Page 36 of Finding the One (River Rain #7)

She’d been doing well these past few days. Not entirely herself, but the day she woke up at Treverton, and once Alex showed, she was no longer the walking dead.

Now, she seemed hazy, unsettled.

He pulled her closer to his side and moved to where Ned, Rix and Alex were standing, waiting for them to walk into the sanctuary.

Their other friends had entered the cathedral proper.

After they arrived at her family, they stood there as Nora approached.

“The choir will begin singing ‘Jerusalem’ once I sit down,” she told them. “Just walk down slowly and take your seats. And the service will begin.”

She squeezed Alex’s hand, Blake’s arm and hurried down the aisle of the very full church to where Jamie sat with Judge and Chloe, Hale and Elsa, and JT and Laird.

“Ye all right, lass?” Dair whispered.

She was gazing at her father, but at his words, she looked up at him.

Then she got on her toes and said in his ear, “Marlo should be here for him.”

The week Blake was in New York, Marlo had been traveling for work, and because of that, a meeting couldn’t be arranged.

Now, Dair studied Ned, and he saw for the first time how Helena’s death had impacted him. His bearing was straight, his jaw strong, but there was a haunted feel to him.

“Take your sister and go to him,” Dair urged as the opening notes to the hymn began.

“But you?—”

“Get Alex and go. Rix and I will follow.”

“You’ll meet me in the front pew?”

This was the decision. Even if he didn’t think they were there yet in their relationship for him to have that place of honor during these proceedings, Blake had insisted on it.

And if she needed him there, he was there.

“Aye, lass, I’ll meet ye. Ned’s about to enter the sanctuary. Go.”

She released his arm and scurried to Ned, tagging Alex’s hand and dragging her sister along with her.

Alex read the situation instantly and they both took one of Ned’s arms, to the man’s open surprise. Ned glanced back at Rix and Dair as they formed together behind the trio.

Dair nodded to Blake’s father.

The choir started singing and Ned led his girls into the cathedral.

Dair and Rix followed.

He felt a muscle jump up his cheek when he came abreast of the row his mum and sister were in, both stiff-backed and staring straight ahead.

This was because his father was sitting in the row with them.

He hadn’t seen the man arrive, and undoubtedly, he’d maneuvered that so he could be right where he was sitting. Next to his daughter, who was next to the wife he’d cheated on with the woman in the casket at the front of the church.

Christ.

Per Nora’s instructions, their row was supposed to be Ned, Blake, Dair, Alex, Rix, in that order.

But Blake arranged them so Ned was between his daughters, Rix at the head of the row next to Alex, Dair at the other end by Blake.

They sat, and the rousing hymn that had been used by the English for practically any purpose, from weddings to funerals to anything in between that had anything to do with England or Englishmen and women ended.

The casket gleamed under a spray of monochromatic roses and orchids in a deep rosy-pink color. A spray that was so enormous, it almost entirely covered it.

The reverend made his approach.

And the memorial began.

During the service, the congregation sang “All Things Bright and Beautiful.” The choir sang “Lord of All Hopefulness.” Kind words were found for a woman who hadn’t done a kind thing, that Dair knew, in her life.

It was a beautiful ceremony.

And then, thank fuck, it was done.

The short, private ceremony for Helena’s few good friends was had at the cemetery behind the chapel in Treverton.

They left so the casket could be laid to rest, the spray of flowers draped over the loose soil on top.

High tea was served in the main house by Christine, the three maids, and a bumbling, frowning Jeff.

Now, the guests were gone, and they were all in the lounge having changed out of their funeral black.

His father hadn’t dared to attend the private ceremony or the tea. Then again, at the ceremony, neither his mum nor Davi came (though, they didn’t miss the tea).

However, he had two texts from the man since the service, Dair just hadn’t read them.

They were chatting and having pre-dinner cocktails.

Though, Blake and Alex were fussing over their father.

“You must stop. I’m all right,” Ned said in an undertone as Blake pinched off a fleck of non-existent lint from the poor man’s jumper.

“Can Marlo fly out?” Blake asked in the same tone.

“I don’t think you girls are ready for that yet,” Ned murmured.

“I think we were ready a year ago, Daddy,” Blake retorted.

“All right then, darling, then I’ll say now is not the right time,” Ned said.

“For her, you or us? Because I can share, for us, we want you to have the support you should have,” Blake returned.

Dair didn’t know Alex knew about Marlo yet, but apparently, she did.

Ned sent him a beleaguered expression.

Dair read the “for God’s sake, save me” look and he wasn’t surprised about it. Blake and Alex had been tag teaming Ned since the memorial.

