And the world between worlds let him go in return.
* * *
After tossing her paper into the fire, Wren walked a little way down the beach from the crowds to where a big log sat in the sand.
Stretching out her legs, she noticed a Summerween program resting against the log. Picking it up, she tried to smooth out the crumpled paper. It had been, for so many reasons, a successful event, but Wren still felt as lost as she did when she first arrived in H-Town two months ago, but for completely different reasons. She’d thought she wanted to spend the summer alone; now she wanted to do anything butspend the rest of her life on her own…Wren held the program to her heart and sucked in a deep breath. She caught the eye of a waitress from The Bar and waved and tried to smile. Tina looked like she was about to run up to her and have a conversation, and Wren prayed she wouldn’t. She simply wanted to be alone, to gather her emotions and her bearings. Though trying to be alone at one of Luna’s festivals was like trying to push a boulder uphill.
Wren glanced at her watch, saw that it was very close to midnight, and decided that she’d given enough of herself, her time, and her energy to this festival, to this town, and to Luna. It had been a hell of a night.
She would just wait for Luna to give her closing-out-the-festival speech and someone—the head witch of Luna’s coven?—to give the Lammas blessing, and she’d leave. Ten minutes? Fifteen? She could last that long.
She hoped.
Wren felt movement to her right and shifted left to allow someone to sit down beside her on the log. She looked down and took in familiar, well-used, expensive trainers, black jeans,and amazing cologne. Wren’s neck prickled, and the hair on her arms rose. Shock and disbelief smacked her, and she turned her head, taking in Dane’s clean-shaven face, his intense eyes on her. She gasped, frowned, and dropped the program. She went to pick it up, but Dane got there first, barely bending over to scoop it off the floor, his fingers brushing her ankle as he did so.
“What are you doing here?” she whisper-shouted, unable to believe her eyes. Or nose. Or her sense of touch. He had to be a mirage…
“This is where I need to be,” he responded, his voice calm and clear.
“But … Kashmir, the earthquake… Shouldn’t you be on a plane?” she demanded, her words machine-gun fast.
His eyes were steady on her face. “Ichooseto be right here with you,” he told her, sincerity wrapping itself around every word like a warm blanket on a freezing day.
Wren couldn’t drop her eyes from his face, couldn’t break their connection. He was here, back in H-Town, because he’dchosento be here, he’d chosen her… She didn’t know how she felt about that. Happy? Thrilled? Guilty?Veryguilty?
“I’m so sorry I left the way I did, for the things I said, how I acted,” he stated. His apology was simple, sincere, and eloquent, but it wasn’t important. Not right now, anyway.
“Dane, don’t they need you?”
Big shoulders under his pistachio-colored button-down, the cuffs casually rolled back, lifted and fell. “Humanatus has other surgeons, Wren. No one but you is irreplaceable.”
Sorry? What? Her mouth fell open, and she struggled to make sense of his words. What did that last sentence mean? What did he expect from her? Why was he here and not in Kashmir? What the hell was happening?
Dane placed his finger under her chin and pushed her mouth closed, before quietly,reverently,placing his mouth on hers in a too-brief kiss. “Luna is about to make a speech, so shall we continue this later?”
Wren, from a place far away, heard someone testing a microphone. She nodded, still unable to wrench her eyes off this man who washereinstead ofthere. Who’d, if she was interpreting him correctly, chosenher.
Dane seemed as uninterested in Luna’s speech as she was, as his eyes remained on her face. “Please stop looking at me like that,” she whispered, her heart in her throat.
“How am I looking at you, sweetheart?”
She licked her lips. “Like you want to kiss me.”
“I do want to kiss you,” he murmured, not bothering to hide how thrilled he was to be here, with her. No one had ever looked at her in this way before. “But that’s, hopefully, for later.”
Hopefully? She guaranteed that they’d be kissing later. And more. A lot, lot more. For a long, long time.
“Ladies and gentlemen, if I may have your attention, please,” Luna boomed from her soapbox, painted purple and decorated with gold stars. “And that includes you, Wren Dunlop, if you can drag your eyes off the town’s new doctor for a moment.”
New doctor? What the hell? Had Luna gotten her way? Was Dane going to be H-Town’s new GP?No!
“You can’t, Dane,” she told him, gripping his arm. She waved her other hand, agitated. “You need to be out there saving lives. It’s what you do, it’s what you love. Don’t give it up for me … foranyone.”
She loved him too much to allow him to make such a massive sacrifice. Dane simply smiled at her. “Your godmother has jumped the gun again, sweetheart. If I do stay, it won’t be forever, I promise. Look, Luna is glaring at us… I’ll explain later.”
He’d better. Unable to keep her eyes off his face—okay, a huge part of her was terrified he’d disappear again—Wren gripped his hand and threaded her fingers through his. She couldn’t keep her next words from escaping. It was, after all, Lammas, and she was grateful. Profoundly so.
“I am so happy to see you, Dane.” Dane dropped his head to kiss her forehead, and Wren felt his fingers wrap around hers. And sitting on that log, Wren felt like she’d finally come home.
