by Wells, Nicky
It was one of those majestic, imposing moments that had helped me find my equilibrium throughout my stay here, and I fervently hoped the others would feel the same. I breathed and I gazed out toward the invisible horizon.
Steve gently took my hand. “Awesome,” he whispered, barely audible across the hissing of the surf. Rachel stood on my other side and also took my hand. Dan took hers, and we formed a solid line of friendship braced against the harsh and unforgiving elements.
We stood like this for a long time. Everyone succumbed to the magic of the moment; there was no need for words. My heart swelled with joy and love, and I couldn’t remember being happier in my entire life.
By silent accord, Dan and Steve eventually moved toward each other, forming a circle, pulling us into a big group hug. A bond was being forged that was stronger than a thousand words. Misdeeds and misunderstandings were put behind us, and the sea pulled them out with her, washing them away, dragging them under, never to be seen again.
Chapter Fifty-Five
We got back to the cottage feeling windswept, with rosy cheeks each and a distinct tang of salt on our lips. As we removed layers of outer clothing, it suddenly struck me that we all looked stripped to our bare selves. Not in a literal sense, of course. Dan was in sweatshirt and jeans. Steve, ditto. Rachel wore no makeup but her skin was glowing, her hair was tousled and messily contained in a butterfly grip, and she looked beautiful.
Rachel caught me eyeing her up and gave me a grin. “D’you know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen all of us so relaxed,” she echoed my thoughts. “There’s definitely something about this place.”
I smiled and was about to reply when Steve was in front of me on bended knee. Rachel exhaled sharply and Dan whistled softly. Steve said nothing to begin with, he just took my left hand and regarded me with his kind, soulful melted-chocolate eyes. Blood roared in my ears and I could hear the sound of my own breathing, turning shallow with excitement.
Steve turned my hand palm up and studied it carefully, as if he was hoping to read my destiny from it. He gently caressed my heart line with his thumb, then turned my hand back over and planted a kiss on the back of it. Raising his eyes to meet mine, he finally asked the question.
“Will you marry me, Sophie?”
Rachel exploded in gleeful squeals and jumped up and down like a child on Christmas Eve until Dan stepped across to calm her down. I looked at the two of them, now loosely hugging while awaiting my answer, and I retuned my gaze to Steve. A succession of snapshots from the past six months flashed before me. Seeing Steve in that church, knowing he was The One. Glimpsing him in the hospital when I was bringing Rachel in. Having him appear by my bedside when I was in hospital myself. Dan and Steve doing their weird double-act in the hospital. Steve towering over me as I was lying in the mud, refusing to help me up. Steve standing at the cottage door earlier, looking hopeful, expectant, anxious.
Yes, I said in my head. Yes, yes, yes.
Aloud, my voice uttered something completely different.
“Why now?”
“What?” Rachel gasped before Dan had a chance to silence her. Steve didn’t blink or bat an eyelid. Instead, he considered the merit of my question. He remained on bended knee as he started speaking seriously.
“Now, because you know and I know that we are meant for each other.” He swallowed and I nodded, just ever so slightly, for him to carry on.
“Now, because you got away once. Because I had planned the perfect moment in the perfect place, and it all went catastrophically wrong.” He gave a wry chuckle.
I had an uncomfortable idea that his plans might have had something to do with the Scotland trip, and that I had ruined more than just a romantic getaway.
“So, now…because this is perfect. Because I love you. Because I’m not letting you go again. And because I want your two best friends to be there as we take this monumental step.”
There were muffled sniffs coming from Rachel’s direction, and when I took a quick peek, it appeared she was crying. She was wringing her hands and waiting for my answer almost as anxiously as Steve.
Dan gave me one of his irresistible smiles. He looked completely relaxed, at ease, happy. Do it, he mouthed. What are you waiting for?
For a few seconds, my gaze rested on Dan as I was trying to figure out what my subconscious had just registered. The necklace—his half of our ring—it was gone. He wasn’t wearing it. We had both sworn we would wear our halves, always, to remind ourselves of what we had. We had been so proud of this romantic notion, but it hadn’t worked. Without really noticing, I touched my hand to my own bare neck, and Dan nodded.
