He was still frowning. “Only a minute or two. Are you okay?”
“Of course. Let me just get my coat and say good night.” She edged past him and headed for the kitchen. She was at the swinging door when she realized she hadn’t taken the flowers from him.
Damn.
“Conlan’s here,” she said to Mama and Mira. “Can you guys close up tonight?”
Mama and Mira exchanged knowing looks. “So that was it,” Mama said. “You were thinking of him.”
“I’ll give Lauren a ride home,” Mira said. “Have fun.”
Fun.
Angie forgot to laugh or say good-bye. Instead, she headed back to the dining room. “So, where are we going?” She took the flowers from him, pretended she could smell their scent.
“You’ll see.” Conlan led her out to his car and helped her into the passenger seat. Within minutes they were driving south.
Angie stared out the window. In the tarnished glass, her reflection stared back at her. Her face looked long and thin, drawn out.
“Is it the baby stuff?”
She blinked, turned. “What?”
“Yesterday you cleaned out the storage room, right? Is that why you’re quiet?”
There it was again, the hesitancy in Conlan’s voice, the treating her with kid gloves. She hated the familiarity of it. “I was okay yesterday.”
Had it really only been a day ago that she’d been there, squatting in front of the relics of her ancient hope, believing she’d moved on?
“Really?”
“I boxed everything up and brought it to the cottage for Lauren.” Her voice snagged on the name and it all came rushing back.
Take our baby, Angie.
“You sounded good,” he said cautiously.
“I was so happy about it.” She hoped her voice didn’t sound wistful. So much had happened since then.
“We’re here.” Conlan turned into a gravel parking lot.
Angie craned her neck and peered through the windshield.
A beautiful stone mansion stood flanked by Douglas fir trees and rimmed in rhododendrons. The Sheldrake Inn welcomes you, read the sign.
She looked at Conlan, giving him her first real smile of the evening. “This is more than a date.”
He grinned. “You’re living with a teenager now. I have to plan ahead.”
She followed him out of the car and into the cozy interior of the inn.
A woman dressed in full Victorian garb greeted them at the door and showed them to the front desk.
“Mr. and Mrs. Malone,” said the man behind the reservation desk. “Right on time.”
Conlan filled out the paperwork, offered his credit card, then whisked her upstairs. Their room was a beautiful two-room suite with a huge four-poster bed, a river rock fireplace, a bathtub big enough for two, and a magical view of the moonlit coast.
“Ange?”
Slowly she turned around to face him.
How can I tell him?
“Come here.”
She was helpless to resist the sound of his voice. She moved toward him. He pulled her into his arms, held her so tightly she felt dizzy.
She had to tell him.
Now.
If they were to have any kind of future, she had to tell him. “Conlan—”
He kissed her then, so gently. When he drew back, he looked down at her.
She felt as if she were drowning in the blue of his eyes.
“I couldn’t believe you gave the baby stuff away. I’m so proud of you, Ange. I look at you now and I can breathe again. I don’t think I realized until yesterday how long I’d been holding it all inside.”
“Oh, Con. We need—”
Very slowly he bent on one knee. Smiling, he held out her wedding ring. “I figured out what to do with it. Marry me again.”
The way Angie dropped to her knees was more like folding. “I love you, okay? Don’t forget it. As Papa used to say, I love you more than all the drops of rain that fall.”
He frowned. “I expected a simple yes. Then a rush to the bed.”
“My yes couldn’t be any simpler, but I need to tell you something first. You might change your mind.”
“About wanting to marry you?”
“Yeah.”
He looked at her for a long time, a slight frown creasing his brow. “Okay. Hit me.”
She drew in a deep breath. “Yesterday, when I called you about the nursery, I was so excited. I couldn’t wait to get home and tell Lauren.” She stood up and moved away from him. She went to the window, looked out at the crashing surf. “When I got home, she’d been crying. And David was there.”
Conlan stood up. She heard the creaking of the old floorboards. He probably wanted to come stand behind her but he didn’t move.
“She got a full ride to USC. Her dream school.”
“And?”
“It changed everything,” she said softly, echoing Lauren’s exact words. “Maybe if she had a toddler, she could swing it, but a two-month-old? There’s no way she could handle USC, working, and raising a newborn.”
It was a long time before Conlan spoke. When he did, his voice was ragged; not his voice at all. “And?”