“Perfect,” Laurie said. “Drew and I can ride in back and pretend we’re in a limo. No looking in the rearview mirror, though, because we’re probably going to make out.”
Kevin chuckled. “I promise not to look.”
“But I will,” Shanna warned, “so behave yourselves.”
The drive took barely five minutes, and the ceremony was only slightly longer. Despite the lack of formality, Laurie looked radiant when the notary pronounced them man and wife. Drew looked faintly dazed, but nearly as happy. Shanna wondered if that wasn’t the way to do it—simply make a decision to wed and dive in, rather than dragging things out and allowing time for a million doubts to creep in.
“Now to the inn,” Laurie said imperiously. “I spoke to Jess, and she already has champagne on ice for us.”
When they reached The Inn at Eagle Point, they were directed to a small private dining room, which Jess had miraculously managed to decorate with flowers, the inn’s best china and beautiful crystal to celebrate the occasion. She even had music playing in the background.
Shanna turned to Kevin. “Your sister’s amazing. I know she had practically no time at all to pull this off, but look how beautiful this is!”
“Jess is a romantic and Bree does flowers. I suspect she pitched in, too.”
“It’s absolutely gorgeous,” Laurie said. “I couldn’t have asked for a lovelier wedding reception.”
Shanna drew Laurie aside and studied her friend’s face, looking for signs that she was disappointed not to have had the big fancy wedding she’d initially wanted. All she saw was a woman practically glowing with happiness. Shanna gave her a fierce hug. “I am so happy this worked out the way you wanted it to,” she told her friend.
Laurie beamed. “I still can’t believe he changed his mind, that he really missed me.”
“Sometimes absence really does make the heart grow fonder,” Shanna said, wondering if their separation had made Kevin miss her, as well. “Drew obviously just needed a little time to get used to the idea of being married.”
Laurie laughed. “Oh, I think that part still scares the hell out of him, but at least he got through the wedding.”
Shanna smiled. “Maybe anyone getting married should have a little fear. It’s a huge step, and it is forever.”
Laurie clapped a hand over her heart dramatically. “Now you’re scaring me!”
“Nothing scares you.” She glanced toward Drew, who hadn’t taken his eyes off Laurie, as if he hardly dared to believe his luck. “Why don’t you go and dance with your new husband?” Shanna suggested.
“Only if you’ll dance with the best man,” Laurie said, leading her across the room to where the men stood.
Kevin hesitated, then asked, “Would you like to dance?”
Shanna nodded and moved into his arms. The moment she was there, she remembered exactly how safe and secure he made her feel and how much she’d missed that feeling. She lifted her gaze to his.
“Thank you for doing this. I know it’s not the way you planned to spend today. We still have a lot of things to talk about.”
“And we’ll get to those,” he told her. “But for now, it’s kind of nice being with two people who are so happy.” His expression turned nostalgic. “I remember feeling that way once.”
“When you married Georgia?”
He shook his head. “The night I spent in your bed.”
Tears immediately filled her eyes. “Kevin, you shouldn’t say things like that.”
“Why not? It’s true.”
“So much has happened since then,” she reminded him. “I know I’ve made you miserable.”
“You didn’t,” he said. “I made myself miserable by not trusting you. I took the worst memories from my past and imposed them on you without bothering to find out the truth. You tried to explain, but I was too stubborn even to listen. That’s all on me.”
She pretended to consider his words. “You know, you’re right,” she said with an exaggerated display of drama. “You were a jerk.”
He laughed. “I was.” His expression sobered. “But I do want to know the whole story. Maybe when we leave here?”
“If there’s time,” she agreed. “Henry will be back around six.”
He gestured toward Laurie and Drew, who were in a tight embrace and barely swaying to the music. “Something tells me they’ll hardly notice if we leave.”
“I don’t think you’re supposed to walk out on the bride and groom,” she said. “They have to go first. That’s the tradition.”
“This isn’t exactly a traditional couple,” Kevin said wryly. “I doubt it will take much to convince them this party is over and they’re free to move on to the wedding night, or the wedding afternoon, as it were.”
“I could suggest they have their meal served in their room,” Shanna said.
“Do it.”
She waited until the song ended, then tapped Laurie on the shoulder. “I think maybe you should take this party upstairs and have room service deliver your lunch. You two can enjoy it in privacy.”
Laurie’s expression filled with dismay. “We invited you here for a reception, and now we’re ignoring you.”
“You just got married,” Shanna said. “We’re not insulted. Honest.”
Laurie glanced at Drew, blushing. “It would be nice to go upstairs.”
Drew’s gaze never left her face. “Works for me.”
“Then go with our blessing,” Shanna told them. She hugged Laurie. “I’m so happy for you.” She turned to Drew. “Be good to her, you hear me?”
“Always,” he promised.
Kevin kissed Laurie’s cheek, then shook Drew’s hand.
“Thanks for being a part of our wedding,” Laurie told him. “Next time, I expect to be dancing at yours.”
Shanna felt heat flame in her cheeks at Laurie’s words. “Pay no attention to her. Women in love say crazy stuff.”
“I’m serious,” Laurie said.
