Hidden Summit

across the floor in a wicked tango move. They turned back.
    “Okay,” Leslie said. “But you don’t have to be interrogated.”
    “I don’t mind a little bit,” he said. “Basic information, you know. Name, rank, serial number. Let’s not tell them I was married to a sex addict, okay?”
    “I still haven’t told them I was married to a guy who had trouble getting it up.”
    Conner’s eyes flew open wide. “He did?”
    “Shit. I was going to be classy and keep that to myself. Naturally I thought that was mostly my fault.”
    He ran a knuckle down the curve of her jaw; his blue eyes got all dark and smoky. “No way.”
    “Thank you,” she mouthed.
    Candace and Robert ended the tango with an elaborate flourish that left Candace draped along the floor at Robert’s feet, one arm extended into the air.
    Leslie and Conner parted and applauded while Robert helped his wife to her feet. He bowed and Candace dipped into a curtsy. “What do you think, honey?” Robert asked.
    “I think you’re awesome, provided one of you doesn’t break a hip.” She stared pointedly at her mother. “You might want to go easy on the collapsing to the floor part, Mom.”
    “I’m very careful and my bone density is excellent,” Candace said. “All right, we’ll get out of your hair. If you really do have time for lunch, just tell us—”
    “I have a better idea,” Conner said. “I’m going home to shower and change. I’ll meet you at noon, if that works for you three.”
    “Perfect,” Leslie said. “See you at Jack’s.”
    As Conner drove to his cabin to change, he saw it as very strange indeed that he should consider the tango debut of Leslie’s eccentric parents absolutely normal, but he did. Sure they were a little out there, but they were clearly enjoying life and each other. And they loved Leslie.
    When Conner had been twenty and Katie a mere seventeen a heart attack had dropped their mother like a stone. She’d only been fifty-three and hadn’t seemed the high-risk type at all—she had been trim and fit and very energetic, much like Candace. Three years later their father passed after a short, difficult battle with colon cancer—he’d been sixty-three.
    Not only had they lost their parents too young, Conner and Katie had been left the house they’d grown up in and Conner’s Hardware. Twenty-three and the owner/operator of a substantial business. If he hadn’t had a few trusted employees who had worked for his father for a long time, he would surely have sunk out of sight. Now he found himself wondering what his parents would be like, had they lived. Nothing like Candace and Robert, that was for sure. His mom hadn’t ever been very fancy and his dad had been a real stick-in-the-mud. They wouldn’t be taking tango lessons or going on cruises. But his dad had had a dream of a retirement cabin on a lake that was full of fat fish. They both had looked forward to grandchildren…and had never met the boys.
    Had Conner relocated to Virgin River for some reason other than this particular one, his parents would have enjoyed this kind of place. But he was living a whole new life in a whole new world, and he found himself hoping Leslie’s parents would like the new him.
    Leslie jumped in the shower, then pulled on some jeans. With her hair still wet and wildly curly, she grabbed a cup of coffee and went in search of her parents. She found her mother sitting on the back porch enjoying a lovely late-April morning. Candace had changed into slacks, and Robert was nowhere in sight.
    “Where’s Dad?” Leslie asked, joining her mother.
    “He wanted to walk around the town a little bit. Leslie, I apologize again. How naive of me—I knew you had a young man in your life....”
    “Don’t give it a thought.”
    “Well, we’re so foolish. We might’ve come all this way and found you weren’t even at home! I promise, I’ll think ahead in the future.”
    “I was home and everything is fine.”
    “Conner went home to shower,” Candace said. “Does that mean he doesn’t exactly live here with you?”
    Leslie laughed. “He doesn’t at all! Conner has a very small cabin by the river and I’ve never even seen it. His stay in Virgin River could be even more temporary than mine.”
    “And what brings him here?”
    “He has an old friend who found him a job with Paul after the contractor he worked for in Colorado Springs filed bankruptcy and shut down. But Conner has a sister who’s still back in