“Hello,” I whisper into his hair. “Hello, my knight.”
It’s ironic, because when he kisses me a moment later, my breath catches in my lungs.
But even as the air stops temporarily, I find I can finally,finally,breathe.
Chapter Ten
One Year Later
“Congratulations,” Ida says, handing the papers to me. My realtor, normally as excitable as a paper bag, grins as Linda and I shake hands.
I think this is the biggest deal of her career to date. A whole island.
“Are you really going to turn this into a retreat center?” Linda asks down at the dock, her voice hopeful. She knows the answer. But I can tell she’s having a hard time letting go of her baby.
I look to Clint, who beams. He looks so handsome in his suit. He signs, “Tell her again.”
“Yes, we are,” I say. “We’ll rent it out privately 50 percent of the time to cover expenses. But the rest of the time, we’ll make it available to nonprofits for meetings and getaways. We’ve already got the Gardener’s Association of BC and a camp for deaf children coming in July, along with several school groups from my elementary school planned for the fall.”
“Barbara would be so proud,” Linda says.
Clint makes a coughing sound, and I know he’s thinking of Barbara the cat, just like me. Barbara the cat practically rules the island, and now she gets to stay. Shewouldbe proud.
We wave Linda and Ida off.
Next week, it’ll all begin. Julia’s coming to start her role as operations manager. We hired her as project manager the moment Mom forwarded me my inheritance—only a month after my wedding imploded.
“We’re not married,” I’d told Mom.
“You will be,” she said with teary eyes that were never once like that for Jeff.
There was a lot of money. Like a lot, a lot. Turns out Dad had made a mint in his business and Grandma was a surprisingly savvy investor. The amount was enough to make me unable to form words for days.
And able to purchase a whole island.
But I still wanted to stay at my job at the elementary school up in Redbeard Cove, which, ironically, takes less time to get to with Clint’s little motorboat than it did driving up from Swan River.
Clint also wanted to keep gardening, of course.
So it only made sense to get a newly jobless Julia on board. She hired a whole staff and will be fully running the center at a very generous salary so Clint and I only have to be with people if and when we want to.
For now, we both inhale deeply. “You know we’re the only people on this island right now, don’t you?” I sign as the boat motors away from the dock.
Clint grins and signs back: “Does that mean I can do that move you love anywhere we want?”
He’s been taking his sexual education as seriously as I have my sign language studies. These are both highly mutually beneficial things.
Turns out we’re both very good at school.
“Absolutely.”
After heading back home for provisions, we hike up to the highest point on the island, one of the few places here I’ve never been.
When we step out from between the trees, I gasp. There’s a pretty little glade here, with a view out to the ocean.
But more than that, the whole place is covered in soft grass, and at the edges of the clearing, rosebushes. They’re peach, their blooms huge and prolific.
“A Rare Beauty!” I exclaim, my heart swelling. I look to Clint. He did this for me. I know he did. I reach for him, and he takes my hands in his, kissing them both before letting them go to sign.