“Go,” Shanna ordered, blaming champagne and the romantic aura of her wedding for Laurie’s change of heart about her and Kevin.
As soon as Laurie and Drew were gone, she turned to Kevin. “Now what?”
He reached for her hand. “Let’s get out of here.”
“We could just have lunch here.”
“Not with my sister lurking about the premises,” he said. “Lunch is one thing, but there’s no way we could have a private conversation.”
“You probably have a point. Where, then?”
He hesitated. “You know, I’m not sure. I have it on good authority that my sisters have spies everywhere. Do you know that Bree took pictures of us on the pier yesterday and sent them out with her cell phone?”
If she hadn’t been so appalled, Shanna might have laughed. It sounded like something an O’Brien would do.
“My apartment then,” she suggested. “We could pick up sandwiches or pizza and take them to my place. Unless one of them climbs a tree on the town green with a zoom lens on a camera or binoculars, they won’t be able to see us.”
Kevin nodded. “That’ll work. Why don’t I drop you off, then pick up the food. Any preference?”
“Quiche and a caesar salad sounds good to me. Is there anything on the menu at the French café that you like?”
“I’ll find something.”
He let her out in the alley behind the bookstore, where the stairs led up to her apartment. “I’ll be back shortly.”
Shanna was halfway up the stairs when the back door to Bree’s shop opened and she popped her head out.
“Trying to sneak past me?” she inquired.
Shanna laughed. “Going home. You didn’t enter into the equation.”
“Where’s my brother going? I thought you’d be together all afternoon. You didn’t have another fight, did you?”
“Actually we were in a wedding,” Shanna told her, resigned to supplying enough details to satisfy Bree’s curiosity.
“Oh, that’s right. I ran the fl
owers over to the inn earlier. Your friend Laurie got married. How was it?”
“Fast-paced, but, you know, I think the impulsive nature of it suited her just fine.”
“Is Kevin coming back?”
Shanna gave her a wry look. “Not if he knows you’re lurking in the alley.”
Bree chuckled. “Okay, I get it. I’ll go back inside and mind my own business.”
“Really?” Shanna asked skeptically. “Is that possible?”
“For a good cause, yes,” Bree assured her. “This is a good cause, right? The two of you are going to work things out?”
“I hope so,” Shanna said. “I want us to be friends again.”
“Friends?” Bree exclaimed indignantly. “This better be about more than that. You both need to get serious.”
“How about laying off and letting us take one step at a time,” Shanna said, her message pointed, but her tone gentle.
Bree sighed. “I suppose you’re right. Meddling’s usually counterproductive.”
“Yes, it is.”
“Okay, I’m gone,” Bree said, stepping back inside and shutting the door.
Before Shanna had climbed another couple of steps, Bree’s door opened again.
“One more thing,” she said. “Then I’ll disappear for real.”
“Yes?”
“Kevin loves you. I know he does. So, even if he messes up the words, listen for what’s in his heart, okay?”
“I think your brother’s perfectly capable of speaking for himself,” Shanna told her. “But, unlike his recent behavior, I will listen. I promise.”
“All I’m asking,” Bree said, closing the door again. This time it remained shut.
Shanna sighed as she continued up the steps and went inside to wait. She was beginning to understand the kind of pressure that Kevin lived with every day. He had this wonderful, well-meaning family, but all those expectations, all that certainty that they knew what was best for him, must be exhausting. She felt it, and she could pretty much tell them to bug off, if she wanted to. He had to sit back and listen.
Not that he had to heed their advice. She’d seen evidence that he had the same independent streak the rest of the O’Briens had. She supposed it was a necessity in that family.
But despite all the potential drawbacks she foresaw, the bottom line was that she wanted to be one of them. She wanted to be Kevin’s wife.
The admission, phrased for the first time in exactly that way, with no hesitation, startled her. She’d allowed herself to acknowledge missing him, even loving him, but this was the first time she’d looked into the future and seen so clearly what she wanted.
Even as she had the realization, she could hear Laurie’s voice reminding her that she’d wanted the same thing when she’d rushed into marriage with Greg. The two men, however, could not have been more different. And their families, well, the O’Briens were warm and welcoming. The Hamiltons had been stiff, cold and unyielding, at least until recently.
Convinced not only of what—who—she wanted, but that it was the right decision for her, she couldn’t help wondering if what Kevin had to say this afternoon would open the door to that kind of future for the two of them. Or, once he heard more about her past marriage and the complicated situation with Henry, if he would slam the door on the two of them forever.
24
Kevin noticed that the back door to Flowers on Main was ajar as he took the steps up to Shanna’s apartment two at a time. He knew instinctively that his sister was standing just inside that door. Upstairs, on the landing, he leaned over the railing and hollered, “Close the door and go back to work.”
He heard Bree chuckle, but the door closed quietly. Only then did he knock on Shanna’s door.
When she barely opened it a crack to peer out, it was his turn to laugh. “Making sure the coast is clear before you let me in?”
“Something like that,” she said, stepping aside so he could enter.
“Did Bree spy on you, too?”
“Accosted me with questions is more like it,” she said. “You?”
