Page 59 of Finding the One (River Rain #7)

Ned hadn’t shared the details, they were all just reminiscing about a variety of things, and he’d brought it up.

But Ned hadn’t hidden, even if it might have pissed him off at the time, he gave no indication it did, and now he found it hilarious.

At this reminder, Blake just pouted.

“You weren’t even drunk?” he asked.

“No.”

“Not even tipsy?”

“No,” she snapped. “And I know how to handle a boat. It’s just, apparently, I don’t know how to handle a houseboat.”

He laughed again.

She cast her gaze to the side in annoyance.

In was after the wedding and they were in her bedroom at her father’s house. Rix and Alex were down the hall in Alex’s room. His mum was in the guest suite, aye, with Craig (and Dair was making absolutely certain not to think about that). Davi was in another room down the hall with her man.

Rix’s family had chosen to stay at a hotel that was closer to things they wanted to see in the city.

Last, Blake was lazing on him, naked, after coming back from cleaning up post-sex.

“She did it,” Blake said.

He let his laughter die and asked, “Who did what?”

“She redecorated my room and Alex’s. It’s subtle, like she just enhanced what was here so we wouldn’t feel like she’d edged us out. But she did it. And she hasn’t done much to the house, but what she’s done, it’s entirely different.”

“Sorry, lass, dinnae ken what you’re talking about.”

“Marlo. Look.”

She pointed across the room.

On the dresser, there was a picture of her and her father dancing at Alex and Rix’s wedding.

This was eight by ten, pride of place, but in front of it, positioned so you could see the photo at the back, was a framed snapshot of Blake, when she was maybe ten, blowing out birthday candles with Alex standing beside her, smiling at her.

There were some pretty candles dotted around the photos.

“And those.” She pointed to each nightstand and then the coffee table in front of the couch in the sitting area across the room.

On these, there were some fake flower arrangements that he’d had to touch, because the flowers looked so real.

There were also more candles and massive books, all on art or fashion.

Not to mention, on one of the nightstands, there was a framed picture of Dair and Alex sitting together at Alex’s wedding reception right before their first dance.

“Alex showed me her room and it’s the same,” Blake continued.

“Pictures of her and Dad, her and me, her and Rix. Coffee table books about outdoors stuff. Alex’s room used to look like Dad was selling the house, it was so bleak.

The whole house did. It almost looks like we live in these rooms now.

” Her gaze went far away as she concluded, “Who knew family photos and some candles and items that share you have interests and personality could make a house a home?”

He’d obviously never been to Ned’s house, but he found it warm and welcoming, the art and architecture stunning, and he had no idea the copious photos of Ned, Blake and Alex on display all over the space hadn’t always been there.

“I love her for him so much .”

When she said that, his woman’s voice was thick.

This necessitated Dair rolling her to her back, with him on top, and cradling her head in his hand while he ran his thumb along her jaw, rubbed circles in the apple of her cheek, and just waited while she felt what she had to feel.

When she seemed to have a handle on it, he noted, “You gave them a beautiful day.”

“It was fun organizing it with Marlo.”

She hadn’t hidden that, even if the engagement came fast, and the wedding faster.

Ned clearly was done fucking about.

“Everyone is happy,” she whispered.

“Aye,” he whispered back.

“Being me, when it comes to Mum, I redefined the stages of grief and cut out everything but anger and added confusion.”

“Mm,” he hummed.

She ran her hands up his back then locked her arms around him.

“Now I’m circling back to sad,” she told him.

“Sad, because Dad is such a great guy, and she missed out on all he could have given her. Sad because Alex is awesome, and they didn’t have a lot in common, but she could have seen what she had a hand in creating with Alex, and she never did.

And sad because she and I did have a lot in common, and she didn’t share that with me.

She died having everything a woman could possibly want in her life and having lost it. ”

Christ, he loved that she knew exactly what that “everything” was that a woman could possibly want in her life.

But she was correct.

It was a tragedy Helena never recognized it.

