Montana Creeds: Tyler (24 page)

“We'll figure that out,” Tyler promised, parking the truck.

The cabin was dark, though she could hear Kit Carson inside, barking out a welcome.

Tyler got out of the truck, walked around to open her door for her. Helped her down.

She swayed a little.

He steadied her.

“We forgot to use the condoms,” she said.

“Yeah,” Tyler agreed lightly. “We sure did.”

And then he took her into his house, where Kit Carson greeted them in a frenzy of welcome. He cooked an omelet, and they shared it, and the dog got some, too.

They bathed each other in the lake after that, and made love again, on the end of the dock, with only the moonlight for covers.

Lily was purely happy, content in a way she'd never thought possible.

And that should have been a warning.

“T
WO WEEKS
?”
Tyler echoed, when they pulled up beside Lily's Taurus, the first orange light of the rising sun just rimming the tops of the mountains. “You're going to be gone for—”

“Two weeks,” Lily confirmed gently. “That's not very long, Tyler.”

She should have broken the news about her upcoming trip to Chicago sooner, she supposed, but when would she have had the opportunity, before now?

Should she have brought the subject up thirty minutes ago, perhaps, when she and Tyler had both crowded into his ridiculously small shower at the cabin, and he'd taken her, standing up? Even after the howling, train-wreck orgasms she'd had, delicious aftershocks still rocked her, little echo-climaxes that made her catch her breath to keep from moaning aloud.

No, she'd told him about her plans as soon as it became possible to string two words together with any vestige of coherence.

Tyler braked the truck beside the Taurus. Gave a low, raw chuckle and shook his head once. “I guess I might have overreacted a little,” he admitted.

Lily smiled. “Ya think?”

He was quiet for a while, struggling with something. “You're coming back?” he asked finally.

“Of course I'm coming back,” Lily said, surprised and, at the same time, not so much. “We're getting married, aren't we?”

At last Tyler looked her way. Grinned slightly. “If you still want to, after you've had the time to think about what you're getting yourself into.”

The sun was about to rise, and Lily wanted to get back to her dad's place before Tess woke up and realized her mother wasn't around. But she hated leaving Tyler, especially when she knew she'd be getting on an airplane soon.

“I'll still want to,” she said softly. She could speak with certainty because she knew now what some part of her had known since she and Tyler dated in high school. She'd
always
wanted to be his wife, even after they broke up over Doreen, and all during her marriage to Burke.

He shifted in the seat, turned to her, took her face gently between his hands and kissed her. It wasn't a passionate kiss, like the ones they'd shared in the shower, or any time before that. It was tender, a sort of communion, and it moved Lily to the very ground of her being.

She loved him.

She could finally admit that to herself, if not to him.

She loved Tyler Creed,
with her whole heart and certainly her newly awakened body, now and forever, amen.

When the kiss ended, Lily couldn't speak.

“Would you mind living in a double-wide for a while?” Tyler asked, his lips still almost touching hers.

Confused, Lily blinked. “What?”

Tyler chuckled, shoved a hand through his hair. “I guess some kind of segue would have been good right about there,” he said. “What I'm asking, Lily, is if you'd be willing to live in a trailer until we could tear down the cabin and build a proper house. It would be a nice one, not like those rentals in town, I promise—”

She'd have lived in a tent, if it meant she had Tyler Creed's wedding band on her finger, all the sex she could handle, which, apparently, was considerable, and the ultimate: a little brother or sister for Tess growing under her heart.

“Sure,” she said. “I'd live in a trailer.”

“There's an outfit in Missoula that leases them out, short-term,” Tyler went on, looking anxious in a way that made her heart pinch. “If it's okay with you, I'll go ahead and pick one out myself, since you're not going to be here to do the choosing, and have everything hooked up by the time you get back. We'll get a license, throw a wedding, and you and Tess can move in.”

Mobile homes, in Lily's experience, were small. With her and Tess there, along with Davie and Tyler and, of course, Kit Carson, the quarters would be a little close.

Right then, fresh from a night of cataclysmic climaxes in Tyler's arms, it sounded cozy, but the reality might be less than fabulous. Still, the benefits would outweigh the liabilities; she was certain of that.

She'd never been—had never expected to be—as happy as she was at that moment in time. Wouldn't have believed it possible. But here it was, this staggering, all-
encompassing joy, this absolute confidence that she and Tyler, together, could make it all work.

“There
is
one thing I'd like to ask for, though,” she said, with a note of mischief in her voice, already working the lever on the door to get out, make her way to the Taurus and head for town.

“What?” Tyler asked, looking puzzled and a touch wary.

Lily leaned across the console and kissed him again. “Have our bedroom soundproofed,” she said. “And make sure there's a strong foundation under that trailer, so it doesn't rock when we—” she dropped her voice to a murmur, licked her lips once, very slowly, because she knew it would drive Tyler mad “—do it.”

Tyler laughed, but he also shifted uncomfortably on the seat. He was hard again, and if she didn't get out of there, she'd end up doing something about that, and there was no time. “Done,” he promised. He started to open his door, planning to walk her to her car.

Lily stopped him with a smile and a shake of her head. The Taurus was ten feet away, if that, and she didn't need an escort to get to it. “See you in two weeks, cowboy,” she said. “You just sit right here in this truck and let that magnificent hard-on go down. If some other woman sees it, she might try to stake a claim.”

