“Yeah.”
“Your hands are shaking.”
I look down. They are. “This one felt different.”
“Different how?”
“Permanent.”
She takes my trembling hands and holds them between hers. Steadies them. No fuss. No commentary. Just her fingers wrapped around mine until they stop shaking.
“Come to the houseboat tonight,”she says. “After the reception. Not for—just. Come sit on the deck with me. Watch the yacht sail away. Drink terrible marina store brew because my machine is dead and neither of us has a replacement.”
“I can fix that thing.”
“I know you can. That’s the whole point.”
Above us, the music swells. Someone—Aidan, probably—shrieks with joy about something. The yacht rocks gently in its slip. Somewhere on the upper deck, Levi is singing another song, and Delilah is dancing, and Twin Waves is doing what Twin Waves does best.
“Emma.”
“Yeah.”
“It isn’t just nice. You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. I’ve thought that since the day you showed up at my marina with a possessed coffee maker and three kids and a smile that made me forget how to be angry. I just didn’t know how to say it.”
Her eyes go bright. “That’s a significant upgrade from your earlier attempt.”
“I’m a slow learner.”
She kisses me again. Shorter this time. Sweeter.
“Come on,” she says, lacing her fingers through mine. “We’re missing thereception. And if Aidan has been doing the shark for this long unsupervised, someone has probably been injured.”
We walk up the stairs to the main deck together and step back into the light and noise and beautiful chaos of a wedding on a yacht in a small town where everybody knows your business and nobody lets you give up on love.
Grandma Hensley spots us first. She elbows Harold. Harold looks. Raises his champagne glass.
Dawson sees our hands and grins so wide I can see it from across the deck. Jenna catches Dawson’s reaction, follows his gaze, and sees me holding her mother’s hand. She doesn’t smile. She doesn’t need to. She pulls out her phone, types something, and shows it to Dawson.
He laughs. She laughs.
They’ve been waiting for us to figure this out. Apparently we’re the last to know.
Aidan spots us from the dance floor. He stops mid-shark. His eyes go wide. He opens his mouth and I brace myself for the volume I know is coming.
“Mom! Mr. Paul! Are you—are youtogether?”
Every head in the vicinity turns. Michelle spills her coffee. Grayson catches it. Jessica grabs Scott’s arm. Mads says “Finally” loud enough to be heard over the band.
Emma squeezes my fingers. “We are,” she confirms.
Aidan’s face splits into a grin so bright it rivals the fairy lights. He sprints across the dance floor, crashes into both of us simultaneously, and wraps his arms around our legs in a hug that nearly takes us down.
“Iknewit,” he says. “I told Millie. I told Olson. I even updated Stomper.”
“You updated the elephant?”
“He was invested. I owed him a report.”