“I got it still and keep it safe,” he said very quietly. Steve and Rachel were somewhat surprised by this seeming random comment, but my heart soared. I still had mine, too, and was keeping it safe. Dan and I had reached the same unspoken conclusion—it was time to let go. I smiled widely. Time for my answer.
“I—” I began finally, but Steve interrupted me quickly.
“Hold on, I forgot something,” he commanded, gesturing for Dan or Rachel to hand him his coat and fumbling frantically with his left hand in one of the pockets.
“The ring.” He presented the blue box with a flourish. I giggled and broke the tension. “Let nobody accuse me of proposing in bad form,” Steve declared, and opened the box. It contained what looked like a shiny purple shell. I accepted the box and cautiously picked at the shell, eventually lifting it off the cushion to discover that it was a ring, after all.
I raised my eyes, smiling at Steve uncertainly, while I gently turned the ring over in my hands. Steve had proposed with a purple plastic ring. It was beautiful, though in a purple kind of way. And surprisingly heavy, for plastic.
Seeing my hesitation, Steve took the ring out of my hands and poised himself to slip it on the ring finger of my left hand. “May I?”
I nodded, yes.
The ring looked good on my hand. Purple and shiny; a definite statement. Very me. Even if it was slightly unusual.
“Will you marry me, Sophie?” Steve reiterated excitedly. And this time, I said “yes” loud and clear, several times.
“Yes!”
Steve swept me up in a big embrace, lifting me clear off my feet, and Rachel and Dan applauded like mad.
“Whoop, whoop,” Rachel shouted, dancing around us like a pixie. “Congratulations, oh, I’m so excited for you both.”
I knew I was grinning like the Cheshire cat, I could feel the smile on my face nearly reaching my ears. Unexpected, this had been, but it was totally right.
Rachel dislodged me from Steve’s hug to give me a hug herself, making me jump up and down with her in excitement. “This is absolutely the best day ever,” she announced, and her delight touched me deeply.
Dan was doing the manly back-slapping-hand-shaking thing with Steve, offering his congratulations. He looked emotional but genuinely pleased. Noticing me watching him, he took the two steps across to envelop me in one of his big bear hugs.
“Congratulations, my lovely Sophie,” he said sincerely, and audibly. “You know I’ll always love you, and I hope you’ll stay my friend. But I am so happy for you both.”
He held me close for another second and gently let me go.
“Thanks,” was all I could manage in response, both to him and to Rachel. “I…I am so glad you are here, and…”
I didn’t have any more words. This morning, I had been worried about making up, anxious that Steve wouldn’t forgive. Now, I was suddenly his fiancée.
My second engagement. Third, if you counted the twenty-four hours I had been notionally engaged to Dan.
Rachel was reading my mind. “Third time lucky, eh?” she stage-whispered and we all burst into laughter.
“Third time lucky,” Dan picked up her thought. “Long may it last. Let’s drink to that.”
Sure enough, another bottle of sparkly was found, and a toast was had, and another one.
We moved from the kitchen to the
lounge, and Steve busied himself with kindling and matches. Sitting in front of the fire, we sipped champagne and toasted marshmallows. It might sound odd, but it was perfect.
Until all of a sudden, an ear-splitting shriek from Rachel broke the atmosphere.
“I got you a present, too,” she exclaimed. “I nearly forgot. You must open it. Where is it?”
I shook my head, indicating that I couldn’t recall what we had done with it.
“There it is,” Steve came to the rescue. “It’s hiding on the sofa, look.”
Sure enough, there was Rachel’s pink-wrapped box. I retrieved it and sat back down among my friends excitedly. Sensing Rachel’s impatience, I tore open the package and found it contained a beautifully crafted pink box with a white and silver pattern of blossoms. Inside a box was a big notebook of the same design. I took it out and flicked through the thick creamy pages, pristine in their blankness. A little piece of paper fluttered out; it read,
Sophie’s Little Book of Notes and Anecdotes
To Help Me Write My Second Book
“It’s beautiful,” I managed uncertainly. “But what does it mean?”
