor was the One and had been all along?

Not yet. She had to work her way up to that. “I’m glad that it all worked out. About Jose, I mean.”

“I told you to trust me.”

She found the courage to ask a question she’d been wondering about for some time now. “You talk to me about trusting you but when are you going to trust me enough to tell me what really happened back in Chicago?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s brutal.”

“It involves a child, doesn’t it?” she said. “A child and a lot of blood. I saw your face at the festival yesterday when that kid was injured.”

“As a cop, you do your work and feel later.”

“What happens when you eventually do feel?”

“I may have some trouble in that department,” he reluctantly admitted.

“So you don’t allow yourself to ever feel?”

“It’s a slippery slope.”

“Not feeling? Being immune? I would think so.”

“No.
Feeling
. You can’t allow yourself to go down that slippery slope or you’d fall apart every time a gang- banger on a power trip decides to kill a kid on a drive-by as a thrill kill or an initiation. I’d seen it happen so many times I should have been immune. Hosea was a good kid. He didn’t deserve that. None of them did.” His words were clipped, his expression closed. “Maybe it was the cumulative effect or something. But Hosea’s murder hit me hard. The blood. So much damn blood.” Connor paused and shook his head. She saw the flash of despair in his expressive eyes. “A week later, another eight-year-old was killed as retaliation.”

Eight years old. The age Marissa had been when she’d refused to dance at the pageant. So young. She couldn’t imagine having to deal with what Connor had.

“I should have stayed,” he said. “I should have done more. Instead I walked away and came here.”

“Maybe fate brought you back here to Hopeful because you’d done all you could in Chicago. If it hadn’t been for you, then Jose would be in juvie right now.”

“Spider and Nadine are the ones who helped break the case.”

“But you listened to them. Another cop wouldn’t
have. You’ve taken the time to build the relationships with these teens. And I know you probably did the same thing in Chicago. I bet there are plenty of kids that you saved.”

“Not enough.”

“It would never be enough for you. Not in Chicago. There are other great cops carrying on your work there. But you…you were meant to come back to Hopeful. Just as I was meant to come back to Hopeful. This is where we’re supposed to be. Right here.”

“Right here on your couch?”

She shifted and in doing so inadvertently hit the remote control on the CD player. The classic song “Have a Little Faith in Me” started playing. “Sorry. My sister did a playlist of dance songs,” she said. “I’ll turn it off.”

“Don’t.” Connor stood and held his hand out to her. “Dance with me.”

She slowly put her hand in his. “I’m not good at this. I’ll probably step on your toes,” she warned him.

“That’s okay.”

“I’ll probably mess up.”

“That’s okay, too.”

“I’ll never be a ballerina,” she said.

“Me neither.”

“I’m afraid of storms. And relationships.”

“Me, too. About the relationship stuff.”

“I’ve got baggage.”

“So do I.”

His arms encircled her, giving her strength and courage. She moved with him, her arms looped around his neck, her fingers brushing the silky dark hair on his nape. They were never going to be contestants on
Dancing with the Stars
but that was fine with Marissa. She felt as if she’d won that disco-glitzy glitter-ball award by doing exactly what she was doing—having faith in Connor.

“One day at a time?” she asked.

“Then a week at a time and then a month at a time.” He twirled her in his arms. “Then a year and a decade at a time. Have a little faith in me.”

“You’re asking me to have a
lot
of faith in you.”

“Because I’m putting a lot of faith in you.”

Her first love could end up being her forever love. This was her chance to find out providing she was brave enough to take it, to take Connor into her heart.

Who was she kidding? He was there all along. He always had been. She’d had to come home to Hopeful to discover that. When in trouble, seek shelter…the shelter of her true love’s arms.

*  *  *

One year later….

“Another Corn Festival bites the dust,” Connor said as he slid into the booth across from Marissa at Angelo’s Pizzeria. “Without incident this year.”

“I can’t believe it’s been a year already.” She fingered her favorite moonstone earrings. “The time has gone by so fast.”

He grinned at her. “And they said we wouldn’t last.”

She frowned at him. “Who said that?”

“Nobody. I was teasing you.”

“You’ve been hanging out with Red Fred too much.”

“Who knew the kid had such a great sense of humor?”

“You did.” Marissa reached across the table to link her fingers with his. “You knew.”

“I am pretty brilliant,” he noted.

“One of the many reasons I love you. What?” she asked as his eyes widened.

“That’s the first time you said that.”

“It is not.”

“I’m a police officer. It’s my job to take note of details like that. This is the first time you’ve said it in public. It’s a huge red-letter day.”

“Yes, it is. Because of what’s going on with the teens. Can you believe that Nadine and Spider have created over thirty apps now? And how about Molly and Tasmyn creating the steampunk jewelry using old watches? They can’t keep up with the demand. And what about Jose’s artwork? The professor at Midwest College is so impressed with him and Jose loves being involved in the art program there. I love the cool book logo he put on my formerly-lame-lime-now-shiny-red VW.”

“No more rust buckets for you. Amazing what a body shop can do. It’s a win-win situation all around. But that’s not why this is a red-letter day.”

“It’s not?”

He shook his head and nodded to the pizzeria owner. “Hit it, Angelo.”

Suddenly “Have a Little Faith in Me” played over the sound system.

“They’re playing our song,” she said.

“I know. I planned it that way.” Connor slid out of the booth and took her hand in his before dropping to one
knee. “I already asked your dad for your hand in marriage. He told me that in ancient Egypt, a woman could actually make up her own mind about marriage. So now I’m asking you at the place where we first met all those year ago, where we first fell in love. I love you so much more now. So Marissa, aka Rissa the Rebel, will you marry me?” Reaching into his shirt pocket, he removed a ring. The diamond sparkled in the classy gold setting. “What do you say?”

This was her moment. She hadn’t known it would be coming tonight. But she knew that this was the man for her. She’d known as a teenager and she knew it even more deeply now. Past mistakes were washed away by the love she saw in those blue-gray-green eyes of his. Her reply was confident and without hesitation. “I say yes.”

He slid the ring on her finger and stood to pull her into his arms. Lights flashed around them as the crowd eating dinner burst into applause.

“Your mom made me promise to e-mail her photos,” Angelo told Marissa as he took another picture with his iPhone. “She’ll send them to your mom too, Connor.”

“One big happy family,” Connor said as he slowly danced with her. “We’ve come a long way for two people who weren’t fans of marriage, but the best is yet to come.”

“I know. And I can’t wait,” she murmured against his lips.

“Hey Angelo, make that pizza to go,” Connor said.

“You got it.”

Marissa and Connor ran out of Angelo’s Pizzeria
with the cardboard box of pizza in hand and the sound of the cheers from the people who called Hopeful home.

Twenty minutes later, Marissa was in bed with the man she planned on loving for the rest of her life. There was no place else she’d rather be.