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“You aren’t the only one, lady.” With a hand on either side of her head, he held her steady as his mouth plundered hers. And in his kiss, she forgot about being afraid.
“I… The way I feel about you… It’s so much more than I ever felt for Brandon. Even the lovemaking… Especially the lovemaking…” She was making a mess of this whole conversation. “I fell apart so completely when Brandon left. I’m scared to death of what would happen to me if you ever did. How would I cope?”
“I don’t know the answer to that. I’m not going to walk out on you. Ever. But I can’t guarantee that fate won’t take me away. What I do know is that if it happens, you’ll be given the strength to cope.”
The conviction in his words reached her right where she loved him most.
“I suspect that the love we feel for each other will be there even when we aren’t physically together,” he said. “So no matter where I am, or you are, in this life or beyond, we’ll have it to draw on.”
“And it’s a well that never runs dry,” she said slowly, thinking about her love for Kara, too. How someday Kara would grow up and be off living her own life and Lynn would still have the strength of her daughter’s love to carry her, too. How she’d probably be gone from this earth before Kara was and how her love would continue to nurture her daughter even then.
And then there was Grant. As she allowed the floodgates of emotion he’d brought into her life to open, she lost her balance and held on to him.
Just as she always would. No matter where he was.
He was right. “With you in my life, my well will never run dry,” she said.
“I love you, Lynn Duncan, soon to be Lynn Bishop.”
She was getting married.
He gazed deeply into her eyes, and her trust started to grow.
They were going to be okay. Really okay.
And suddenly, she couldn’t wait until bedtime. Every bedtime. Or mornings, either. For the rest of her life.
* * *
GRANT SET THE table for lunch. He told Maddie where she was going to sit. Next to Darin. And Kara, because Kara had asked to sit next to Maddie. He was sitting next to Lynn.
She put the plate of sandwiches on the table. Ladled everyone a bowl of soup.
“Why are you grinning like that, Grant?” Darin eyed him like a man who knew. And Grant knew that he would never get used to seeing the glimpses of the Darin who’d once been in the eyes of the Darin who now was.
“You’ll find out,” Grant told him, still grinning. If Darin saw a new man in him, a less serious, less rigid man, then he was just going to have to get used to it.
“Did you get the test results, Lynn?” Maddie asked before Lynn even sat down to eat.
“Yes, I did,” Lynn said just as calmly. But Grant wasn’t fooled. He knew how nervous Lynn was about the changes descending on them.
And how excited she was, too.
They’d had sex so quickly they’d had time left over to talk.
“And I’m pregnant, right?” she asked.
Darin dropped his spoon into his tomato soup, splashing the liquid over the sides. He slid back from the table and stood up, his hands on his hips, looking down at Maddie.
“You’re pregnant?” His voice squeaked like an adolescent going through a voice change.
“Yes,” Lynn said.
“Woo-hoo!” Darin whooped so loudly that Kara jumped and missed her mouth with her peanut butter–smeared bread. He danced and jigged and wiggled his hips and threw his arms about, going around and around the table and into the kitchen. Maddie laughed so hard she had drool at the corners of her mouth.
Watching them, Kara started to laugh, too.
* * *
GRANT WASN’T SURE he’d get his older brother to calm down enough to have the conversation they’d planned on having before his next therapy session. But he knew he had one shot and he needed to use it.
“Sit down, Darin, we need to talk about your responsibilities here.” He made his voice purposely stern. “You’re going to have to marry Maddie.”
Hurrying back to his seat, Darin sat with so much force his chair rocked back. Grant’s stomach sprang to his throat as he lunged for the back of the chair, righting it before Darin fell backward.