Rachel giggled gleefully. “Dan showed us your book,” she informed me.
“My book?” I repeated.
“Yeah, you know? The one you made for his birthday. It’s brilliant.” Rachel nudged me with her elbow as if to jolt my memory.
“You read it?” I burst out, completely nonplussed. I hadn’t really intended it for a wider audience than Dan.
“I didn’t read it,” Rachel began to clarify, and I breathed a premature sigh of relief. “I devoured it. In one sitting. It’s bloody brilliant, and I want another one. Please?” She proffered the notebook at me.
“I’m told that writers need something to set down ideas when they come to them. Organize thoughts. Write down anecdotes. So this is perfect. Or,” she mused, “if that’s not what you want, you could use it as a wedding planning diary. It is pink, so it fits wonderfully.”
“It’s gorgeous,” I hastened to reassure her and gave her a big thank-you hug. “It’s just so unexpected. I never thought about writing… I just…well, you know, they were only scribbles.”
“Well, they were jolly good,” Steve commented from his prone position on the floor and I nearly passed out with shock.
“You read it, too?” I squeaked, resolving to murder Dan at the first opportune moment.
But hang on! Steve had read it, and he still proposed?
“I certainly did,” Steve confirmed. “And very interesting it was, too. Explained a lot. Well written, I might add. And funny.”
You could have knocked me over with a feather.
“As we’re on alternative career news and monumental announcements,” Dan chimed in from his prone position on the other side of the fire. “There’s something else you ought to know.”
“Oh yes,” Rachel squealed, “I forgot about that. Tell her!”
I held my hands up in a gesture of defeat. “I don’t think I can take any more,” I protested, only half-joking, but my friends elected to ignore me.
“You must know,” Steve told me. “Otherwise you’ll be in shock when we leave.”
“That sounds a bit ominous,” I muttered, confused.
“‘Love Me Better,’” Dan continued his announcement. “You know, the song?”
“You mean the one that we recorded in private, with me merely standing in for a female artist to be found later? The one that was subsequently released? That one? Yes, I remember,” I said, a little tartly.
“It’s gone platinum,” Dan said. “You’re famous. Somebody made the connection and it went all over the net.”
Platinum? A single? With my voice?
“You’re having a laugh,” I stated flatly.
This was too much. It was totally ludicrous. All over the Internet? How could I not have known?
Dan was still trying to get his message through to me. “I’m not having a laugh. You were gone a long time and life carried on.”
“But, but, but! The single is ancient. We messed about with it in, like, June. That’s five months ago.”
“It was a slow burner,” Dan acknowledged. “But it got there in the end.” He couldn’t suppress a smile.
Oh God. He was serious.
“I’m marrying a rock goddess,” Steve realized. “Well, I never. Lucky me.”
Rachel toppled over with hysterical laughter, but I was still not buying it.
“This is too much,” I objected. “And anyway, I thought it was all meant to be anonymous? Huh?”
“It was,” Dan acknowledged somberly. “Yet somebody let the cat out of the bag. It wasn’t me,” he held his hands up defensively. “Uh-uh. It turned up on the Internet one day and that was that. And now the press is looking for you.”
I shook my head to clear the fog that had descended.
“In fact,” Dan began, but Steve intervened. “Best leave it there for now, shall we?” he suggested gently. “I think it’s all been a bit much.”
“Of course,” Dan conceded immediately.
“No, tell me,” I protested, but Dan shook his head.
“Not now,” he reiterated. “We have plenty of time.” He consulted his watch and gave a startled gasp. “My friends, it is almost two o’clock in the morning. Perhaps it’s time for bed?”
“Brilliant idea,” Rachel agreed instantly, trying to suppress a wide yawn but giving in eventually. When she finished stretching her jawbones, she got to her feet. “What a day it’s been. I know I’m totally overwhelmed, poor old Sophie must be reeling. Come on, Dan, we have a cozy room waiting for us each.” She pulled Dan up to his feet while Steve helped me.