“Nope. She stuck with peeking out the back door of her shop.”
“I love your family, but they’re a little obsessed when it comes to the two of us.”
“Tell me about it. I’ve had Mick, Trace and Jake on my case recently. You should probably be happy to know they’re all on your side.”
“I didn’t realize our situation called for taking sides,” she said, as she reached into the bags he’d brought and put their food onto dishes she’d already set out on a table by the window overlooking the town green.
Kevin shrugged. “We’re talking O’Briens here. They take sides over everything, which is one reason my father and uncles rarely speak. I’m pretty sure Uncle Jeff’s daughter, Susie, is the only cousin who defies the rules. She speaks to all of us. Her brothers barely nod if they pass us in the street. The only time there’s detente is on holidays, when Gram’s around.”
“But isn’t the fight between your father, Thomas and Jeff?” she asked, regarding him with bewilderment.
“That’s how it started,” he acknowledged. “Like I said, sides were chosen. Facts and logic had little to do with it. All that was required was ingrained family loyalty.”
“But you’re all O’Briens,” Shanna protested.
Kevin chuckled. “There you go, trying to impose logic on this.”
Shanna sat down at the table, picked up her fork, speared some romaine lettuce, then chewed thoughtfully. “Doesn’t it make you crazy?” she asked after a while. “Who can work up the energy to keep a grudge going after all these years?”
He leaned forward. “You’d never know it to see them now, but my father didn’t speak to my mother for something like fifteen years after the divorce. Most of us kids didn’t speak to her, either, unless Gram forced us to when Mom came to visit.”
“So that’s what I could have looked forward to, if you hadn’t decided to listen to my side of the story about Henry? You’d have frozen me out from now till doomsday?”
“What can I say? It’s a family tradition.”
“That’s just nuts.”
“I know,” he agreed. “But I’m here now, and I want to know everything. Before you even start, I apologize for misjudging you, jumping to conclusions, refusing to listen to your explanations and all of the other idiotic things I did.”
“Okay, do you want to hear the long version or the short version?” she asked.
“Whichever one you want to give me,” he told her.
She began haltingly, but eventually the words started to spill out. Kevin cursed as Shanna told him about her disastrous marriage to Henry’s father.
“Let me be clear about one thing,” she said. “Greg was never physically abusive to me or to Henry, but his unpredictability and verbal abuse was almost as bad. Eventually I realized that I couldn’t stay. It was only the thought of what might happen to Henry if I left that kept me there even as long as I stayed.”
“You should have left the minute you realized how bad his addiction to alcohol was,” Kevin said.
“I’d made vows,” she said simply. “More important, there was Henry to consider.” She met Kevin’s gaze. “I loved him as if he were my own.”
“You should have taken him with you.”
“I thought about that, believe me, but with absolutely no legal right to him, I would have been charged with kidnapping. Since no one—not even his own family—believed me about Greg’s drinking and his abuse, I knew they’d never believe that I’d done it to keep Henry safe. We’d have been on the run for the rest of our lives. How could I do that to him? In some ways that seemed as cruel as leaving him with his dad. It was a no-win situation.”
“Surely the law would have been on your side,” Kevin protested. “There must have been evidence, something. You would have been protecting a child, for heaven’s sake.”
“Nothing,” she told him. “Leaving Henry behind was the hardest thing I’ve e
ver done in my life. If the nanny hadn’t been there, I don’t think I could have done it. Every day since, I’ve prayed that his family would wake up to what was going on and keep Henry safe. His father never hit him, but his yelling used to terrify Henry. And that was if he was even around. The nanny was the only person in Henry’s life most of the time.”
“How did he wind up here with you?”
She explained about the accidental overdose, the hospital stay, Greg’s liver complications, and the decision by Greg’s family that Henry needed a more stable environment. “He’d bonded with me. Even before Greg and I were officially engaged, Henry was calling me Mommy. At first we both tried to discourage it, but it made him so happy. I think that was part of why we finally decided to marry, because we knew how thrilled Henry would be.”
She sighed, thinking back to the time when they’d actually been a real family. It had been so brief. Then Greg’s drinking had started again in earnest.
“So, after keeping you from him for over a year, they suddenly realized you were the parent he needed? And you agreed to step in?” he asked incredulously.
“I think Greg’s family knew all along, but they would never admit such a thing to the world. Then the circumstances changed, and they’ve been forced to take drastic steps to ensure Henry’s happiness.” She grinned. “The nanny helped. Greta kept insisting that Henry would be better off with me. I have to give Mrs. Hamilton credit, though. In the end, she was the one who brought him here. It had to have been humbling for her to admit that I’d been right, but she did it.”
“She was the one with him in the store that day?”
Shanna nodded. “She finally realized that Greg wasn’t able to provide Henry with the kind of life he deserved and that getting Greg well again was going to be all she and her husband could possibly contend with. She convinced Greg to agree to let me become Henry’s legal guardian. We’ll see where it goes from here. She even offered to send Greta here to help me look out for Henry, but in the end, Greta decided to accept a position with another family.”
Kevin was stunned. “Hold on a minute. Are you saying Henry could wind up back with his father?”
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