He was about to make a move to do so when he heard Rix announce, “All right, people, we’re doing this.”

He looked that way to see Rix standing, and he had Alex in his hold.

“Oh my God,” Blake breathed with excitement, clutching her father’s hand in one of hers, and reaching out for Dair with her other.

“It’s time for some good news,” Rix said when he had everyone’s attention. “And that good news is, I knocked up my wife.”

Trust Rix to put it that way.

Dair laughed while others did the same, while clapping or crying out, and everyone got up to rush them with hugs and kisses and good wishes.

If Ned was troubled before, there was nothing left of it. He was beaming, proud and happy, as he gave his youngest a long hug and turned to his son-in-law to do the same.

“How far along are you?” Genny asked when they settled back down.

“About ten weeks,” Alex told her. “It’s a little early to share, but we thought everyone could use some good news.”

“Och aye, and that’s the best news ever,” his mum called out.

“This deserves champagne,” Blake decreed, pushing out of her seat. “I’ll go talk to Christine.”

And off she went to do that.

This left Dair sitting on a sofa with Ned.

He scooted into the spot Blake left and said, “I ken ye didnae miss it, but she’s worried about ye. And she’s keen to meet Marlo.”

“No, I haven’t missed it. She hasn’t made a secret of it either,” Ned said on a sigh.

“You’re correct, now isn’t the right time. But I think she’ll settle having met the woman.”

“This isn’t Helena’s place anymore, it’s Blake’s,” Ned replied. “And Helena is put to rest. Marlo is in Paris. I’ll see if she wants to swing a trip to the UK before heading home.”

“I think that’ll be good for all of you.”

Ned nodded.

Blake came back.

Champagne was served.

Ned’s attention was taken with something Elsa was saying.

“Everybody is going to start leaving tomorrow, and that sucks,” Blake complained in between sips of champagne.

“We can stay as long as ye like.”

“But you have matches to call,” she reminded him.

“Aye, and I can journey to them from here just as easily as I can do it from Edinburgh.”

That statement was as profound for her to hear as it was for him to say, and she didn’t hide it. She just added a kiss to the hinge of his jaw to punctuate how it made her feel.

When she sat back, Chloe was there with JT.

“Can you take him?” she asked Dair.

“Absolutely,” Dair replied instantly, setting his glass aside and laying claim to the precious wean.

He vaguely noticed Chloe smirking knowingly at Blake, but he was mostly busy bopping the baby’s nose so he’d giggle.

“I want two,” Blake announced.

Knowing what she was referring to, a tidal of warm goodness washed through him as he looked to her. “Aye?”

“You?” she pushed.

“Two is good.”

She reached in and stroked JT’s cheek.

He giggled at that too.

“You don’t sound convinced,” she noted.

He looked to her. “That I want weans?”

“That you want two of them.”

“Prefer three.”

Her brows drifted up.

“But I won’t be carrying them around in my body,” he carried on. “So if my woman wants only two, I’ll settle for two.”

Her expression turned triumphant.

He bent to her and kissed her curved lips.

JT landed a baby smack on his jaw while he did, and that meant they were both smiling when they broke.

“I’m visiting a voodoo practitioner to make sure they’re girls,” she warned.

He burst out laughing, and that made JT giggle too.

“Do you want boys?” she asked through it.

“I want healthy weans and a healthy woman when it’s all said and done. Dinnae give a shite what they come out as.”

She frowned. “Don’t say the s-word in front of a baby.”

“Lass, his vocabulary consists of gurgles and whatever sound comes from drooling.”

Her gaze moved to the baby. “Who knows what they soak in at this juncture?”

“Safe to say, with as much research as there’s been put into it, a lot of people ken that at this age, they dinnae understand a thing.” He lifted the baby to bounce him. “If JT starts speaking with a Scottish brogue, we’ll know they’re all wrong.”

“Whatever,” she muttered, then stole the baby from him.

In the last days, it hadn’t been lost on him she enjoyed children.

He had to admit, it was a bit of a surprise.

She didn’t seem like the hang-with-kids type.

Though she talked gibberish to them, and took every chance she could to hold and play with them, she wasn’t the gushing, ooing and ahhing type.

It was more she just enjoyed their company.

And he enjoyed that one fuck of a lot.

“Is it freaking you out how easy things are with us?” she asked JT a question aimed at Dair, the gravity in her voice communicating itself to the baby, who in turn assumed an expression like he was trying to understand her.

It was bloody adorable.

“No. Why would it?” he answered.

She turned to him. “It’s a little freaky.”

“It’s not.”