Hazel Whyte stepped through the doors of Autumn Arms Nursing Home and looked down the long hallway. Even after all these years her heart still beat in anticipation. She smoothed her gray, shoulder-length hair behind her ears and waited.

“Mr. Whyte, get back here!” a female nurse hollered from the corridor around the corner.

A smile lit up Hazel’s face as she watched her husband of fifty years wheel around the corner in his souped-up—well, according to him—wheelchair and head her way. She smiled and for a moment she saw the young man who’d always met her at the end of her road.

“Hey, Pretty Gal, I sure did miss you. Ready to take this wheelchair for a spin?” He pulled her down on his lap and planted a big kiss on her lips.

Her heart picked up speed, and she marveled at how Wyatt Whyte could still set off a course of Fourth of July fireworks in her stomach.

A petite nurse with hair the color of maple syrup joined them. “Mr. Whyte, how many times do I have to tell you that wheelchair is not a motorcycle and you do not give people rides on it?” Her words were meant to be a stern admonishment, but the twinkle in her eyes said otherwise.

“Aw, come on, Miss Durrant, you know nobody’s allowed to ride with me, except my pretty gal here.” He put his hand on Hazel’s hip and pulled her snug against him.

Miss Durrant gazed at the wall above his head to keep Wyatt’s chocolate brown eyes from persuading her, but a smile tickled her lips. Finally she gave up and met his gaze. “Mr. Whyte, you’re a charmer.” She patted his knee, and grinned at Hazel. “Enjoy your visit, Mrs. Whyte.”

Hazel smiled at the nurse and wiggled around until she felt comfortable on Wyatt’s lap. She knew she’d be there for awhile, just spending time with her husband. Oh, how she wished she could bring him home with her when she left for the night, but the doctors said he needed more care than she could give.

Wyatt sighed deeply and tightened his hold on her.

“How are you feeling?” she asked, her eyes searching his face with concern.

“Okay, just a little tired today is all.”

“Maybe we should go back to your room and let you rest before supper time.”

“Naw, I like the change of scenery out here in the hall.” He absently caressed her arm before he spoke again. “Do you remember the first time I took you for a ride on my motorcycle?”

Hazel lay her head against his chest. “Of course I do.”

“Refresh my memory.”

Hazel smiled against his shirt. She knew that day was as clear in his memory as it was hers, but he liked to hear her tell the tale. “Okay…

* * *

The dust settled around the contraption as it roared to a halt at the end of Hazel Preston’s road. It was a huge hulk of black machinery that looked as dangerous as a panther on the prowl. It also held an allure that mesmerized Hazel like the man who straddled it.

Wyatt Whyte. The bad boy of Ela County. All muscle and tough-guy attitude. Heaven help her, he even had a tattoo of barbed wire wrapped around his right bicep.

To her daddy’s chagrin, Wyatt had taken a fancy to Hazel. And, glory be, Hazel liked it. Liked it a lot.

“Hop on Pretty Gal, let’s take this thing for a spin.” He reached for her hand.

She hung back and eyed the beast with apprehension. “Is it safe?”

“Safe as the rider who guides it,” he answered.

That didn’t make her feel a whole lot better, especially when she stared into dark brown eyes that smoldered with mystery and a hint of amusement. “Are you safe?” she ventured.

Wyatt laughed. “Just get on the damn thing and let’s ride.” He reached for her hand again and pulled her forward. “If I didn’t know what I was doing, I wouldn’t put a pretty gal like you at risk.”

Feeling a little uncertain, Hazel straddled the bike behind Wyatt and slid down until she touched his backside. Oh, dear! Her heart jolted hard enough to jumpstart a dump truck. What a naughty way to spend an afternoon.

Wyatt looked over his shoulder. “Have you ever ridden?”

Hazel sucked in a breath of musk, male cologne. “Yeah—no—I mean…” She acted as nervous as a mouse in a field full of cats. Or maybe it was—as excited as the only rooster in a barnyard full of hens. Stop that! she berated herself.

“When we go around curves, I need you to lean with me.” He twisted around. “You got that?”
Hazel nodded, gave him a thumbs-up with a smile. “Got it.” What would he do if on the spur of the moment she kissed his cheek? Her heart beat wildly at the thought.

“Okay, hang on, Pretty Gal.”

Five minutes later they were right back at the end of her road.