“That is sad, my love,” he murmured.

“And now she’s just gone, and nobody misses her and that’s sad too.”

“It is,” he agreed and asked, “You think you’ll make it to acceptance?”

“I already have,” she told him. “Though it’s a sad acceptance.

And I think I have to further accept it always will be.

But I hit that zone when Dad and Marlo walked into the bridal suite tonight looking so amazingly happy.

I have you. Alex has Rix and a baby coming.

” She tightened her arms around him. “How could I not accept being happy?”

I have you .

“Aye, it’s impossible for you not to be happy, hen, since you scored a catch like me,” he teased.

Her eyes got wide, and she tried to buck him off.

He chuckled and kissed her.

She stopped trying to buck him off.

But some time later, she did some bucking.

And as was her way, it got both of them off.

Sorcha was standing at the top of the stairs while Dair climbed them.

He gave her pets when he hit the landing, but didn’t call out, because he could hear Blake talking on the phone over what sounded like water running.

“If that’s the tub you want, that’s the tub we’ll order,” she was saying as he and Sorcha hit the bedroom. “But I want you to look at the specs again. It isn’t very wide. It’ll fit your ass, but if you want Ewan in it with you?—”

Dair had stopped in the bedroom to look around, hearing her voice coming from the bathroom.

He’d had a meeting that day with the Scottish Rugby Union. They’d been trying to recruit him for a couple of years.

After a conversation with Blake, they agreed it was time for him to get serious about considering it. His contract would be up soon with the BBC, and with Blake in his life, and a future to build, he needed something that didn’t require him flying all over Europe and most of the world every week.

Blake was worried he was giving up something he loved when she told him she adored travel, so she could come with him, or she could take the opportunity when he was gone to go to Treverton or New York if he had a longer haul than normal.

But they wanted bairns, and he didn’t want to be that dad who was gone all the time, or that man who made his woman deal with everything because he was.

Fortunately, he had choices.

With what was on offer, particularly working with kids, that day, he got serious about it.

However, he’d left after Blake that morning. She was meeting his mum and Davi to look at some stuff for Davi’s new bathroom.

And when he was about to leave, their clothes from the night before were on the floor, the bed was not made, and the bathroom was a disaster from Blake getting ready.

He’d thrown the clothes in the hamper, but didn’t have time to do more than toss the bedsheets up so they were less of a mess.

And he left her shoes where they were, because she was careful with them and had a specific place for each pair in the closet, and he didn’t have time to figure out where they went. Then he took off.

Now the bed was made, the shoes were put away, and when he moved to the bathroom, he saw it was tidy, except for the towel she had laid out where she was resting the makeup brushes she was cleaning.

He heard her laugh.

“Okay good,” she said into the phone “I’m glad you’re reconsidering. I think you’ll be glad too.” Her eyes came to him standing in the doorway, and she gave him a big smile.

Fuck, she was beautiful.

“Dair’s home, and he doesn’t know it yet, but he’s making me his bangers and mash because I might be more in love with his mash than him,” she said to who he knew was his sister.

Now Dair was smiling.

“Right, I’ll tell him. Speak soon and love to Ewan,” she said, then wiped her hands on a towel and took the phone from where it was tucked between her shoulder and her ear.

“You could have put her on speaker,” Dair noted.

“Hello to you too,” she replied.

He moved in, took hold of her hips, then took what he wanted from her mouth.

She looked dazed when he lifted his head and said, “Hullo.”

This smile she gave him was a little hazy, but he liked it too.

She recovered and explained, “The faucet was on. It was easier to hear and be heard that way.”

“Right,” he replied.

“Davi sends her love.”

“Right,” he repeated.

“How was the meeting?” she asked.

“They’re working up an offer.”

Her brows lifted. “Are you happy about it?”

“Aye. Very.”

Her smile returned.

“I’m making bangers and mash?” he asked.

“Please,” she replied.

“How’s Davi’s bathroom coming on?”

“I think we licked it for all the important bits. We just have to find a contractor to fit them.”

