“I’ll make one and send it over tonight,” Bronwyn said, her voice thick with emotion. “Thank you all. I’m still frustrated, but I’m not scared anymore.”
Mo was glad she wasn’t afraid.
He was afraid enough for both of them.
Twelve
Twenty Years Earlier
Fourteen-year-old Mo Quinn stood beside Meredith, Cal, and Bronwyn. They held bags of rice at the ready. Cal had suggested that they throw the whole bag at Chad, but Meredith and Bronwyn had insisted they only throw the rice.
Rice was stupid.
In fact, this entire concept was questionable. Standing around in the dark waiting for the bride and groom to run the gauntlet on their way to their getaway vehicle. Why? What was the point?
He had enjoyed decorating the car. Connor, Cal’s oldest brother, had let them help. The back seat was filled with balloons and the windows had all kinds of random comments on them. They’d tied old cans and shoes to the back bumper. It would make a terrible racket as they drove away.
He leaned toward Bronwyn. “Do you want all this stuff when you get married?” He pointed at the crowd, the chaos, the mess.
Her eyes glowed. “It’s traditional and fun for everyone. Why? Don’t you?”
He shrugged. “I would think when you get married, the partthat matters is the getting married part. Not the reception. And definitely not all this stuff. I don’t think I’d want all this.”
Bronwyn rolled her eyes. Funny, but when she did that, he thought it was cute.
When Meredith did it, it ticked him off.
“What?”
“When you get married, you’ll go along with whatever your bride wants. You’ll want her to be happy. And you won’t care if there are shoes tied to the bumper and whipped cream on the windshield.”
At that moment, Naomi and Chad appeared at the end of the line. Chad was laughing. And Naomi was smiling at Chad in a way that made Mo think they had some private joke going between them.
Bronwyn leaned in and whispered, “All this stuff won’t matter, but the smile on her face will be all you need. And you’ll do anything you have to, to put it there.”
Maybe she was right.
He turned so their faces were inches apart.
“You think so?”
“I know you. And I know so.”
Thirteen
Present Day
As soon as the plans were finalized, Donovan left to hang out with Cassie. Cal, Landry, and Eliza said their good nights soon after. But Gray and Mo continued to hash out details for another twenty minutes. Bronwyn wanted to stay up and talk to Meredith long into the night the way they’d done a hundred times as teenagers. But the lack of sleep from the night before and the stress of the day hit her almost as soon as the doors closed on Mo and Gray. She made her apologies to Meredith, settled her in the guest room, and was in bed well before ten.
Despite her worries about what they’d found tonight, fatigue won, and she had no memory of tossing or turning. But now she sat in bed, panting for breath, convinced that something had awakened her—a quick glance at her nightstand, and she understood.
It wasn’t that she’d heard something.
It was that she’d heard nothing.
She looked to her bedside clock, but the familiar red glow was absent.
The power was out.
