Page 62 of Wild Promise

“He offered. Lucy needs a dress. And he said he knows people.” I shrugged, trying to sound casual about Zane blow-my-mind Alexander taking my little sister dress shopping.

“He knows people.” Olivia leaned against the kitchen doorframe, arms crossed, her expression somewhere between amused and impressed. “Does he know everyone in town or is it just an excuse to spend more time with you?”

“Probably both.”

She grinned. “You know Lucy hasn’t stopped talking about him, right? She’s changed her outfit twice.”

“She’s nervous about finding a dress.”

“She’s smitten. We all are.” Olivia’s grin softened into something more genuine. “But seriously, Meli. The way he is with Dad, with us…it’s not an act, is it?”

“No,” I said, and the certainty of it caught me off guard. “It’s not.”

The honk of Zane’s truck horn saved me from whatever Olivia was about to say next. Lucy came thundering down the stairs in her third outfit of the morning—jeans, a sweater, and a look of barely contained excitement.

“Ready?” I asked.

“I’ve been ready for an hour.” She grabbed her coat and was out the door before I could zip mine.

Zane was leaning against the side of his truck, arms crossed, wearing that easy grin that made my pulse jump every single time. He straightened when he saw Lucy barreling toward him.

“Hey, kid. You ready to find the best dress in Copper Ridge?”

“Define best,” Lucy said, climbing into the back seat. “Because Melina’s version of best and mine are very different.”

“Then it’s a good thing I’m in charge today.”

I shook my head as I climbed into the passenger side. “You have no idea what you’ve signed up for.”

“I never do.” He caught my hand across the console and pressed his lips to my knuckles before shifting the truck into drive. “That’s what makes it fun.”

He drove past every shop I would have picked and pulled up in front of a boutique I’d walked past a hundred times and never once considered setting foot in. It was the kind of store that didn’t put prices in the window. The kind that was way outside my budget.

But Zane walked in like he owned the place—which, knowing his family, was an actual possibility—and within minutes, he was chatting with the salesclerk like they were old friends.

“Margot, this is Lucy. She needs something for the Winter Festival Dance. Something that’ll make her date jealous of himself.”

Margot, an older woman with reading glasses perched on her nose and a measuring tape draped over her shoulders, looked Lucy up and down with a practiced eye. “I think we can manage that. What color are we thinking?”

Lucy’s eyes went wide, and she looked to me for guidance.

Before I could say anything, Zane stepped in beside her. “What’s your favorite color?” he asked.

“Blue. But not dark blue. More like…” She hesitated, her cheeks flushing pink. “Like ice. That really pale, clear kind.”

“Then that’s what we’re getting.” He turned to Margot. “You heard the lady.”

Margot smiled and led Lucy toward a rack near the window, pulling options as they went. Lucy’s fingers ran tentatively over the fabrics while Margot held dresses up against her, tilting her head and murmuring compliments.

Zane wandered the shop with his hands in his pockets, looking completely out of place among the silk and lace and taffeta, and somehow entirely at home at the same time.

I hung back and let them work, drifting along a nearby rack without really seeing anything on it. My attention was on Zane. The warmth of seeing him here, being patient and kind with my little sister like it was the most natural thing in the world.

He didn’t have to do this. He had nothing to gain from spending his morning in a dress shop with a teenager. But here he was, unhurried and easy, no agenda, no impatience, no trace of obligation. And something deep in my chest ached in the best way.

Margot pulled a pale ice-blue dress with delicate beading along the neckline from the rack, and Lucy’s eyes lit up. “Oh, I love that one.”

She looked to Zane, not Margot, not me. Like his opinion was the one that mattered.