“Is it all right if I stay?” he whispered in my ear.
“Totally,” I whispered back, feeling unaccountably naughty. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Chapter Fifty-Six
Steve had come vaguely prepared. Tucked into the voluminous pockets of his outdoorsy coat were a pair of tightly folded pajama bottoms and a toothbrush.
“I’ll have to be stubbly in the morning,” he joked as we were getting ready for bed together, for the first time since…well.
“But I didn’t want to bring a big bag and look presumptuous. And I didn’t know whether I’d get a chance to propose this time, and if it all went wrong, I didn’t want to have the added problem of an overnight bag speaking volumes on my behalf.”
I gave him a big hug.
“I love you, Steve Jones,” I said sincerely. “And I can’t believe we’re getting married.”
“You’d better believe it,” he admonished me teasingly. “Besides, you’ve got the ring to prove it.”
I waggled my left hand in the air, admiring the glint of purple as the ring caught the light.
“Do you like it?” Steve suddenly asked. “It’s a bit unusual…”
“Yeah, you can say that,” I interrupted laughingly.
“It’s only a stand-in,” he clarified. “I’ve picked three proper ones, you know, but I wanted to see if you wanted to choose the final winner. Just in case.”
Ah. A stand-in.
“That’s a bit of relief,” I admitted. “It’s just a bit on the clunky side.”
“That, it is,” Steve conceded. “Still, they don’t make them much smaller. I guess it gets a bit fragile if they make it more slender.”
“Fragile?” I retorted. “Why would a plastic ring be fragile?”
Steve looked at me, completely aghast. “You think this is plastic?” he asked, his voice an unusually high pitch.
Oh dear. Bad mistake. I obviously had committed quite a serious faux pas. “Is it not?” I whispered in the smallest, most apologetic voice I could muster. We were still standing side by side by the sink, looking at each other in the bathroom mirror, and now Steve nudged me gently shoulder to shoulder. It was a kind, indulgent kind of gesture. One that said, I know you’re a philistine but I’ll marry you anyway.
“No, silly,” Steve said very tenderly, caressing my face as he spoke. “No, it is not plastic. It is, in fact, a classic Lalique Cabochon ring.”
I swallowed. That sounded expensive.
“Lalique, huh?” I repeated.
“Lalique,” Steve confirmed. “But that doesn’t mean anything to you at all, I can see it on your face.”
We both burst out laughing, clinging on to each other for dear life.
“It’s a crystal designer ring,” Steve managed to clarify in between howls of laughter. “Crystal. And I love that about you, that you haven’t got a clue. Oh, Sophie,” he chuckled. “I do love you more than anyone in the whole wide world.”
I cupped his face in my hands and pulled him close. “I love you, too. More than anyone. You are my thunderbolt-and-lightning man. And I’m sorry it took us such a roundabout way to get back together.”
“Nah,” Steve laughed again. “Best to get these things out of the way before we tie the knot. But now…” he pulled me toward the bedroom. “Let’s make mad, passionate love.”
“Consummation before the act, huh?” I teased. “That means I can’t marry in white.”
“You can’t marry in white anyway,” Steve teased right back. “And I don’t care. You could marry in red as far as I’m concerned.”
“Or scarlet,” I suggested. “I could be your scarlet woman.”
“Now that’s going a bit too far,” Steve admonished. “Come here, you, and let me teach you some manners…”
Needless to say, we did make mad, wild and passionate love. And tender, considerate love. And hungry love. Several times. It was as if we were making up for lost time. We erased the past weeks from our mental and bodily memories and celebrated our engagement in the most worthy of manners. I would have to John-Wayne-walk the following day, but who cared?
It was bliss, sharing a bed with Steve again. I had forgotten, or had tried to forget, how comfortably my body fit into the curves of his big frame, and how cozy it was to snuggle like spoons, cocooned under two duvets.
