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“Well, right now, it’s leading me down the obvious path of a heart attack,” I gasp. “He just kissed me.”
“Yeees!” Sharon cries, still squealing with excitement.
Debs’s grin gets even bigger, not that I knew that was possible, but clearly, it is. “And?”
I sigh, my face crumpling into blissful delight. “It was the most amazing feeling I’ve ever felt in the history of feeling anything.”
Sharon sits back up having finished her seizure, and stares at the screen. “So, what did you say? Tell me you said yes, Emma. Please. Please tell me you said yes.”
“He didn’t ask yet.”
“Of course he did,” Debs cut in. “He just didn’t use words.”
“Exactly!” Sharon blurts.
“Oh,” I say, feeling like I’ve been out of the game for far too long. “Well, we talked a bit before that. He told me how he felt, and—”
“Which was?” Sharon presses, desperate to get all the juicy details.
I laugh at her and shake my head. “He told me that I had a calm, sweet serenity. That I take his breath away. That being around me has made him a better man. Oh, and that my beauty speaks for itself—only, he said that in Italian.”
“What?” Sharon squeals, throwing herself back on the bed again.
Debs and I are both laughing at her now, as she clearly cannot take the overload of Ryan’s words. Her reaction makes me think how truly sweet his words were, how loving and caring and tender. But nowhere near as tender as that blissful kiss.
Sharon flings herself back off the bed and stares at the screen with the most serious face I’ve seen. “If you don’t go out with this guy, I swear, I’ll kill you myself. You won’t need to worry about a heart attack.”
“So,” I say, taking a deep breath in. “You think I should take a chance?”
“YES!” the two of them yell at the screen.
*****
The following morning, I wake up with a spring in my step. I hardly slept a wink last night, thinking about what I wanted to say to Ryan this morning, but when I get to the dining room, he’s not there. Beatrice then tells me he’s out on the ice, and so, I head to work still excited about what I’m going to say to him. Maybe it’s better that I talk to him this evening. We’ll have more time.
I head into the local store to pick up a newspaper. When I get to the counter, Shirley gives me this deep, sympathetic look. “I’m so sorry, honey.”
My eyebrows pinch together, and I shake my head, feeling confused. “Why? What happened?”
A million things are running through my mind. Has someone I know died? Is Debs okay? Is Sharon okay?
Shirley nods to the paper and says, “Page 15.”
I flick the paper to page 15. A picture of Megan, with her arms wrapped around Ryan, stares up at me. They’re both laughing. She’s wearing that same red dress. And in the background is Clint serving drinks.
The picture was taken at our local bar.
21
Ryan
I woke up conflicted.A part of me in hopeful eagerness, a part of me in dread.
When Emma got up to leave last night, I thought I’d gone too far, but she assured me I hadn’t. And I know Emma. If I had, she would’ve told me. What she did say was that she needed time to think. I get that. I’m just impatient.
After spending hours on the ice this morning, I’m now back in the house and standing under the roasting hot water in my ensuite shower. I need to freshen up, for sure, but I also need to warm up. It’s freezing out there. The hot water pounds down on my skin, breathing life back into my muscles, but while I know I have to warm up, my mind is on more important things than being cold.
Just as I finish washing my hair, I hear a loud thumping noise. For a second, I don’t know what it is. Sticking my head out of the streaming water to try and hear it more clearly, I strain, and then it comes again.