Wyatt dropped his booted feet to the dirt and cut the engine. For a long moment he was silent. Then, “Did I not make myself clear when I said you needed to lean with me in the curves?”
Hazel felt very small. “I was scared we were going to tip over.” She hugged her waist with one hand and fiddled with her lower lip with the other.

“We weren’t going to tip over. It’s called gravity and balance.” A scowl colored Wyatt’s rough and rugged features.

“It looked dangerous. Our knees were way too close to that blur that whisked by us.”

“You made it dangerous by leaning in the opposite direction.” His words blew out on an edge.

“Hey, now, I like my knees just the way they are with the skin still intact, thank you very much.” A glare shot from her eyes into his.

“I could lose control of this machine and both of us would take a nasty spill.” His eyes softened. “Trust me, Pretty Gal. Despite what your daddy thinks, I wouldn’t cause you harm.”

Something in the way his eyes maintained contact with hers made Hazel believe him. There were no lies in their dark depths, only truth.

“Try it again?” he asked.

This time, when Wyatt leaned dangerously close to the pavement, Hazel kept her eyes closed and leaned with him as they rode down to Fontana Lake. Each time a curve rounded the road, she prayed her knee wouldn’t scrub along the pavement in a blind burst of fiery pain.

When they reached the murky, green water, the last rays of the sun dipped behind the mountain. Golden sparkle fingers danced on the surface and a red leaf blew off an autumn cloaked tree, landing in the water to float lazily around in circles.

“Beautiful,” Hazel breathed.

Wyatt inhaled and let it out slowly. “Yep—my place of solitude. I come here often.”

Hazel felt all warm and fuzzy that he would choose to share this with her. She really liked this charmed and dangerous man.

“We better get you back. No doubt your daddy waits for us at the end of the road with an arsenal of guns and knives, just aching to take my head off.” He dismounted the bike and removed his black leather jacket. “Here, wear this. It can get downright cold on the back of a motorcycle after the sun fades.”

Hazel took it from him with trembling fingers and slipped her arms into sleeves still warm from his body. The feeling was intimate and she conjured up all kinds of images of them lying next to each other, skin to skin, mouth to mouth. She was glad Wyatt had remounted the bike and couldn’t see her red-stained cheeks.

After he pulled up to the end of her dusty driveway, she hopped off and handed his jacket back to him. “Wouldn’t want you to freeze either,” she said with a smile.

“Thank you, Pretty Gal.” He caressed her cheek with his knuckles. “I’ll see you again right here at the end of the road.”

* * *

Hazel lifted her head from Wyatt’s chest and listened to his light snoring. He’d fallen asleep during her tale! He’d never done that before, not in the five years she’d been coming here to spend time with him.

“Wyatt?” She pushed against his shoulder.

A snore caught on a breath and he jerked. “What—huh?” He glanced around as if he didn’t know where he was, and then he found Hazel and his eyes refocused.

“Hey, you two, it’s time for the evening meal.” Miss Durrant peeked around the corner. “You’ll join us like always, Mrs. Whyte?”

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.” Hazel stood and pointed Wyatt’s wheelchair in the direction of the cafeteria.

The spice and cinnamon smell infiltrated the cafeteria from the kitchen. Apple pie. Hazel and Wyatt’s favorite.

Wyatt looked back at her and smiled. “Remember that time you talked me into climbing up an apple tree with you?” A faraway, dreamy look crossed his face as Hazel sat down across from him at a table in the corner. She knew she must’ve had the same look on her face as she traveled back in time to a younger day.

* * *

“Right there!” Hazel yelled above the roar of the bike as she pointed toward an ancient, sprawling apple tree in a meadow just off the road.

Wyatt guided his motorcycle to a smooth section of bank and drove across the field. When he reached the tree, Hazel jumped off the back end almost before he’d cut the engine.

“Slow down, there, Pretty Gal, them apples aren’t going anywhere no time soon.” His lazy voice flowed over her skin like warm molasses. Funny how the sound of his voice had the power to send erotic goose bumps all up and down her spine.

When he looked at her in her cut-off blue jeans and pink T-shirt with a healthy dose of male appreciation, that really sent erogenous shivers dancing up her back.

They’d been together for over a year now, and the whole town was agog that a wild, woman-loving man like Wyatt hadn’t sampled from another buffet in all that time. Hazel figured she must have something he couldn’t get enough of—she hoped, anyway.

“Climb up here with me,” she said and placed her foot in the crook of the lowest branch while reaching for one above her head to pull herself up.

