TWENTY-THREE

My stomach growled loudly by the time we arrived back at the resort. We ordered room service and waited on the balcony for lunch to arrive. Outside, workers scurried around the manicured lawn, setting up round tables and a portable dance floor for the reception. On the beach, white folding chairs were being lined up, facing the surf.

"I never asked. Is your cousin the bride or the groom?"

"The bride," Ranger replied. "Her name is Mia."

"Were you close?"

Ranger shrugged. "In a way."

"In a way?"

"I'm nine years older than her, so when I moved down here I often got assigned to babysit her."

I smiled, trying to imagine Ranger babysitting. "Please tell me there's a photograph somewhere of you playing tea party with her."

"I didn't play tea party, and I wasn't exactly the best influence. She got in trouble at school for threatening the kids who picked on her that I'd beat the snot out of them."

"Would you have?"

"Without a second thought."

Room service delivered lunch and I inhaled half a BLT. I started on the second half and looked down longingly at the pool deck. "I think there might be enough time for me to take a quick swim before I need to get ready for the wedding." And by swim, I meant stretch out on a lounge chair and soak in some rays while reading a dirty novel.

"You might not," Ranger replied. "I made you an appointment at the hotel spa for two-thirty. Thought you might want an actual expert to do your hair for the wedding, since my skill set ends at ponytail. You can cancel it if you want."

I looked again at the pool and sighed. "No, I need something a little better than a ponytail."

At two-thirty, I plopped into a stylist's chair in the posh spa. Half an hour later, I reemerged, my hair defrizzed, tamed and pulled away from my face. Two pieces twisted in a loose braid around to the back, leaving the ends to drape down my neck and shoulders in big beachy curls. The stylist had tucked a sprig of small white flowers into the back, slightly off centered to the right. Ironically, she'd said the flowers were called Stephanotis.

I returned to the hotel room and immediately took up residence in the bathroom to do my makeup and get dressed. At three-thirty, I emerged in the skimpy little blue lace dress Ranger had picked out of my closet and a pair of strappy tan sandals with three inch block heels. Ranger waited for me on the balcony. He'd dressed in a pair of dark brown dress pants, brown loafers and a dark blue button-down dress shirt that complimented my dress. The top few buttons were left intentionally unbuttoned, making him look sexy as hell.

I heard Ranger suck in a breath as he got a good look at me, his eyes darkening.

"No messing up the hair, makeup, or dress before the wedding," I warned, intentionally saying nothing about after. I'd written the dress off as a sacrifice to the sex gods since I didn't expect it to live through the night.

Ranger pulled me against him. "We could always skip the wedding," he murmured, lips kissing down the side of my neck.

I twisted away from him before he convinced me that was a good idea. "Let's go."

We rode the elevator down to the main floor and walked out of the lobby toward the beach.

As the wedding reception wound down, I breathed a sigh of relief. I'd survived meeting Ranger's family. His mother got the word out beforehand about the pretend wedding rings and mercifully no one mentioned them. The DJ announced the last slow dances of the night. "You and Me" by Lifehouse began to play as the bride and groom moved close together on the dance floor. Many of the people sitting out the more exuberant dancing rose to join in a slow dance.

Ranger stood and offered me his hand. I accepted his silent invitation and followed him to the dance floor. He pulled me close, wrapping his left arm around my waist and gently taking my left hand in his right, holding our hands close to his chest. I draped my right hand around his neck and leaned into his body, enveloped in the heavenly aroma of Bulgari Green. I let Ranger lead, not that we did anything fancier than shuffle our feet and sway gently to the music. My head rested against his chest and shoulder, his face resting against the top of my head. I closed my eyes and breathed in his scent, listening to his heart beat. The song changed to "Unforgettable," then "At Last" by Etta James.

As the final notes faded, Ranger and I ruefully moved apart.

"Walk with me, Babe," he whispered into my ear.

We snaked our way off the dance floor and away from the reception. At the edge of the grass, we paused to take our shoes off. We added them to the growing pile of abandoned footwear, not the only ones to think of a nighttime stroll in the sand. Ranger rolled the cuffs of his pants to mid-calf before leading me into the darkness.

The surf felt cool, but pleasant. We walked slowly, hand in hand. A nearly full moon, somehow larger than the moon back in Jersey, hung above us.

"It's beautiful here," I said lightly, looking out over moonlit waves. "Why don't you work out of your Miami office? This is paradise."

"Most of my family lives in Jersey." He paused half a second before continuing, "You're in Jersey." He gave me a meaningful look. "It'd be hard to be your super hero from down here."

I knew I relied on Ranger way too much. "I don't want to be the thing holding you back."

"Babe, you don't hold me back. You make life enjoyable."

"Because I amuse you?"

"Because I love you."

It wasn't the first time he'd told me he loved me, but the air caught in my lungs just the same. It took a few seconds for me to find my voice. "But you can't offer commitment." It wasn't a question. I'd heard it countless times from him.

