“Dean would just show up,” Jo says. “No roses. No poems. Just him, standing in the doorway, looking at me like—” She stops. Waves her hand. “You know.”
“We know,” everyone says in unison.
“What would Paul do?” Hazel asks, turning to Emma.
Emma opens her mouth to answer.
The front door opens.
Paul Spencer is standing in Hazel’s foyer in jeans and a flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up. The whole book club discussing romance novels, and he’s walked right into the middle of it. His hair is pushed back. His jaw is set. He’s holding something in his right hand—his fist is closedaround it.
The entire book club goes silent. Every voice drops. Total silence.
“Paul?” Emma stands up. “What are you—is everything okay? Are the kids?—”
“Kids are fine. Dawson’s got them.” He steps into the living room. Looks around. Takes in the circle of chairs, the pastry box, the shirtless book covers, the nine pairs of eyes locked onto him like targeting systems.
He clears his throat. “I had a speech.”
“A speech,” Emma repeats.
“I wrote it down. On the boat. Took me an hour.” He reaches into his back pocket with his left hand, pulls out a folded piece of paper, looks at it, then puts it back. “It’s terrible. I’m not using it.”
“Okay,” Emma says carefully.
“Here’s what I’ve got instead.” He takes a breath. “I’m not good at this. You know that. Everybody in this room knows that. I’ve been saying that since the day you docked at my marina, and you keep telling me you’ve noticed, and I keep not getting better at it.”
Nobody moves. Grandma Hensley’s pen is hovering over her notebook.
“But here’s what I am good at. I’m good at showing up. I’m good at six a.m. and pancakes onSaturday and junction boxes at midnight. I’m good at Stomper rescues and dock readings and lists. I’m good at fixing things that are broken, and Emma—” His voice catches. He pauses. Resets. “Emma, you fixed the thing in me that was broken, and I didn’t even ask you to. You just did it. By being here. By being you. By being so relentlessly, impossibly bright that I couldn’t stay in the dark anymore.”
He opens his right hand.
A ring. Simple. A diamond that catches Hazel’s lamplight and throws tiny sparks across the ceiling.
“I’m not good at speeches. I’m not good at grand gestures. I’m a guy who owns one suit and talks to a sticky note. But I will show up for you every single day for the rest of my life, and I will never check my phone at dinner, and I will fight your coffee maker until one of us dies, and I need you to know that I am completely, terrifyingly, permanently in love with you.”
He drops to one knee. On Hazel’s living room rug. In front of the entire book club, a sleeping baby, a plate of pastries, and a pile of dog-eared romance novels.
“Marry me, Emma. Please.”
The room holds its breath.
Emma is standing in front ofhim with both hands pressed to her mouth, and she’s crying, and she’s laughing, and she’s shaking her head—not no, just overwhelmed, just too full of everything to hold it all in.
“You crashed book club,” she says through her fingers.
“I crashed book club.”
“With a diamond ring.”
“With a diamond ring.”
“In front of everyone.”
“I needed witnesses. You might say no and I wanted it documented.”
She drops to her knees in front of him. Takes his face in her hands.
