He turned his back on her and continued through the house. For the most part, he did trust her not to search for clues withouthim. However, he couldn’t trust her with more. He couldn’t trust her with himself.
Forty minutes later, Finley’s friends convened at Bridget’s house for an emergency meeting. Topic: Finley and Luke’s kiss.
Actually, Luke was the one who’d called it akiss. It hadn’t been one kiss. It had been plural. Many kisses, which had added up to one explosive experience. It was astonishing and scary to realize that she was still capable of responding to kisses so powerfully.
The three of them sat on the plush living room rug, Bridget’s coffee table between them.
Finley finished explaining what had transpired. “Today’s kisses were worthy of banners and marching bands and twenty-one-gun salutes.”
“Let’s just hope,” Meadow muttered, “Luke doesn’t make you want to take one of those twenty-one guns and shoot him with it in a few months.”
“Don’t mind her.” Bridget rested her chin on her hand, smiling dreamily. “I’m swooning.”
“Just because you shared some fabulous kisses doesn’t mean you should revoke your decision to stay single,” Meadow pointed out.
“True,” Finley agreed. “It’s not so much the fabulousness of the kisses that’s making me doubt my choice. It’s more that the conviction that I once had about my singleness is draining away. I no longer have the sense of certainty and rightness I once had about it.”
“You know,” Bridget said, “it’s understandable that you were led to draw back from dating after Chase’s death. What happened to him was just so sudden and so ... completely devastating.”
One day, she’d been part of a stable, wonderful relationship. Cherished. Confident that her wedding to Chase would happensoon and that she’d spend the rest of her life married to him. He was the only man she’d love, the only man she’d sleep with, and that’s how it was going to be. The next day, he’d died.
Bridget pushed the mug of tea she’d made for Finley closer.
Finley tasted it, registering the tang of ginger. “Chase’s death was incredibly hard to accept. It took me ages to get used to the idea that he was gone. That I wouldn’t become his wife. That my future wouldn’t look anything like I’d envisioned.”
He’d died just three months before their wedding date. By that point, most of the plans for their big day had already been in place. Her wedding dress still hung in the back of her closet, where she’d placed it after a successful day of shopping at bridal boutiques in Atlanta.
Meadow and Bridget had been with her that day, as had Aunt June, her cousin Leslie, and Leslie’s daughter. They’d burst into applause when they’d seen her in the gown she’d eventually selected.
In fact, choosing that dress was just one in a long line of perfect moments that defined her love story with Chase. They’d met when she’d entered the animal shelter where she’d volunteered during her college years and seen him feeding a kitten milk through an eyedropper.
He’d told her he loved her for the first time after a day at the beach. They’d been sandy and happy and lying on a blanket under an umbrella, Atlantic Ocean waves crashing in the distance. “I love you, Finley,” he’d said, looking deeply into her eyes. And her heart had soared. Unreservedly she’d said, “I love you, too.”
He’d proposed by bringing her to a rooftop at night. They’d stepped inside a line of flowers and flickering votives he’d placed on the floor in the shape of a heart. He’d played a song for her, then explained how much he loved her and why. Then he’d asked if she’d marry him. She’d cried with joy.
The ring had been perfect. The prayer they’d prayed together afterward had been perfect.
Every aspect of their relationship had felt destined and star-crossed until the story’s end, when he’d lost control of his Jeep and shattered his body.
In the days following Chase’s funeral, Meadow and Bridget had swooped in and canceled Finley’s wedding venue, caterer, florist, photographer, and the rest.
“The path you walked changed you,” Bridget said soothingly.
“It toughened you,” Meadow said.
“Yes and yes.” It had matured her. “It took a long time to envision my future a different way.”
“And now it’s difficult to consider envisioning it differently yet again?” Bridget asked.
Finley nodded.
“Sometimes,” Bridget said thoughtfully, “the Lord can place a temporary call on our lives. Not every calling is forever.”
“I thought I was supposed to spend my life as an overseas missionary,” Meadow said. “But then I served abroad for that summer in college. Best thing I ever did. I think He called me to that summer trip in order to show me that my actual mission wasn’t on the other side of the world. My mission is the family farm.”
“When Juilliard turned me down,” Bridget told Finley, “I was certain that meant I was never supposed to play the clarinet again. I was so disillusioned. So sick of it and burned out on it that I quit for six years. Then the worship director at church asked me to play, remember?”
Finley and Meadow nodded. They’d been there to support her the Sunday she’d joined the church orchestra.
