Keep On Loving You

Then she hurried off the dance floor, keeping a lookout for a dark-haired, hazel-eyed ten-year-gone guy. But when she didn’t see him, she began to wonder about her sanity. Perhaps the night before she’d stayed up too late boxing the chocolates that were going to the guests as party favors. Maybe she needed to gulp down a large cup of hot coffee and get her wits back in place.

“There you are!” Her sisters, Poppy and Shay, approached, their long skirts swishing about their legs. They wore gowns identical to Mac’s, only different in color. Poppy’s was pink, while Shay’s was a subtle peach.

“Nice catch,” Poppy said, nodding to the bouquet.

Mac rolled her eyes. “You saw what happened. It hit me in the head.”

“Maybe you’ll be better prepared when I throw mine at my reception in two weeks,” Shay said.

“No,” Mac groaned the word. “Not you, too?”

“London is insisting.”

“I’ll hide out in the bathroom, then,” Mac said. “Promise you’ll give me the high sign?”

“Absolutely,” her youngest sister said.

Mac narrowed her gaze. “You’re a terrible liar.”

“I’m not even going to pretend I won’t make you be in the gaggle of bachelorettes when it’s my turn,” Poppy put in. “But, anyway, did you see—”

“I did.” Mac’s heart jumped, then started to race. “I thought maybe I imagined it, but if you saw Zan, too...” She broke off at the puzzlement on her sister’s face.

“Zan?” Poppy said. “I was going to ask if you’d seen Mason dancing with the little McDonald girl.”

“Um, no, I didn’t,” Mac mumbled, feeling stupid. “Never mind—”

“Zan is here?” Shay asked. “Zan Elliott?”

“I don’t know. Probably not. It was just a glimpse,” Mac said.

Her two sisters exchanged glances. “How much have you had to drink?” Poppy asked.

No way would Mac mention the two tequila shots. “Never mind. I’m sure I was mistaken.”

Her sisters looked at each other again. “Oh, Mac,” Poppy said in a concerned voice.

Mac winced. Poppy had the gooiest heart of any of the Walkers, and right now she was clearly oozing pity for her poor, unattached sister who had delusions about the return of her very first boyfriend, her very first love. “It’s nothing,” she told her sister in a firm voice. “Like I said, a mistake.”

“But—”

“Look, they’re about to cut the cake.” Mac pointed toward the other end of the room. “We’d better get over there.”

Thankfully, that distracted her sisters, and Mac followed slowly in their wake. Could she really have mistaken some stranger for Zan?

In her mind’s eye, she saw him as he’d looked his second-to-last day in the mountains. She’d been eighteen, he’d just turned twenty-one, and they’d been a couple for two years. That afternoon they’d taken his boat to a secluded cove, where they’d spread a blanket and a picnic. Her intention had been to tough it out and not allow her belly-hollowing longing for him and her aching sadness at his imminent departure to ruin those final warm, sunny hours.

They’d made love for the last time, the wide shoulders of his rangy body blocking the sun so that she couldn’t read the expression in his hazel eyes as he’d entered her. But her legs had wound around his hips, tight, like two vines that could bind him to her forever.

He’d cupped her face in his hands. One hot tear had leaked from her eye and he’d brushed it away with his thumb, the stroke slow and tender. “Mackenzie Walker,” he’d whispered. Just that, as if memorizing her name.

Maybe he no longer even remembered it. Maybe he’d never thought of that girl again, who’d given him her body and who’d wanted to give him everything else: her heart, her soul, her whole life.

She grimaced, thinking of that green and unguarded young woman. Likely Zan had headed down the mountains and never thought of her again.

Except that didn’t explain the postcards that had come to her regularly over the past decade. On their fronts were photos of places like Oslo and Algiers and Singapore. On the other side, a single-letter message, three bold strokes that made up the letter Z.

No other thought. No return address. Just a pointed reminder of the young man who’d left her behind.

Mac was older now, but maybe no wiser if she truly thought for even a second that Zan might return to the place he’d always sworn to leave.

Standing near the table at the far end of the room, she watched Angelica and Brett feed each other bites of cake with the tidiest of manners. When her brother brushed an errant crumb from his bride’s bottom lip, a hot press of tears burned at the back of Mac’s eyes, which she ruthlessly held back.

God, how was she going to make it through two more of these darn events?

Poppy was the family crier, but Mac was on perilous ground herself and thanked God she was recruited to pass out slices of cake. A diversion was necessary. Moving among the guests wasn’t as much of a reprieve as she’d hoped, however. It was easy to agree about the bride’s beaming smile and the groom’s clear dedication to his new wife. But other comments weren’t so simple to smile through.

When will we see you married, Mac?

Why hasn’t some man finally put a wedding band on your finger?

Whatever happened to that boy of yours...that Zan Elliott?

At this last, she stopped short, staring down at tiny Carmen Lind, who had to be closing in on ninety and wore her silver hair braided in a crown on top of her head. “What made you think of him, Mrs. Lind?” Mac asked, through a suddenly tight throat.

The little lady dug into her cake with relish. “Who, dear?”

“You mentioned Zan.”

“Who?”

Mac smiled a little. “Zan Elliott. You just brought up his name.”

“Oh, yes. Such a good-looking young man. But he got into a lot of trouble, I recall. Those bad boys always catch a girl’s eye, don’t they?”

At nine years old, Mac’s big brother had brought Zan around one day, and she’d tagged after the two boys until Brett knocked her down into a pile of pine needles. Already she’d been too stubborn to cry or complain. Instead, she’d thrown a pinecone at Brett in retaliation and her bad aim meant it nailed Zan in the butt. He’d whirled, laughter glittering in his eyes, then leaped on her to “shampoo” her hair with a handful of dusty needles.

Red-faced and sneezing, she’d handed her heart over to him.

It had been that fast. That simple.

Mrs. Lind glanced around, her fork in midair. “You know, I thought I saw him a few minutes ago. Did he come to congratulate your brother?”

Brett. Mac whipped her head around, searching out the groom. If Zan had returned, surely he would have spoken with Brett.

It wasn’t easy getting a quiet moment with the groom, though. The reception was wrapping up and it seemed that each guest needed to pause on their way out the door for a short word with the new couple. She hung in their periphery, intent upon swooping in as soon as her brother was free.

Finally, the only people left in Mr. Frank’s were the bridal party and the bartender. While her sisters went to a back room to help Angelica out of her gown and into something warmer for the ride home, Mac snagged her brother by the sleeve.