“Not the easiest part.”

“No, but we’ll lick that too.”

He had no doubt.

She had renovations in full swing at the New York apartment because, “I’ve always wanted to do that to make it more me, but Mum always pushed back,” and she was nowhere near that flat.

Then again, she insisted on still looking after her father’s properties being nowhere near them either.

All this meant more binders but fuck it.

She was like his mum. She liked to be busy. And she loved to do things for people she loved.

“I’ll get started on dinner,” he said.

“Great, but just a note we popped into St. James Quarter, and I grabbed you that Kiehl’s stuff you like. It’s in your top drawer by your sink.”

Dair blinked slowly before asking, “Sorry?”

“You used it at Dad’s place in Prescott?” she asked for confirmation.

“The face stuff?” he asked the same.

She nodded.

“You noticed that?”

“I could smell it after you used it.” She appeared bemused. “Did I get it wrong? Don’t you like it?”

“Aye, lass, I just didn’t think about it after we left.”

She turned back to the sink, saying, “That’s what you have me for. To think about those things for you.”

Fuck.

Fuck .

She was something.

She was lathering up a brush.

He decided to leave her to it and exited the bathroom to go make dinner.

As if sensing food might soon be spilled on the ground, as it was her job to clean that up, Sorcha came with him.

But Dair stopped in the bedroom again.

He’d always liked his bedroom. It was simple, uncluttered, and therefore, restful.

But now, on his side of the bed, there was that photo, framed, of Blake and Sorcha on their day in the park.

He’d put that there.

And on her side of the bed, there was a picture of her and him, Ned and Marlo, Alex and Rix, all in a line with their arms around each other under the arch of flowers around the doorway that led into Marlo and Ned’s reception. This sat along with a white pot with a white orchid coming out of it.

It was not much, but it made a house a home.

As such, Dair was humming as he and his dog jogged down the stairs to the kitchen so he could make his woman dinner.

Several days later, Dair walked by his office in their townhouse and saw Blake in there, pacing, her phone to one ear, his dog doing the pacing with her, another bloody binder open and cradled in her arm in front of her.

“No, poinsettias are too…on the nose. Holly as well. Though we should stick with the berries and Amaryllis,” she was saying.

She’d decided which charities she was to be patron for, and unsurprisingly, one was the SPCA.

So now, along with all the other stuff she was neck deep in, she was neck deep in some function she and his mother were planning.

The writing was on the wall that he was going to share his life with a bevy of binders.

And he couldn’t say he was upset about it.

He went to the lounge, stretched out on the couch, flicked on the telly, found a golf tournament to watch, and his dog abandoned her mum to stretch out on the floor beside her dad.

Sorcha wasn’t fond of the binders either.

He was idly stroking her fur when Blake came in, plopped her book down on the ottoman and then did the same with her body on Dair.

He grunted with no small amount of exaggeration and wrapped his arms around her.

“Talk Mum down from poinsettias?” he asked, not giving that first shite about her answer, but she did, so he’d listen.

“No. She says they’re traditional. And I suppose she’s right.”

“Aye, lass, she is.”

She puffed out a breath to get some hair out of her eyes.

Adorable.

“Done with the binders for the day?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Want to go out and get a curry?”

“Yes.”

“Want to marry me?”

She went solid on top of him.

He pushed into the pocket of his jeans, came out with the ring, took her hand, and slid the large emerald cut diamond surrounded by a band of diamonds on her left ring finger.

“You’re not allowed to start another binder until after our curry.” He paused and added, “And after our celebratory fuck.”

She turned shining, wondrous violet eyes from the ring to him.

And then she kissed him.

He took over and they ended their kiss with her on her back and him on top.

“I’ll take that as aye,” he said.

Her irises rolled up. “You’re excruciating.”

He grinned.

She caught his grin.

And she kissed him again.

He changed his mind, and they did their celebratory fuck first.

Because, hell yes.

It was an aye.

#teamblairforever

THE END

The River Rain Saga will continue…