“You’re right.”
After more than an hour of agonizing suspense—the final episode was ninety minutes long instead of the usual sixty—the timer buzzed. The head chef had mostly positive comments for Francine’s dishes.Flaky crust on the pie. Perfect blend of flavors. Apples could be cooked a hair longer. Chowder superbly seasoned. Clams cooked to perfection.
As Tessa carried her tray up to the stage, Liam noticed that she didn’t look quite the grizzly bear they portrayed her to be on the rest of the season. She seemed . . . nervous. Not once had they ever captured her as anything but confident and collected. “Superb chowder. Decent blend of flavors. The clams are cooked perfectly. But there’s something missing. The wow-factor. Shame, too. Your pie is baked beautifully. One of the best apple pies I’ve ever tasted.”
Liam and Sophie exchanged confused expressions.
“Did Tessa really just pull off the pie butnotthe chowder?” Sophie asked.
Liam walked off toward the kitchen, thirstier than he’d been all day. Or was that just nerves? “Red pepper flakes, Tessa?” he mumbled at the sink.
“You’re right. I forgot the red pepper flakes.” Tessa’s voice, so close to him, didn’t feel real. He’d been so focused on the woman on the TV screen, listening to her give interviews of things that would boost ratings but didn’t really matter, that hearing her voice beside him gave him chills.
Liam hardly managed words at her unexpected presence. He thought there would at least be a phone call or a text before she returned. “Tessa, you’re here?”
“Spoiler alert,” she whispered, taking his hand in her own. “I don’t win.”
“Did you forget—” Liam wanted to ask if she’d skipped the red pepper flakes on purpose, but the Tessa Whitmore he knew would never intentionally lose a competition, no matter what the stakes.
“It was a careless oversight. I couldn’t seem to focus. All I could think about was . . . here.” She met his eyes. “And you.”
“You’re back,” he said.
“And I’m staying. For good.”
“Staying.”
“Yes, and I’m not going anywhere else. Being without you isn’t a fate I can live with, Liam. I want to start a life together. I really like that living room view of the bay.” Seemed she realized he was still too stunned to form words, and she went on. “When you have time, I was hoping you’d meet me in Anchorage with the plane so I can drop off the rental car.”
Liam let out a gentle laugh at that. Relishing the last few moments before rumor that she was back traveled like a wildfire through the other room. He drew Tessa into his embrace, memorizing the way she fit perfectly in his arms. “Why didn’t you call me to come get you this time?”
“And miss making an entrance?”
“I shouldn’t have expected anything less.” Liam caught a glimpse of eyes through the kitchen window and nodded toward the sink. “Looks like someone else is glad you’re back, too.”
“Nowhe shows up.” Tessa turned her head over her shoulder at the moose. “You’ll just have to wait for the goods, mister.” She drew her hand to Liam’s cheek, combing her fingers over the beard she’d come to love—and miss—so much. Such love lingered in the gaze between them. It reassured Tessa that she was right where she was meant me to be. “Ed’s waiting on me. You going to kiss me now or what?”
Epilogue
Denver
“Hold on tight to that cake,” Tillie Grant said to her son. “Can’t be dropping the crown jewel of the party, now.”
Denver steadied his arms stretched beneath the decorated sheet cake—baked into the shape of a moose—as they trekked cautiously down the sloped gravel drive toward the Sunset Ridge Lodge. He’d take a bullet before he let anything happen to Sophie’s daughter’s birthday cake. “I’ve got it, Mom.”
“I know you do.” She gave him a smile, but it didn’t reach her sullen eyes. He closed on his house less than a week ago, but as far as Mom seemed to be concerned, he’d abandoned her and moved to another state. Never mind thethreefamily dinners she hosted this week alone.
“You know I’m only five minutes away.”
She patted his forearm gently as they stepped onto the hardpacked dirt trail that snaked its way to the kitchen entrance of the lodge. “It was just nice having you home after all this time.”
If he didn’t have his hands full with precious cargo, Denver would’ve wrapped her in another hug. He’d given them out in surplus this week. “I’mstillhome.” He loved his mom dearly, but where she was social, Denver was introverted. He preferred working quietly on his mystery novels to endless conversation about the goings-on in town.
His new house was quiet, and he loved it.
“Fouryears, Denver.”
He swallowed, certain nothing he could say would help. Yes, he enlisted in the Army right after college graduation, only weeks after losing his dad. At first, his commitment was intended to honor the Desert Storm veteran; he wanted to do something to make his dad proud. But in the midst of that goal, Denver forgot to come home for visits. “I bought a house. I’m not going anywhere.”
