She laughed, wondering if her heart could burst from happiness. “These are happy tears. Not like the ones I cried all night. Conan had to drag me out of bed to run. All I wanted to do was pull the covers over my head and hibernate there for a few weeks.”
“What if I’d missed you this morning?” he asked. “If I hadn’t decided to bring Chloe here one last time? If you and Conan had decided to go in the other direction?”
She hugged him. “We’re both here. That’s the important thing.”
“I think you’re the reason I came back for The Sea Urchin, why it seemed so vital to me that I buy it. The hotel was only part of it. Call it fate or destiny or dharma or whatever, but I think everything that’s happened was leading me right here, to this moment and to you.”
It was the perfect thing to say and she could swear she tumbled even deeper in love with him. This was her prosaic, austere businessman, talking of fate and destiny? Dharma? Had she ever been so wrong about a person in her life?
“I think it was Abigail.”
He blinked. “Abigail?”
“I think she met you and fell for those gorgeous green eyes of yours.”
She could swear a touch of color dusted his cheekbones. “She did not.”
“You didn’t know her as well as I did. She always was a sucker for a gorgeous man. Since she couldn’t have you for herself, I think she handpicked you for me and she’s been doing everything she can since she met you to throw the two of us together.”
Eben didn’t look convinced, but since he reached for her and kissed her again, she decided the point wasn’t worth arguing.
She received confirmation of it a moment later, though, when a sudden bark managed to pierce the lovely fog of desire swirling around her. She wrenched her mouth from Eben’s to gaze at her dog.
Conan watched them from a few feet away with that uncanny intelligence in his eyes. He barked again, a delighted sound. It seemed ridiculous, but she could swear he looked pleased.
Chloe was close on the dog’s heels and she studied them with startled concern in her green eyes. “Daddy, why are you holding on to Sage? Did she fall?”
His expression filled with sudden panic, as if he hadn’t quite thought far enough ahead about explaining this to his daughter. Sage took pity on him and stepped in.
“You’re exactly right. I fell, really hard. Harder than I ever thought I could. But you know what? Your dad was right there to pick me back up and help me find my feet. Isn’t that lucky?”
Chloe’s brow furrowed as she tried to sift through the layers of the explanation. Sage could tell she wasn’t quite buying it. “So why is he still holding on to you?”
She laughed and slanted Eben a look out of the corner of her eyes. “I’ll let you answer that one,” she murmured.
He gave her a mock glare then turned to his daughter, “Well, after I helped her up, I discovered I didn’t want to let her go.”
Chloe seemed to accept that with surprising equanimity. She studied them for a moment longer, then shrugged. “You guys are weird,” she finally said, then chased Conan across the sand again.
“I meant it. Idon’twant to let you go,” Eben repeated fiercely after they were gone.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and held on tight. “I’m not going anywhere.”
As he kissed her again, she could swear she heard Abigail’s wicked laughter on the wind.
