Total pages in book: 44
Estimated words: 41687 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 208(@200wpm)___ 167(@250wpm)___ 139(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 41687 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 208(@200wpm)___ 167(@250wpm)___ 139(@300wpm)
“I love you too, my little Magpie. Always.”
“So,” Nadine interrupted with a grin, “I guess this means I’m planning a wedding?”
Robbie and I looked at each other and started laughing.
“Actually,” Robbie said, “I was thinking something small. Maybe on the beach. Just family and close friends.”
“And the kids from your class as flower girls and ring bearers?” I suggested.
His face lit up. “Really?”
“Really. Whatever you want, sweetheart. It’s your day.”
“Our day,” he corrected, squeezing my hand.
“Our day,” I agreed.
As we drove home to our house by the ocean—to plan our future and celebrate our engagement and maybe convince Robbie to keep that ring on while I made love to him for the next several hours—I couldn’t stop smiling.
I’d finally gotten my wish. And better yet, so had he.
BONUS EPILOGUETTE
ROBBIE - THREE WEEKS LATER
The sunset painted the sky in watercolor pinks and golds, and the ocean breeze carried the salt-sweet scent of autumn on the coast. Our small wedding was exactly what we’d dreamed of—intimate, meaningful, and surrounded by the people we loved most.
Twenty-eight third graders in their “grown-up” clothes sat cross-legged on blankets in the sand, watching with barely contained excitement as Kit and I exchanged vows. Behind them, our real family—Nadine, Rajiv and Morris, Sam and Griff, who’d flown in from Napa, Jason and Rex from Kentucky, and Sibley—stood in a loose semicircle, all of them crying happy tears.
“Do you, Kit, take Robbie to be your husband?” the officiant asked.
Kit’s voice was steady and sure. “I do. Always.”
“And do you, Robbie, take Kit to be your husband?”
I looked into Kit’s eyes—my Kit, my love, my home—and felt my heart expand until it filled my entire chest.
“I do. Forever.”
The kids erupted in cheers before we’d even been pronounced married, and I started laughing through my tears. This was us. This was our life. Messy and beautiful and perfect.
When Kit kissed me as the sun set behind us, I tasted salt air and champagne and the promise of every tomorrow we’d have together.
“I love you, Mr. Warren-Evers,” he whispered against my lips.
“I love you too, Mr. Warren-Evers.”
Later, after the kids had gone home and the reception had wound down to just our closest friends sitting around a bonfire on the beach, Sam raised a glass. “To Kit. For finally recognizing the treasure he had all along.”
Kit was the first one to shout, “Hear, hear!” Before turning to me with an expression on his face that took my breath away. “My best treasure. My forever treasure.”
I leaned in and kissed him.
Then it was Jason’s turn. “To Mr. and Mr. Warren-Evers for letting us have an open invitation to the Rabbit Island House! I still have plans for my reality television show and we’re filming it right here.”
Sibley snickered. “You’re no more interesting now than you were then. No one’s paying to watch the lot of you eating taquitos and breaking another margarita blender.”
The jokes and toasts continued for a while until everyone mellowed and moved closer to the fire.
Kit and I walked hand in hand along the water’s edge.
“Any regrets?” he asked softly.
I squeezed his hand and leaned into his warmth. “Only that it took you so long to get your head out of your ass.”
“Was I worth the headache?” he teased.
I stopped walking and turned to face him, this beautiful man who’d loved me patiently through all my growing up, who’d waited for me to be ready, who’d given me everything I’d ever wished for and things I hadn’t even known I wanted.
“You’re worth everything,” I said, echoing his words from months ago. “You always have been.”
As we kissed under the stars, the ocean waves lapping at our feet and our friends’ laughter carrying on the wind, I made one more wish.
For this. For us. For always.
And when Kit pulled back to smile at me, his eyes reflecting the moonlight like promises, I knew it had already come true.