“You’re on your own with this, Pretty Gal.” Wyatt knelt and tinkered with the front tire of his motorcycle.

“Pretty please, with sugar on top? I’ll even throw in a cherry from that tree over yonder.” She gestured further down the field.

Wyatt groaned. “Please don’t say please. You know I can’t resist you when you do that.”

Hazel sat on one of the limbs, one knee drawn up, crooked her finger and beckoned him. “Please?”

“No.”

“Please.”

“Nope, uh-uh, not gonna do it this time.”

“Please.” Her voice dropped to a seductive whisper.

“Ah, hell.” He stalked toward the tree and climbed up next to her. “You beat all I’ve ever seen.”

“But you love me anyway.”

“Yeah, I do.” He leaned over and touched his mouth to hers in a soft, short kiss.

Hazel almost purred her content. Oh, how Wyatt made her heart sing.

The top of the apple tree called so she reached for the next branch and pulled herself to a standing position.

“Let’s go, Big Boy,” she said and started to climb. “There’s some delicious green apples up there.”

“This is as far as I go, Pretty Gal.”

“Please.”

“Ah, man.” The branches shivered, as he started up behind her, much like her body always did whenever Wyatt touched her.

She began to sing, “God don’t make little green apples in the winter tiiiiime…”

Wyatt groaned from below her. “God don’t make cute little derrieres quite like yours either, but I don’t sing about it.”

Hazel snickered, looked down and blew him a kiss.
Near the top, she heard a branch snap, followed by Wyatt’s muffled curses as he slid and bounced down several limbs before coming to rest on his back on a thick branch.

“Oh, my God! Are you okay?” Hazel peered down at him with her heart in her throat. Life without Wyatt would be unlivable.

“I’m a few layers short on some skin is all.” He groaned and eased to a sitting position, clutching a nearby limb. “I’ll stick to my motorcycle, it’s safer.”

Hazel laughed with relief. “Here, have an apple.” She plucked one from the branch above her and tossed it to him.

* * *

Her laughter followed her into the present. It faltered when she saw that Wyatt hadn’t eaten much. Only one bite had been taken out of the apple pie he loved so much.

He noticed her look. “Not hungry today. Besides, nobody makes apple pie like you do.”

She nodded, warmed by his compliment. Maybe he’d be hungry for breakfast. She made a mental note to ask one of the nurses if he ate when she returned tomorrow.

Once back in his room, with the help of Miss Durrant, she got Wyatt tucked in bed for the night.

Hazel stood near the window in the light of the moon.

“Do I ever tell you that you take my breath away every day?” Wyatt asked.

She moved away from the window and sat in a chair next to his bed. “No, but not a day goes by that I don’t feel special and loved by you.” She twined her fingers with his, loving the warmth of his nearness.

“You were in moonlight the night...”

“I remember.”

* * *

A chilly breeze kicked up in the dim light of a September dusk. The moon hung low and spread its warm glow to the earth. Wyatt leaned against the apple tree they’d climbed back in the summer. One hand was in his leather jacket pocket and the other was fisted and pounded lightly on his knee.

Hazel sat astride his motorcycle, her head thrown back, gazing at the low-level light above, spellbound by its tranquil beauty.

Wyatt cleared his throat. “Come here.”

She dropped her head forward and turned toward him. “Did you say something?”

“Come here,” he repeated.

“Oh.” The seductive tone of his voice drew her like an enticing scent from some grandmother’s kitchen. She dismounted and walked over to the wild, handsome man she’d come to love so much over the past year and a half.

Wyatt slid his hands around her waist and pulled her close. “Marry me.”

For a moment, all she could do was stare at him, dumbfounded. “Marry you?” Her heart rapped like a hammer against her ribs. Was he serious?

“I want to be with you forever, nothing separating us, not even death for long.”

* * *

A smile touched Hazel’s lips as she glanced at the man she still loved as much today as she did then. He was asleep, so she kissed him goodnight and headed home.

She hated to be there alone without him, but his medical problems had been too much for one frail woman to handle, so she’d placed him in a good old-folks home and satisfied herself with a visit as often as she could. Sometimes every day, if she could swing it.

Sleep didn’t come easy. The silence ticked in the hollow hours of early morning. A sick dread brushed her stomach.

She was awake when the phone rang.

This time when she stepped through the doors of Autumn Arms, she didn’t pause and wait. Instead, she hurried to her husband’s room.

Wyatt was a pale shell of the man he once was, his eyes sunken and dark. Yet they still sought hers like a lifeline, one she’d never allow to be severed if she could have her say in the matter.

