“I think I do. And it’s taken me a while to admit it, because the thought makes me panic. I’ve devoted my whole adult life to this. It’s hard to walk away from that without wondering if it was all a waste.”
“Whatever you do in the future, the past is never a waste.” Rosie leaned her head against her sister’s shoulder.
“Jordan said something similar.”
“You discussed it with Jordan?”
“He’s a good listener. And it helped that he wasn’t emotionally invested. Sometimes when a decision feels huge, you want someone to tell you you’re doing the right thing.”
“I know. One of the things I love about Dan is that he’s so confident about everything. And his confidence rubbed off on me a little. He’s not scared of life. Being with him made me braver. He doesn’t talk himself out of doing things that are difficult. He looks at the obstacle and either goes over it or around it. He makes me think about the things I can do, not the things I can’t.”
Katie pulled her closer. “Tell me what else you love about him.”
“I don’t know. It’s a thousand small things, isn’t it? Like the way he makes me tea because he knows I love it even though he never drinks it himself, and the way he watches romantic movies because that’s what I want to do.”
“He watches romantic movies? Does he pull a face?”
“No face.”
“He looks at his phone during the sloppy parts?”
“Never.”
“Wow, that’s—definitely love. And he does better than I do, by the way. If Vicky chooses a romantic movie I moan all the way through it. What else?”
“He’s so calm and patient. The first time I met him, in the gym that day, I had an asthma attack.” She felt her sister tense.
“You never told me that.”
“Because I knew you’d overreact. I was using the treadmill and—” she waved a hand “—it doesn’t matter. But Dan noticed, and he was by my side in an instant and then came with me to the hospital and handled all of it because I hadn’t been in the US long. And he was calm. So calm. You already saw that when you were subjecting him to interrogation.” She felt her sister wince.
“You’re right, he could have punched me and he didn’t.”
“He would never do that. He would think that if there was something you needed to say, then you should say it.” She sighed. “And I didn’t.”
“And that was my fault. I’m sorry I made you doubt yourself. And for what it’s worth, I don’t think those doubts came from you. I put them there. I created this problem and I need to fix it.”
“It’s my problem. I could have shut you down. I could have told Dan how I was feeling.” Rosie didn’t want to think about that. “You discussed this with Jordan, too?”
“We were snowbound for the best part of fifteen hours. Talking about the weather got old after twenty minutes.”
She was dismissing it, but to Rosie it seemed momentous that she’d talked to Jordan.
“What else did the two of you talk about?”
“A lot of things. Including my overdeveloped protective instincts.”
“He’s seriously hot.”
“Rosie White, you’re about to be married.”
“Doesn’t seem that way, but even if I was it doesn’t stop me noticing when a man is hot. Just stops me doing something about it. Jordan is smoking hot.”
“He is.” Something in the way her sister said it made Rosie wonder.
“Did you have trouble staying warm when you were snowbound in that cabin?”
“No. I was toasty. There was a perfectly good fire.”
“So no body warmth, then.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Katie!” Rosie sat up and stared at her sister. “Did you—?”
“Yes, we did. Several times in fact. Probably would have been more but he ran out of condoms. There. That’s my first ever kiss and tell. I’d carve his name in my bedpost, except my bed doesn’t have a post.”
Rosie hadn’t thought she was capable of being cheered up, but for some reason this cheered her up. “How long is it since you’ve been involved with a man?”
“Who said anything about being involved? I’m not involved. We spent a pleasurable physical night together, that’s all.”
“Apart from the fact you told him things about yourself you’ve never told anyone else.”
“That too.”
“And he knows your real name.”
“Now you’re freaking me out. Fortunately for me, as you pointed out, he kept me there so that you and Dan would have time alone, so I don’t think