He stared at her, marveling. It was a wonder Josie Stratton was still standing. Yet here she was, having picked herself up yet again. And he had no doubt that whatever she had to do to stay on her feet, that’s what she would do.
Their smiles faded and they stared at each other for another moment, the mood suddenly serious. God, he’d missed her. He’d missed her so much. And yet he didn’t know where to pick up.
“We started out kind of backwards, didn’t we?” he blurted. He didn’t want to skirt around the issue anymore. He wanted her, wanted them, didn’t want just one dinner, but a million dinners, a million breakfasts and lunches and everything between, and life was too damn short—too damn unpredictable—to waffle around.
Her expression sobered completely, gentled. “Yeah, I guess we did.” She glanced to the side. “What I told you about being broken when it comes to love, I . . . I don’t think that’s true.” She swallowed.
“I don’t either,” he said. He stepped closer. He could smell her. The delicate scent of her shampoo, her skin. Her.
She nodded, a little jerkily. “But I’m still practicing how not to be.”
His heart swelled. “Then we’ll practice together.”
She let out a breath, smiling at him, her expression so filled with hope.
“I want to date you, Josie. Court you. Bring you flowers and take you to meet my parents and all that sappy shit. Let’s do this right.”
She laughed, a happy sound as tears filled her eyes.
“I love you,” he told her.
Joy flashed in her expression. “That’s still sort of backwards, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” he said, stepping right up to her, tossing her hat in the car so he could take her face in his hands. “But I can’t help that. I love you,” he repeated. “Every imperfect, flawed part of you. Every heroic, selfless part of you. The part that’s fallen, and the part that’s gotten back up, over and over and over. You.”
A tear tracked down her cheek. “I love you too,” she whispered.
He brought his lips to hers and kissed her as the stars began blinking to life, one by one in a darkening sky.
EPILOGUE
It was Josie’s favorite time, that dreamy golden hour right before the day drifted toward dusk. She attached a clothespin to the line, the sheet she’d just hung picking up in the slight summer breeze and dropping back down again as the scent of fresh laundry and sunshine met her nose.
The life within her stretched, rolled, and Josie paused, putting her hand to her belly and living right then, in the moment. She did that a lot these days. Maybe it was the combination of hormones and happiness that made her feel so overwhelmed with gratitude that she literally had to stop and—sometimes tearfully—linger in the feeling as long as possible. Maybe it was just pure, unadulterated happiness.
Her belly tightened and a flutter of nerves lifted inside of her. It wouldn’t be long now. Maybe even tonight, tomorrow. A small frisson of grief trembled through her, the knowledge that this birth—her second—would bring both celebration and heartache. Memories. Longing. Despite her happiness, and the peace she’d found, for her, life would always be a tricky mixture of conflicting emotions that sometimes she just had to breathe through. She was prepared, and because she was, she knew it would be okay.
Josie clipped another sheet to the line, looking beyond at that field where her aunt had once brought her to pick wildflowers, the place she’d carried inside her through so many dark days. Her own, very real vision of hope. The thing she’d clutched to with all of her heart. Someday very soon, right in that spot, she’d gather bouquets with her own daughter, the little girl they’d named Arryn in honor of the brother Zach and his family had loved and lost. But as she’d learned, love didn’t end. Love never died. Love went on and on, like a swiftly moving river. No matter the obstacle, it continued forward, an unending force moving around, over, into—carving away at the rocky shores in its path.
Her lips tipped as she envisioned a toddling girl with brown curls and midnight eyes.
A shadow darkened one of the sheets and her smile grew. She knew his form, his height, the way he moved, even through white cotton. He pulled it aside, a grin lighting his face as he caught sight of her. “Hey,” he said. “I would have done this.”
She picked up the empty basket. “I wanted to get outside. And”—she shot him a look—“I’m not an invalid.”
He gave her a boyish, chastised smile but took the basket from her anyway. “I know. I just want to make sure you’re resting enough. Pretty soon rest is going to be in short supply.”
Josie smiled, putting her hand on her large belly where their daughter lay curled inside. Yes, rest was going to be in short supply, and she could hardly wait.
Zach laced the fingers of his empty hand through hers as they moved toward their house. In the end, they’d decided not to run it as a bed and breakfast, but instead—God willing—fill its rooms with their children.
Fill its dinner table with their cherished friends, and Zach’s loud, big-hearted family, now Josie’s family too. From the start, Zach’s mother had taken Josie under her wing and treated her like her very own daughter. Josie basked in the feeling of being mothered. She’d never felt it before, and it had healed another part of her that had long been broken.
As they stepped onto the porch, Zach’s cell phone could be heard ringing from inside. Jimmy, no doubt, calling to update him on the case they were working. Josie nodded toward the house. “You get that. I’m just going to sit out here for a few minutes and take some weight off my feet.” She offered him a wry smile, lowering her cumbersome body onto the porch swing they’d installed the summer before, right after she’d received her college diploma, fulfilling that long-awaited goal.
He leaned down and kissed her forehead. “Okay. I’ll bring out some iced tea and join you in a minute.”
Josie used her foot to rock the swing slowly, gazing out to the sky, alight now with the fire of sunset. Her thoughts turned to Charles Hartsman as they sometimes did, and she wondered if he was watching the sunset—or perhaps the sunrise—from some distant shore and felt a small fearful pinching in her chest. Another one of those emotions she had learned to breathe through. He wouldn’t be back. She knew that, felt it in her gut. Someday perhaps he’d face justice. For the time being, she had to learn to live with that lack of closure. She’d come to it easier than her husband, which was interesting, but true. My sweet guardian. The man who would save the whole world if he could.