The polar opposite option is she’s going to give me closure and break things off for good. Face to face. As I ran, I tried to come up with rebuttals, but I know when it comes down to it, I’ll give her whatever she wants. Whatever makes her happy. In the convoluted heart where we’ve built our friendship, the relationship hides. If she’s done with this, then I know I’ll have to switch Teams. It’s what will be best for the both of us, and the world.
I’m pacing my office, back and forth, slicking my hair back after a shower as I wait for her. She’s five minutes late, and I nearly jump out of my skin when Jonas buzzes to let me know she’s parking. I jog to the front door and open it. Aarabelle looks like a goddamn angel, long brown hair waving over her shoulders. Her dress is tight, black, and short. She’s wearing more makeup than she usually does, her lips are shiny and red. Her eyes are all mine. I can’t control the smile on my face. It’s huge and goofy and it takes everything in me to not break down right now.
“You’re here,” I say.
“You’re here,” she replies.
“You look beautiful.” I walk halfway down the staircase as she walks forward a few more steps. Aara has her hands behind her back.
She’s breathing in shallow quick gasps. Bringing her phone from behind her, she taps the screen and the most awful song of all time shrieks from the speakers. Holding it above her head she says, “You were supposed to be inside so I could do this John Hughes proper.”
“How are we supposed to dance if I’m inside?” I say, biting my lip, cringing at the chorus. “That’s part of a proper apology, right?”
She grins as I take the last steps to stand in front of her. I slide the phone out of her hand and slip it into the pants of my slacks, speaker side up. “May I have this dance? If we can figure out how to dance to this song, that is.”
Aarabelle throws her arms around my neck and the panic rioting my system, calms. The relief is so evident, I release a pent-up breath—one that I’ve seemed to hold since I saw her slip my ring in her pocket. I take her left hand from around my neck and gaze at the ring on her finger. I sway a little to the music, and she follows me, her body pressing firmly against mine.
“You’re wearing it.”
“I never should have taken it off, Luke.” She has an air of self-confidence that wasn’t there before, and I bask in it. The song fades from my pocket and I release her, but she clings tightly to my chest. “I missed you so much.”
“I’ve been right here. I’ve always been here.” Leaning down, I kiss the top of her head and inhale her hair. Her scent. “I’ll always be right here. For only you.”
“I don’t know what I did to deserve you, but I’m finished pretending you’re not mine. All in. You hear me?” Her voice rises at the end, and I have to laugh at the seriousness of her declaration.
“I hear you. So, what’s the plan for our date tonight?”
She walks carefully on the cobblestone ground to her trunk and pops it. I follow close. “At first I had reservations at a fancy restaurant in the Gas Lamp. That would be the normal thing to plan for a date.” She teeters on her heels as she picks up a huge picnic basket from her trunk. I try to take it from her, but she swats my hand away. “Then I realized that nothing about us is normal, and I don’t want it to be. We’re going to have a picnic on the beach instead.”
A blissful, warm feeling spreads over my whole body. “That sounds perfect. Still sort of normal, though,” I tease.
“Trust me, nothing about this picnic is going to be…normal.”
“Should I be scared?”
Aara grabs a blanket and closes the trunk. “No one is getting wet and sandy tonight, Hart.”
I chuckle and wrap an arm around her shoulders as we hike up the stairs to the house. Aara pauses when I close the front door behind her. Like she’s remembering something. Good or bad, she smiles and continues her path through the house to the pool deck. Kicking off her heels before she descends the rocky staircase down to the beach.
“God, the ocean is so beautiful here,” she whispers, stalling when she hits the white sand.
I guide her to a patch of packed sand and help her spread the enormous camouflage blanket, that I now recognize as a tent cover. “It was the biggest thing I could find,” she explains.
We talk a little bit about the camping training we’ll have to do, and that distracts her enough to take away her jitters. She’s nervous about something. She starts taking stuff out of the basket. Pistachios are the first out, and she stretches her legs out in front of her, crossing her ankles.
“I canceled the reservation at the fancy restaurant, but forgot to cancel the dress. Not the most proper picnic attire,” she says, yanking on the hem.
“Personally, I think it’s perfect picnic attire.” I grin.
“Killing me with your smile, Hart.”
I lean back on my elbows. “And you’re just killing me, Dempsey. Tell me what’s on your mind.” I toss shells next to the bowl as she takes out a bottle of bubbly and pops the top.
“There’s a lot of my mind. But first, champagne. To celebrate.”
“You’ll have to tell me what exactly we’re celebrating.” She pours it into two long-stemmed glasses and hands me one.
“We never really got to celebrate the end of deployment,” she says. “Or our almost engagement.”
