Page 178 of Her Wicker Guardian

“Maybe.”

“That’s how she gets you.”

I went back to work at the Blue Plate the week after the Harvest Festival. While I worked, Tom taught Locke to drive. He passed the first time he tested and is a calm and competent driver. He often drives me to work and picks me up so he has the vehicle during the day.

He’s in town on his own often enough now that Ben has stopped treating every visit like an event. Sometimes Locke goes to town to see what’s new at Calhoun’s. Sometimes he just goes because he wants to, and I’m not automatically part of the trip anymore.

He sits beside me on the porch step, his shoulder pressing lightly against mine.

For months, people have asked me what it’s like living with Locke. Reporters asked until Blair stopped returning their calls. People in town asked until it became ordinary enough that they stopped. Strangers online still ask, though I’ve learned the extraordinary skill of not reading comments.

The real answer is probably less exciting than they want it to be.

It’s coffee in the morning and willow branches strewn across the yard. It’s Shannon sending messages nobody requested and Locke reorganizing the workshop according to a system that makes perfect sense to him and leaves me asking where he put everything. It’s hearing him sound out a word at the kitchen table and watching him glare at silent letters as though they’ve personally betrayed him. It’s his hand finding mine in town without checking first to see who might be watching.

It’s ordinary, or at least our version of ordinary. I didn’t know ordinary could be this good.

Locke nudges my shoulder. “You’re thinking.”

“I do that sometimes.”

“What about?”

“You.”

“What about me?”

Six months ago, that question would have sent me looking for an answer I could live with. I would have weighed every feeling against every possible reason not to trust it.

Now the answer is easy.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

He says it without hesitation, the way he says it when he leaves for town or comes upstairs after working late or when we’re curled together in bed at the end of the day.

Somewhere along the way, the words stopped feeling dangerous. They became part of the life we made. I reach for his hand, and his fingers close around mine.

“You know,” I say, “you were right.”

“About what?”

“Choosing someone when you don’t have to.”

Locke’s fingers tighten around mine. “I still choose you.”

My throat tightens, but this time the feeling is sweet.

“Good,” I say. “Because I still choose you too.”

His shoulder presses a little more firmly against mine, and we sit here together in the morning sun.

A truck turns onto the road in front of the cottage, and a moment later Ben pulls into the driveway.

Locke looks toward him. “He’s early.”

“By two minutes.”