Ranger took a beat to reply. "I've been reevaluating my own rules."

I sucked in a breath. The idea of a committed relationship with Ranger set butterflies loose in my stomach. I could barely handle sex with him occasionally, but to get it on a regular basis? Fire raced across my skin and headed south.

I saw Ranger smile in the moonlight as he leaned over to kiss me. One of his hands snaked through my hair, the other wrapped around my waist to pull me into him. Several minutes passed before we broke apart, gasping for air.

"You want to go back to the room?" I breathed.

"Yes, and tonight I'm driving."

A sensual whimper escaped my lips as a fresh thrill shot through my body.

We walked quickly back to the hotel, collecting our shoes and washing the sand off our feet at a spigot by the entrance to the lobby.

The elevator doors barely closed behind us before Ranger pressed himself against me again, kissing me hungrily. We stumbled into our room and Ranger released me just long enough to toss the "Do Not Disturb" sign onto the doorknob before shutting and bolting the door.

He had my dress and panties off before we crossed the room, and his clothes soon landed on the floor as well. The back of my knees hit the edge of the mattress and I fell onto the bed. Ranger crawled after me, using his knees to spread my legs before sliding inside me. We moaned in unison. He thrust his hips slowly, cautiously, as his lips worked their way from my mouth down toward my chest. I matched his rhythm, moving my hips opposite his, moaning with pleasure. His mouth brushed one of my breasts as he sucked a nipple between his lips. My breaths grew ragged at his ministrations, my hands gently roaming across his back.

I felt my body getting close to release, but Ranger suddenly stilled his hips and the feeling faded. I gave Ranger a concerned look, but earned only a wicked grin in return.

He picked the rhythm back up, growling in my ear, "I'm not ready for you to come yet."

Holy shit. I gulped as his words sent shivers across my entire body.

He brought me to the edge of ecstasy again and once more slowed, resting inside me for a minute before resuming.

"Please don't stop," I moaned the third time I felt myself getting close. "Ranger, please!"

He didn't stop thrusting this time and my back arched off the bed as a wave of pure pleasure swept through me. His lips crashed down on mine as he continued to move inside me, moaning as he reached his own climax. Our bodies stilled, the only movement the heavy rise and fall of our chests as we both struggled to catch our breath.

He kissed me, with tongue, and I felt him harden again inside me.

"We're not sleeping tonight, are we?" I asked softly.

He ground his hips against mine. "Who needs sleep?"

"The sun is rising," I remarked quietly as soft light filtered into the room through the balcony curtains.

I lay on my back, the covers pulled up to my belly button. Ranger rested on his right side next to me, tracing lazy circles around my breasts with his finger. We'd slept only a few hours, if that. Finally, though, we both seemed to be spent. His fingers felt warm against my skin, but not arousing.

"Did you mean it when you said you were reevaluating your rules?" I asked softly.

"Yes."

I waited for him to elaborate. He didn't.

"You can't just leave me with a 'yes.'"

He gave me a half smile and tucked a piece of my hair behind my ear. "I'm tired of sharing you."

"It's not that simple," I returned. "I love you, but I also love Morelli."

Ranger smiled. "You've never told me you loved me before."

"You knew it."

"But it's nice to hear you say it."

"It doesn't uncomplicate matters."

"No, but I'm partly to blame too," he said gently. "I made it clear that I couldn't offer you a relationship. I just expected you to eventually marry Morelli and that would be the end of it."

"You underestimated just how screwed up I am in the relationship department."

"No, I underestimated my feelings for you. And I've come to realize that Morelli isn't the right guy for you."

I raised my eyebrows at him, "and you are?"

"I think we're right for each other. You and Morelli are like a pair of refrigerator magnets. If you are both facing the right direction, you attract. A lot. But if one of you gets turned around, instead of attracting, you push apart. And I think you both know it."

As much as I hated to admit it, Ranger made a valid point. Morelli and my relationship swung between two extremes like a perpetual pendulum. "If Morelli and I are refrigerator magnets, what are you and I?"

"You and I are like gravity. No matter how far I tried to distance myself from you, I got pulled back. Our attraction is natural and not easily broken."

"You know, a less secure woman may take offense to being likened to something with enough mass to have a gravitational field," I teased.

Ranger kissed my forehead. "Good thing you're a secure woman."

"So, we're gravity, like the moon around the Earth. Doesn't mean the moon wants to be there."

"Trust me, I want to be there."

I scanned his face. "Are you sure this isn't just an overreaction to almost dying? A midlife crisis a decade early?"

"I'd been contemplating it before I got shot, but…"

"But?" I prompted, anxious to hear whatever he held back.

