She set a cup down in front of him, then took the seat next to him, curling her legs beneath her and looking more like an eager high school senior on career day than a thirty-year-old woman. “So I don’t want to quit, but I’ve been thinking…. I can keep my job and try other things, right? Nothing’s stopping me from writing in my spare time. I might get rejections, but the day job will keep paying my bills. And also pay for the occasional medicinal margarita.”
He laughed. “I think that sounds like a great idea.”
“I was hoping you would say that because you remember how we talked about that travel writing?” When he nodded, she asked, “How would you feel about letting me tag along on your trip to Hawaii?”
Jake was too startled to respond. What happened to her needing time and space?
“I wouldn’t be writing about you this time,” she clarified nervously. “And I certainly wouldn’t expect a free ride. I—”
“Brooke. I am okay. I was not in mortal danger today, I wasn’t even injured. You don’t have to cross an ocean with me just because you’re relieved.”
Her bottom lip trembled. “I was being too pushy, huh?”
“That’s not it. Push as much you want. I guess, the important part is make sure you want it. Last night, for instance, I thought we were on the same page—until you ran out the door so fast you left a trail of smoke behind.”
“I’m sorry about that,” she said. “I don’t have much experience in that area, certainly none like that, and I wasn’t sure how to act. I definitely hadn’t planned to say I love you, and there didn’t seem like a graceful way to take it back. But I did a lot of thinking today.”
“Because of the fire?” he asked.
She shrugged. “Yeah, maybe, but just because sometimes it takes an outside event to trigger an epiphany doesn’t make the epiphany less true. When I was driving to the Mesquite Bend apartments, I was obviously really worried for you, but I also realized I was really glad that I’d blurted out my real feelings for you last night. If you had been hurt today…” She shuddered when she said it, and he reached across the table to squeeze her hand comfortingly.
Taking a deep breath, she tried again. “Life is uncertain. You told me once that anyone who tries to act otherwise is either in denial or a coward.”
He flinched, hearing his words repeated like that. It made his opinion of her sound far too harsh. “Brooke—”
“No, you were right. I’m not saying we should all give up and just live in anarchy,” she stipulated, “but I have to accept that my feelings are not always going to be predictable and regimented and that not all my relationships are going to follow terms and conditions I dreamed up when I was twelve because I thought it would keep me safer.”
“You really were a very goal-oriented child.”
She laughed. “Anyway, things happen to people, even people who don’t fight fires for a living. And I don’t want to think that if I’m hit by a meteor tomorrow that I’ll leave behind people who never really knew how I felt because I was too scared to let myself express it. To let myself feel it in the first place. I do love you. It sounds insane when I hear it out loud—we’re pretty different, aren’t we?—but I think I’ve tried to be sane too hard for too long.”
I am the luckiest SOB on the face of the earth. Pure joy expanded inside him, making his chest tight. “I think I can help with that.”
She slid out of her chair, and he pulled her into his lap. “I love you, too,” he said. “But we can take it slow if this starts to freak you out.”
“I’m not so worried about that anymore,” she told him as she raised her face to his. “You make me brave.”
And you make me happier than I ever thought possible. He didn’t say the words aloud now, too busy kissing her, but he’d tell her later. And often.
Epilogue
The high-pitched squeals coming through the cell phone were so loud that Brooke held it away from her ear.
Jake, who was on the balcony proofreading a humorous piece she’d drafted about honeymoons, winced in sympathy.
“You eloped?” Meg demanded at an ear-splitting decibel. “You?”
“Some moms pass on their wedding dress to their daughters, I guess our mother just passed on this quaint tradition.” She grinned. “It was very passionate and romantic.”
This got a thumbs-up from Brooke’s husband of the past forty-eight hours. They really should have started calling their loved ones yesterday with the news, but they’d been…otherwise occupied. His parents—two charming people she’d come to adore—had not been surprised by the announcement and had welcomed her warmly to the family.
“We’ll have a huge party to celebrate when we get back,” Brooke said. “Wanna help with that?”
Meg, whose latest venture was a party-planning business, laughed in delight. “If it turns out well, you have to let me use you as a testimonial. And now that your last name’s McBride, people won’t even know we’re related.”
Brooke McBride. She grinned stupidly, thrilled with her new name. During the past six weeks of dating Jake, she’d decided without a doubt that she wanted to spend the rest of her life with him, but she’d been having trouble getting excited about looking for another dress and sending out invitations. Again. And even though Giff was being a veritable saint about their relationship, neither she nor Jake could imagine asking him to be the best man at their wedding. It seemed unbelievably tacky.
So when Jake had half-jokingly pointed out that they could elope during their trip to the islands, Brooke had decided it was perfect, in an ironic, fate-getting-the-last-laugh kind of way.
“Do you have pictures? Did you tell Mom and Dad yet?”
“Yes and yes. I’ll give you all the details when I get home,” Brooke promised. “But we’ve got other calls to make.” Eventually.
“All right. Give your gorgeous new hubby a hug from me!”
“Will do.” Brooke hung up and went to join Jake in the tropical breeze, bracing an arm on either side of his chair. “In case I haven’t told you in the last five minutes, I love you.”
“Back at you.” He kissed her deeply, then rose, scooping her up and carrying her toward the bed.
Brooke giggled. “You do realize you have over twenty states left to go. You may have set the bar too high—it’ll be impossible to top this trip.”
Waggling his eyebrows at her, he said, “I have some ideas. Wanna hear about them?”
She shook her head. “Surprise me.”
ISBN: 978-1-4268-5683-9
THE BEST MAN IN TEXAS
Copyright © 2010 by Tanya Michna.
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*4 Seasons in Mistletoe
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