“It won’t be long now,” Miss Durrant whispered, then sniffled as she left the room to give them the last few precious moments of his life together alone.

With her heart a painful lump in her throat, Hazel sank to her knees beside the bed. A tear slipped down her cheek.

Wyatt’s hand crept across the blankets and touched her arm. “Tell me about the day we first met,” he said, his hoarse voice like sandpaper. “One last time…”

A sob escaped her throat. “I don’t know if I can.”

“Please.”

* * *

The creek froze Hazel’s feet, but cooled the rest of her body to a tolerable level of heat in the hot afternoon sun. She sat on the dammed up rocks in the middle, enjoying the man-made pond. Her teeth chattered and she could almost see the blue of her lips in the reflection of the water, along with the snake’s sitting right next to her.
She shrieked, jumped off the dam, and plowed through the water, headed for the creek bank full-speed ahead, water splashing like rain.
With a mad scramble, she clawed her way up the bank, looking over her shoulder. Then she hit something solid and tumbled back toward the water with a painful oomph.

“Hey, Pretty Gal, you okay?”

Hazel looked up to see the most gorgeous hunk of man this side of the Great Smoky Mountains. For a long moment she just stared at his dark skin, deep, brown eyes, smooth shaven face, full mouth, and the hard length of his body encased in a black T-shirt and faded jeans. He dang near made her forget what year it was.

Then she remembered the snake.

Scrambling to her feet, she scurried away from the water’s edge. “Snake.” She pointed toward the dam.

“It’s probably long gone by now, Pretty Gal.”

“How do you know?”

“I’d wager you scared it as much as it scared you.”

“Ha! It didn’t look too scared sitting there next to me like we were having some kind of afternoon pool party.”

Wyatt threw back his head and laughed.

“It’s not funny. I’m not going back in that creek ever again.”

“Now that’s a shame to waste all of that good cool water, especially on a day as hot as this.”

He had a point. The pinpricks of sticky heat started to become unbearable again. “Will you check it out for me?” she ventured.

“Sure.” He walked down to the water and stepped from rock to rock until he’d perused the perimeter of the shallow pool. “It’s gone.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

Hazel walked back toward the creek and dipped one toe in the water while keeping an eye on the dam where she’d seen the snake.

Suddenly Wyatt lost his footing and fell into the water. He was on his feet in seconds. “Damn, that’s cold!”

Hazel’s mouth dropped open and then she burst into laughter. She laughed so hard she couldn’t catch her breath, and it didn’t help when Wyatt started splashing her with the icy liquid.

“Stop!” she shrieked between gales of laughter.
Wyatt lunged for her and yanked her in on top of him. “Teach you to laugh.” Then he tickled her.

“No!” She flipped around in his arms like a fish, trying to catch her breath.

“Hazel Elizabeth Preston!” Uh-oh. Her father stood on the bridge above them, like a bull with steam blowing out of his nose. “You get your hind-end up to the house. Seventeen or not, you do not play with strange men in the creek.” He jerked his arm up and pointed toward the house.

Hazel smothered a laugh as she walked out of the creek, dripped water on the dusty ground, and joined her father on the bridge.

“I’ll see you again here at the end of the road,” Wyatt said and pointed where the main gravel road met her driveway.

Hazel smiled and nodded before she followed her dad to the house.

* * *

When she finished her story, Wyatt gazed at her with eyes as clear as a summer day. “I’ll see you again here at the end of the road,” he whispered, and closed his eyes for the last time.

Hazel kissed his fingers, then stood. Miss Durrant hovered near the door, tears streaming down her cheeks. “I’m so sorry, Mrs. Whyte.”

“Don’t cry. Death is only a door to another life.” Besides, Wyatt had promised her death wouldn’t part them for long. She’d make him keep that promise.

* * *

Six months later, on a warm night in September, Hazel stepped through the door to another life near a little creek with a man-made swimming hole. A sleek black motorcycle sat on the bridge above it in the moonlight.

Wyatt appeared from the shadows. “Hey, Pretty Gal, isn’t there an apple tree you want to climb somewhere?”

“Wyatt!” She raced toward him, jumped up and anchored her legs around his waist. He was once again the wild, tattooed, motorcycle-riding tough guy. And she was a young Hazel, so much in love with the man who held her.

“I told you, not even death can separate us for long,” he whispered against her hair as they held each other, there, at the end of the road.