Something seemed to crumble as I watched Ranger's face. The façade he kept up even around me disappeared and he gazed back at me with nothing but honesty in his eyes. He laid a hand along the side of my face, thumb stoking my skin softly. "I knew I was dying," he explained in a whisper. "As everything faded to black, when I thought the last sound I'd ever hear was your panicked voice, I felt regret. Now, there are quite a few things in my life I should feel remorse over, but in the end, you were my only qualm. That I'd wasted the time I'd been given with you. And then you turned out to be the reason I have a second chance at it."

He bent his head down, brushing a light kiss across my lips. I recalled his mother's words to me before she left, seeming prophetic now. A tremor of fear ran through me. What if I couldn't live up to Ranger's new expectations? Disaster seemed to tail my love life. Unable to bear hearing anymore, I reached up, entangling my left hand in his hair, trying to keep his mouth on mine, hoping to distract him with thoughts of a more physical nature. Ranger chuckled as he pulled away.

"For someone who accused me of always keeping my emotional distance, you sure are trying to derail my attempts to close the gap."

My heart raced inside my chest. "You're going to need to spell this out for me. If you've thrown out the old rules, what are the new ones?" I needed to hear him say it plainly.

"I want a serious relationship with you. A committed relationship, where I am yours and you are mine. And only mine. In whatever form you want that to take."

"Does that mean marriage is on the table?" I breathed, absentmindedly fiddling with the fake rings.

Ranger paused, "If that's what you want, I'll replace those fake rings with real ones tomorrow."

Whoa. My breath caught in my throat. Ranger watched me with just a hint of a smile and I realized he was messing with me. He knew my trepidation about marriage. And I knew his. I toyed with the idea of accepting, just to see if he would balk first. But then I thought better of it. A game of chicken with Ranger over marriage might not end until we were both standing in front of an altar.

"I think we should just try dating first," I replied. Even that seemed crazy. Me dating Ranger? "What are the other rules?"

"Just one other rule. No children. You're already a target for anyone looking to hurt me, and I've come to terms with that. I won't bring a child into it, though. It wouldn't be fair to you, me, or a kid. And I understand if that is a deal breaker."

I took a shaky breath. "So, two rules: monogamy and no babies." I didn't know how well I would do with either of those things. I'd honestly tried to stay true to Morelli when we'd been together, but Ranger did a fair job of sneaking kisses and touches anyway. And there were times when I looked at my little nieces and desperately wanted a baby of my own. The feeling usually passed as soon as the kid needed a diaper change or started screaming, but one day I feared my biological alarm clock would start ringing and refuse to stop.

We laid in silence for a few minutes. I weighed my options in my mind. Ranger's offer both exhilarated and terrified me. I'd had both Morelli and Ranger in my life for so long that my messy love life felt normal. Complicated became my comfort zone, the status quo. But the status quo had gotten me nowhere.

"You don't have to decide right now and this isn't an ultimatum," Ranger said softly.

"I have decided," I replied. "I'm just scared. I break things. What if I destroy gravity?"

Ranger laughed lightly, then pulled me into him for a long kiss. "Even you can't destroy gravity, I guarantee it."

I yawned and snuggled into his side.

"Get some more sleep, Babe."

I woke to the sound of the room door opening and quiet voices. Cracking open my eyelids, I saw Ranger carry a room service tray onto the balcony. The tempting aroma of bacon and maple syrup drifted after him. I sat up, stretched, and dragged myself into the bathroom. A few minutes later I reemerged wrapped in a terry cloth robe, looking and feeling slightly more human. I joined Ranger on the balcony.

I sat down opposite Ranger and took a few long swigs of coffee, then ate a piece of bacon. "I had a really odd dream about us last night," I told him between bites.

"Was it about gravity?"

I looked at him over the rim of my coffee mug. "I didn't dream that conversation, did I?"

"No. Having second thoughts?"

"No, are you?"

Ranger smiled. "No regrets."

I finished my breakfast and looked longingly down at the pool.

"We need to check out in an hour," Ranger said, "but the front desk will hold our luggage and let us use the amenities until it's time to leave for our flight."

"Sweet. You'll find me by the pool."

"I never would have guessed," Ranger replied dryly.

I got my suitcase packed and stuffed some clothes and sneakers into a bag to keep with me. Then I changed into the little black bikini from Victoria's Secret and slipped the silky mini dress cover-up over top. We checked out and left our luggage in a secured room behind the front desk, then made our way out to the pool.

I grabbed a complimentary beach towel and staked my claim to a poolside lounge chair. I pulled out my iPod, a trashy romance novel, and yanked the cover-up over my head.

"I don't suppose you'd consider putting that back on?" Ranger said into my ear.

"Nope," I replied, settling onto the lounge. "I'm getting a tan."

"And a lot of looks," he grumbled, stretching out on the lounge next to mine. He wore dark gray swim trunks and a tight blue t-shirt that accentuated his biceps and abs.

"Welcome to how I feel," I replied, watching more than a few women, and one guy, look Ranger over appreciatively. "At least I need to take most of my clothes off to turn heads. You do it with no effort at all."