Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 68309 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 342(@200wpm)___ 273(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68309 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 342(@200wpm)___ 273(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
“Whenever.” I shrug. “We’re not in a rush. It’ll happen when it’s supposed to happen.”
We glance into the next room, where my father and Cainan are deep in some discussion about foreign trade policies as it relates to building supplies. Cainan is doing his best feigning as much interest as possible, though I’m sure he’s bored to tears. It’s sweet that he’s indulging my dad.
“Have you two talked about it at all?” She grabs the last potato.
“Not in detail, no. We both just know it’ll happen someday. We’re not worried about it.” I scoop the peels from the sink and toss them in the garbage.
While we’ve only been dating a year now, Cainan and I feel like we’ve been together our whole lives—and we know we’re going to be together the rest of our lives. Engagements, weddings, those are formalities.
We’re choosing to focus on what matters: the relationship.
Besides, the last engagement left a bit of a bitter taste in my mouth. Fortunately, I’ve yet to run into Grant since everything went down. Cainan mentioned they spoke on the phone briefly after their altercation in Vegas, but he never heard from him after that. Though he still sent Georgette a card on Mother’s Day—and the day she got it, she called and spoke to him for a solid hour about this, that, and everything else non-Grant-related.
I think she understands why the guys fell out.
And I think she truly sees Cainan as her second son.
I’ve yet to meet his parents. He doesn’t like to talk about them. You have to pry details out of him like tweezers to a deep splinter. His sister’s a little more forthcoming, though she’s in the blissful throes of new motherhood, so I avoid dredging up anything from the past when we’re all together.
I smile to myself when I think of Cainan with his baby niece, Hadleigh. The first time Claire put her in his arms, he claimed he wasn’t good with babies. But he settled down and she settled in and the two became best pals from there on out. Now whenever we visit, he doesn’t waste any time crawling on the floor with her and making ridiculous noises and silly faces to match.
To be honest, I was never one-hundred-percent sure I wanted kids …
But seeing Cainan with Hadleigh sends a twinge to my ovaries like nothing before. And then there was that dream he had after his accident. He said we had two kids: a boy and a girl. I try not to let him go into detail whenever he brings it up.
I don’t want to know what comes next.
There is beauty in not knowing.
Magic, too.
“Well, whatever you decide,” Carly says, “just know that we all really like him.”
“Appreciate it.” I give her a wink, and I don’t remind her that they all really liked Grant too.
Grant was my past.
Cainan is my future.
He was, is, and always will be the best man for me.
Epilogue
Ten Years Later …
Cainan
“I’m not ready to leave.” Brie hugs her thighs against her chest, toes buried in the sand as we watch our daughter, Elle, and her kid brother, C.J., chase one another along the shore, giggling every time the ocean laps at their bare feet.
“Then we won’t.” I wrap my arm around her shoulders and pull her against me. Her bronzed skin is sunbaked, freckled, and warm, and the scent of her coconut sunblock carries on the salty ocean breeze that surrounds us. “I’ll quit my job and we’ll stay here. Forever. Every day will be just like this.”
I’ve lived this before—this exact moment.
In my dream.
She turns to me, fighting the smirk that claims her full lips, and then she pushes her cat-eyed sunglasses down her nose. “Don’t tempt me.”
“You’re not happy in the city.”
We’ve been here before. We’ve had this conversation before—only she doesn’t know it.
While we’ve talked about the dream I had after my accident, it’s never been in great detail—at her request.
From the beginning, she told me she wanted our life together to unfold organically, to be a surprise.
And for the most part, it has been.
I never could have anticipated moving to Phoenix for a few years shortly after we married. I also never could anticipate that she’d want to move back to the city—which we did shortly after C.J. came along. She said it felt like home, that it fit us better. And she felt more of a connection to Manhattan because it was where we fell in love and had all of our firsts.
First kiss.
First broken bed …
First fight.
First (and only) wedding.
Brie slides her glasses up and turns to watch the children. “It gets claustrophobic sometimes. The kids come out here and there’s so much space. They don’t stop smiling for months. Then we head back to the city, cram ourselves in a narrow, three-bedroom brownstone, and live in that gray cinderblock world for nine more months. Things are so fast-paced in the city, you know? Life is literally passing us by. Out here, time moves slower. Or at least it feels that way.”