For now, that was enough.
She let herself lean into the future he had painted—not as a replacement for the past she wished she could change, but as a promise that her life still had chapters left to write.
TheGood Time Girlhad a way of making everything feel as close to perfect as it could, so Lacey was happy she and Roman had decided to take it out on this, their last night before he left for training camp.
Tessa’s twenty-nine-foot cabin cruiser had a low, confident profile and a name in a looping script across the stern that Lacey had watched an artist hand paint a while ago.
The boat had been Lacey and Roman’s happy place since they’d met, but tonight felt more bittersweet than joyful.
Lacey stood near the bow with her bare feet planted on warm fiberglass, one hand curled around a champagne flute, the other braced on the rail. The sun was dipping into the horizon, dragging gold across the Destin harbor like somebody had spilled a jar of honey on the water.
In the distance, a charter boat was easing back in, tired and slow. Closer by, a pair of teenagers laughed loudly on paddleboards, their voices carrying across the slick surface. Pelicans glided over the water, wings barely flapping, as if they had all the time in the world.
Lacey wished she could borrow that feeling.
Behind her, Roman adjusted something at the helm, turning them away from another boat’s wake. He loved this boat, too. Born and raised on the water, a fisherman from both his birth and adopted families, Roman loved the freedom of being out here away from the world.
Lacey loved it because it was familiar. The boat carried the memory of earlier, lighter days—Tessa at the wheel with her hair in a messy knot, a playlist blasting, with Lawsons and Wylies sprawled across the seats like sun-drowsy cats, laughing about nothing, everything.
But there was no lightness tonight, their last date in Destin—at least for a while. Lacey had been telling herself all afternoon that this was simply a sunset cruise. Champagne. Harbor breeze. Salty kisses. A moment of softness before reality slammed back in.
She hadn’t given him an answer about moving, but then, they hadn’t really discussed it after he came back from Jacksonville. The topic had been tabled, she assumed, and he was waiting for her to bring it up.
That had to happen tonight. Now, even.
Her pulse had been jittery all day, her thoughts skipping and sprinting, as if something inside her already knew this was a threshold.
A line she’d cross and couldn’t uncross.
Roman came up beside her and slid his hand into hers, their fingers threading naturally. He kissed her temple, a warm brush of lips that made her want to turn into him and stay there until the sun sank completely.
“How you doin’?” he asked, low and gentle, as if he could feel the tension humming beneath her skin.
She tried to answer lightly. “I’m great. We’re on a boat. The only thing I’m responsible for is…not dropping my phone in the water.”
He gave a soft laugh, but he didn’t let it go. “Lace,” he said quietly. “Talk to me.”
Lacey stared out at the water, at the marinas and docks and condo balconies all fiery with sunset light. Boats rocked gently on their moorings. Music floated from somewhere—a distant speaker, a bar on HarborWalk.
“Okay,” she said, and her voice came out too tight. She cleared her throat and tried again. “I’ve been rehearsing it, actually, because I didn’t want to ruin tonight, and now I’m worried I’m going to ruin tonight anyway, so I’m sorry.”
Roman’s mouth curved, but his eyes stayed steady. “You can’t ruin anything by telling me the truth.”
She swallowed and looked down at their hands. His thumb stroked the side of her finger in a small, loving motion.
“I’ve been thinking about Jacksonville,” she began, and felt her chest tighten immediately. “About what it means if…if we do this. If I go.”
Roman didn’t speak but waited, listening intently.
“It isn’t just moving,” Lacey said, words tumbling, because once she started, she couldn’t stop. “It isn’t just changing my address and learning the fastest way to the grocery store. Tessa’s offered me a bigger role in her company and it’s a huge opportunity. I can’t do that job from Jacksonville, not the way I’m doing it now. And it’s becoming a huge part of my identity. Like I wake up and know exactly who I am when my feet hit the floor.”
Her eyes burned, and she hated that. She hated crying when she wasn’t even sure what she was cryingaboutyet.
“I love you,” she said, and that part came easy, because it was the clearest thing she’d ever felt. “I’m not questioning that. I’m not questioning us.”
Roman’s grip tightened slightly, but he still didn’t interrupt her.
“But I’m scared,” she admitted, voice shaking. “And I’m embarrassed that I’m scared, because you do things with such confidence and I keep…spinning.”
