*
Hector’s Bronco pul ed into a spot across from the art gal ery in LoDo or Lower Downtown Denver and Jane pul ed into a spot two car lengths down on the opposite side of the street. Hector sat in his beat-up, brown Bronco, head turned, eyes aimed into the art gal ery.
He did this awhile.
Jane watched awhile.
Final y, Hector put his Bronco in gear, pul ed out of the spot and drove away.
Jane switched off the ignition to her car, exited it, locked it, fed the meter and walked into the gal ery.
When she did, she smiled.
A petite, curvy, very wel -dressed, strikingly beautiful woman with a mass of golden-cream-strawberry blonde hair that was a riot of soft ringlets mixed with ful waves that floated down her back and al around her exquisite face and shoulders was standing behind the counter.
She looked like a fairy princess.
Jane especial y liked her hair. It was fabulous.
Jane suspected Hector Chavez liked her hair too.
But he probably liked her curves better.
“Hel o.” Her soft voice sounded as her pretty eyes smiled.
Mm-hmm.
This was good.
Jane approved.
“Just looking,” Jane muttered, the woman tilted her head welcomingly toward the gal ery then Jane spent the next fifteen minutes pretending to look as she surreptitiously watched the blonde doing whatever she was doing behind her counter.
Then Jane bought three postcards that had prints on the front of art displayed in the gal ery. Postcards she would never use.
Then she left.
*
Jane waited for her computer to boot up as she turned on dim lighting around the room and lit a scented candle. Cotton flower.
Pretty and soothing.
Then she sat at her desk, moved her mouse and opened her word processing program.
Then she centered the cursor, turned on bold, set the font size at eighteen and typed.
Rock Chick.
Then she hit control at the same time she hit return, starting a new page, changed the font size to fourteen and typed.
Chapter One.
She hit return, turned off bold, turned on italics and changed the font size to twelve and typed.
The Great Liam Chase.
Then her eyes went fuzzy and her memory was swamped with the image of Liam Nightingale embracing his very soon-to-be wife in her angelic wedding dress prior to being declared man and wife.
Then Jane smiled.
Jane was a romantic and she felt the world needed to learn about this love affair.
She felt this because it was beautiful.
They al were.
Then she refocused on her monitor and started typing.
Epilogue
Get Out Here, Babe, I Wanna Kiss You
Ava
Five years later…
I was sitting, cross-legged, smack in the middle of Luke and my big bed.
I could hear Shirleen downstairs, talking to Gracie while Shirleen (and Gracie) banged around the kitchen.
I told Shirleen that she should come with us tonight but she wouldn’t. She’d fashioned herself into the Rock Chick version of Auntie Mame and it was clear her favorite of the Rock Chick/Hot Bunch progeny was, by far and away, Gracie. If Luke and I came home to find Gracie and Shirleen spirited away in the night with a note explaining that Shirleen had kidnapped her and would never return, I wouldn’t have been surprised. She loved that child nearly as much as Gracie’s father and I did.
It was lucky for Gracie, Shirleen had a lot of love to give and I was happy she wanted to give it to my daughter.
The shower turned off and my attention went to the door of the bathroom.
Within minutes, the door opened and Luke was there.
He was clean shaven and his hair, worn much longer now than the way he used to wear it when we first got together (that was to say it was thick, wavy and lush), was wet. He’d long since shaved off the kil er mustache he used to have much to my despair but with the time he spent with me, Gracie and at Nightingale Investigations, not to mention spending time at our cabin in Crested Butte (where, if we were there very long, which we were a lot these days, he’d usual y grow a beard) he said he didn’t have time for ‘tache maintenance.
He’d done his usual half-assed job at toweling off. There were droplets of water clinging to his beautiful shoulders were droplets of water clinging to his beautiful shoulders and perfectly formed, just hairy enough to be sexy as al hel chest and he had the towel wrapped around his waist.
“Towel off much?” I teased and his dark blue eyes sliced to me.
He stopped moving toward the dresser and one side of his mouth went up in a half-grin.
“Babe, get dressed. We’re gonna be late,” he ordered.
“We won’t be late. I’m total y ready.”
I watched as one of his dark eyebrows went up.
“You’re in a robe,” Luke pointed out.
“I just have to put on clothes,” I replied.