“You could come to South America with me,” she said softly, sliding her fingers over the back of one big lean hand resting on the table beside his plate. “It’s nice there. They always need people. You wouldn’t even need to carry a gun. You could give up all this violence and have a job that was nurturing instead.”

He looked at her as if she’d taken off her ears and flung them at him. “Grace, I’ve been in law enforcement since I was seventeen,” he pointed out.

She made a face. “I know that. But people can change. It’s not too late.”

“I love my job,” he said. “I don’t want to change.”

“But you have to carry a gun and shoot people,” she said. “I finally persuaded Mike that he needed to get a job in administration and stop wearing a gun all the time,” she added. She sighed sadly. “He’d already put in an application when he was...killed.”

“Mike loved police work, Grace,” he said after a minute. “He would have made the change, because he loved you. But you’re missing the point. You can’t change people to suit you. You have to take them as they are.”

“No,” she returned. “It’s our duty to turn people’s lives around and bring them back to faith.”

He gave her a long, sad look. “I’m proud of you, for the work you do,” he said. “You’re suited to it. You don’t really want a relationship with a man, Grace,” he added quietly, watching her face react to the shock of the words. “You do everything in your power to push men away. You want me to give up law enforcement, even though I felt called to do it from the start. You wanted Mike to give it up. The plain fact is that you like your life the way it is, and you don’t want to give that up. You’re devoted to your job. It takes the place of marriage and a family for you. It...” He searched for the right words, “It completes you. Makes you whole.”

She sat back in her chair and just stared at him for a minute. She didn’t say anything.

“You know I’m right,” he told her.

She drew in a long, slow breath. “Yes, I think you are.” She studied his hard face. “You’re in love with that woman, Clancey, aren’t you, Colt?”

He laughed softly. “I’m afraid so.”

“Well, as they say, you don’t choose who to love. At least she goes to church...” she began.

“Let’s agree to disagree on some issues,” he interrupted. “How about dessert?”