Again, he laughed, and maybe it was wishful thinking, but Lily dared to hope that new softness she saw in his eyes meant he was at peace. Tyler had always been troubled, but now he looked as though he might have laid the worst of his demons to rest.

She'd certainly sent some of her own running for the
hills. She wasn't sure when—and it really didn't matter—but for the first time in years, she wasn't afraid to let herself be happy. She wasn't waiting for the other shoe to drop—the way it always had with Burke.

Humming to herself, she dashed to the Taurus, got inside and sped off toward town.

 

T
WO WEEKS
, T
YLER THOUGHT
glumly, as he watched Lily drive away, disappear around the bend.

A lot could change in two weeks.

For one thing, all those orgasms would wear off, and that telling glow, rimming Lily like an all-over halo, would fade.

Once she was back in Chicago, Lily would probably look around and ask herself why she was marrying a Creed, giving up big-city life to live in a double-wide trailer out in the dingle-berries.

She'd have lunch with her friends, at some elegant bistro the likes of which Stillwater Springs couldn't offer, and word would get around that she was back. Someone would offer her a better, more glamorous job than the one she'd lost. Beautiful as she was, all pink-cheeked and bright-eyed and shimmery as a Christmas angel, with her hair fluffed out instead of tamed with hair goop, some smooth type in a suit was sure to spot her and zero in.

In no time at all, she'd be calling him to say she was sorry, and she hoped he hadn't spent too much money soundproofing the bedroom of that double-wide they'd discussed, because she'd changed her mind about all of it.

She wouldn't be coming back to Stillwater Springs.

She wouldn't be coming back to him.

Oh, there was Doc to consider, but she'd talk him into retiring—he was way past the age anyhow—and pretty soon he'd be living in Chicago, too, in one of those fancy independent-living places for senior citizens.

Tyler clenched his right fist to pound the steering wheel once, but stopped himself short when the very atmosphere around him suddenly altered at a quantum level.

The change, intangible as it was, seemed to permeate his very cells.

Jake was there.

He couldn't see him, or hear his voice, but it was as if the old man had wafted right up out of his nearby grave and plunked himself in the passenger seat.

Jake's words came from inside Tyler's own head and nowhere else, he knew that, and yet the sense of being haunted by his father was as strong as any hunch Tyler had ever had.

And hunches were a way of life for Tyler. A survival mechanism, developed early on and honed during the rodeo years. Without them, he'd have been dead, buried in this graveyard with all the other Creeds.

Let Lily go, Ty. Let her go before she gets hurt again.

“Like you ever gave a damn if anybody got hurt,” Tyler said aloud. “And I'm going to take care of Lily, because I'm not you. Damn it, you son of a bitch,
I'm not you.
”

Blood is blood,
Jake's invisible ghost insisted.
And a Creed's a Creed. If I were in any position to make a bet,
I'd wager all I know of heaven and half I know of hell that you'll be bedding down with that waitress, or somebody just like her, before poor sweet Lily's plane touches down at O'Hare
.

“You know
all
about hell, if there's any justice in this world or the next one,” Tyler growled. It was crazy to be sitting there, talking out loud to a dead man, and one he couldn't see at that, but he made no move to start up the rig, head home, get on with the million and one things he needed to do to make a real home for Lily and Davie and Tess. For himself, too. Because this was something that had to be settled—now. “Get out of my truck. Get out of my
head.
”

Jake was as intractable in death as he had been in life.
I'm trying to
help
you, boy. Spare you the kind of grief your brothers are bound to run into. Spare
Lily
some heartache, too. Listen to me. You're a Creed. Dylan and Logan are Creeds, and that's the fact of the matter. They might think they can fancy the old place up and make a new start with that cattle outfit of theirs, but they are who they are, and there's no changing that. We're poison, us Creeds, every last one of us.

Tyler felt sick. God knew, he had his problems with Logan and with Dylan, too. But damn it, they were trying, both of them. They deserved a shot at hauling the Creed name up out of the mud and building lives for themselves.

They deserved to be happy.

“Let them be,” Tyler warned his father. “If you're real, and not a figment of my imagination like I think you are,
you let Logan and Dylan and their women alone
.
You've caused enough pain—even you ought to be satisfied.”

He'd have sworn he heard Jake laugh, though it was a feeling, not a sound.
What do you figure you can do about it if I don't let them be?

“I can hunt you to the farthest corner of hell, when my time comes,” Tyler said. “That's what I can do. And
by God, old man, I will.
If it's a hundred years before I kick the bucket, or five minutes, I'll find you, you sorry son of a bitch. And when I get through with you, you'll be running to the devil for pity, because after me, he's going to look real good to you.”

The soundless laugh seemed to fill the cab of that battered truck.

Tyler half expected the windshield to shatter with the force of it.

Tough guy,
Jake mocked.
All three of you think you're so damn tough, just because you won a few buckles at the big rodeo.

“That's more than
you
ever did,” Tyler answered.

You don't know what tough is, boy. And I did plenty.

Something in that last statement sent a weird chill snaking down Tyler's spine, and his hand trembled a little when he reached for the keys, turned them to start the rig. He was making up this entire scenario, processing a lot of old crap he'd always tried to deny, no question about it—but it seemed just a shade too real now.