suppose you’re going to tell me I have to leave his balls intact.”
“You’ve already heard my lecture about assault charges and jail time, so I won’t repeat myself.” She couldn’t help another snicker. “A muskrat?”
“That was one scraggly-ass beard, babe. You could do better.” Belle’s voice brightened. “Come to think of it, you did do better. How’s it going with Sparky?”
Tess told her. And by the time they ended the call, the ghosts of her failed engagement had stopped clanking. At least for now, and maybe forever.
Right. That was done.
Now she knew what to do. Now she knew what to believe.
Her most important romantic relationship to this point had cracked under the stress of daily life together, true. But she knew how to give love, and how to receive it. She knew how to be there for those she cared about—her friends, her students, her coworkers, and all the other people in her life. She might be overly practical and managerial on occasion, but she knew how to apologize when she fucked up, and she knew she definitely would fuck up on occasion.
Lucas would too. Because they were human, both of them, as he’d said.
Because of Jeremy, she knew not to let those fuckups snowball into something too big to recover from. So maybe those ghosts had served a purpose, after all.
Above all else: She knew she loved Lucas, even after a startlingly short amount of time together. He deserved that love more than any other man she’d ever met. If he still wanted her, if he still wanted to take a chance on her, on them, that was his choice, and she’d take that chance along with him.
If.
That was the word haunting her now. Her new ghost, come to call with a decided clank.
If.
Twenty-Seven
For the first time since Lucas’s arrival on the island, he called in sick to work. He was suffering from terrible stomach cramps, either from food poisoning or too much time in the heat.
Either way, he definitely couldn’t give lessons that day, and not the next morning either. Not until Tess had boarded her departure ferry for the mainland, anyway.
The lie caught in his throat and itched beneath his skin, as did the thought of disappointed, inconvenienced clients. But a man had to have priorities, and a certain intransigent, terrified principal-to-be was his.
He’d fucked up last night. No question about it.
Their evening on the nude beach, she’d essentially explained everything he needed to know about how she approached risk, and he hadn’t listened. Not well enough.
This isn’t an impulse or moment of folly, she’d told him. I considered the potential problems, and I took steps to control as many variables as I could.
After that—and only after that—she’d allowed herself to have what she wanted. What they both wanted.
Then, literally the next day, he’d approached her with a high-stakes gamble and given her absolutely no reason to believe he’d thought it through sufficiently. He hadn’t considered potential difficulties and concerns and counterarguments she might offer. He hadn’t theorized how best to address her worries.
In short, he hadn’t eliminated as much risk as he could. For her. For them.
No wonder she’d considered his decision to move a fleeting impulse. Pure, stupid folly. Yes, she’d responded from fear. But he hadn’t given her any reason not to be afraid, had he?
Tonight, he had one more shot at convincing her. Today, he’d prepare.
He’d already compiled his list of topics to research, people to contact, and tasks to complete. By the time he saw her that evening, he’d have his shit together and his arguments in place. He’d have positioned himself for a winning shot as best he could.
Rally tolerance. He was learning. Better late than never.
Around lunchtime, he texted her to meet him at the clubhouse at seven.
In the end, the timing was tight, but he marked the last item off his list ten minutes before she was due to arrive. And after a quick shower, one last review of his plans, and a near-panicked jog down the stairs and through the clubhouse, there she was, standing outside the door and looking precisely as tense as he felt.
When he unlocked the door to her, though, she immediately stepped into his arms, which lowered his heartrate all the way from barely survivable to rabbit-like.
He held her and kissed her cheek.
“Hey, älskling,” he said into the fine, soft hair at her temple.
Her response was just as quiet. Just as tentative. “Hi, Lucas.”
After claiming her hand in his, he led them both upstairs