“You must be Amelia,” she said. “I’m Natalie. Ethan’s fiancée. Recently elected mayor.”
Lexi, by contrast, was all effortless movie-star glam—long blond hair in waves, soft sundress, a face I’d definitely seen on the big screen.
“Lexi Montgomery,” she said cheerfully, as if I might not recognize her. “I pretend to be other people for a living. Nice to meet someone who actually is interesting.”
I blinked. “You’re?—”
“Freaking out a little?” she supplied. “Don’t. I’ve seen what you do, by the way. Afghanistan piece. Syria series. You’re the badass at this table.”
My cheeks warmed. “That’s … debatable.”
Hazel dropped into the seat next to me. “She crawls through rubbled cities with a notebook and a satellite phone,” she said. “You’re marrying a Dane, Madam Mayor. Let’s not pretend you’re the one with good judgment.”
Natalie laughed. “Fair.”
Meghan snapped her fingers, and plates began appearing like magic. Finn and Charlotte moved in well-practiced choreography, servers trailing behind them with dish after dish.
“The catch came in at dawn,” Meghan said, watching our faces instead of the food. “We’ve got red snapper with a citrus beurre blanc, grilled shrimp with a chili-lime glaze, a tomato salad with basil oil, sourdough we started three days ago, and a lemon tart.”
Then she turned her attention back to me. “So. Amelia from Canada. War correspondent. Dating Levi Dane. On a scale of one to ten, how much does that feel like walking into an ambush without backup?”
“Today?” I said. “Seven and a half.”
“Well,” Natalie said. “It gets better.”
“And worse,” Hazel added. “But then better again. It’s like tide charts—you’ll get used to it.”
Lexi leaned forward, propping her chin on her hand. “What’s it like?” she asked. “Being in love with someone you’re supposed to report on?”
The table went quieter than restaurant noise should allow.
I took a sip of water, buying time. The fancy glass clinked faintly against my tooth.
“I’m still figuring that out,” I said honestly. “My whole life, the job came first. The story came first. When I was eight,my parents got in a fight about whether a local politician had misrepresented something in a campaign ad. They sat me down at the kitchen table and walked me through fact-checking his claims. The lesson was: we tell the truth, even if it’s inconvenient.”
Camille nodded slowly. “And now the truth might hurt someone you love.”
“Or get him killed,” I said quietly. “Or his family. Or you.”
Silence settled again, this time not awkward, but heavy.
Natalie was the first to break it.
“Welcome to the club,” she said. “The ‘loving a Dane means rethinking your ethics in real time’ club.”
Meghan snorted. “We should get jackets.”
We all laughed, which felt good.
“That’s the thing you need to know,” Hazel said, turning back to me. “These men are possessive. Obsessive, sometimes. They will track your phone and argue with you about door locks and insist you text when you get where you’re going. But they’re also the most fiercely devoted people I’ve ever met. To us. To each other. To whatever they’ve decided is worth protecting.”
I thought of Levi on the veranda, shaking apart in my arms. Of Levi on the yacht, telling me about the mercenaries he’d taken out to stop a massacre. Of Levi in a tent two years ago, choosing to cut me off rather than risk me as collateral damage.
“How do you live with it?” I asked. “The intensity?”
Lexi smiled, soft and a little sad. “You accept that your life is going to be loud,” she said. “And that someone will always be watching the exits. You decide whether that makes you feel trapped or safe on any given day.”
Natalie added, “And you build your own guardrails. Boundaries. Ethan can have all the secret briefings he wants, but loving him doesn’t mean letting him rewrite who I am.”
