Reunion Beach by Elin Hilderbrand (best ebook reader under 100 .TXT) 📗

nothing that ever had him ignoring her; nothing that felt like this, like her heart was twisted in knots.

The first proposal had been casual, not even a proposal at all if you wanted to diminish it, which she did. Two years before, while they cooked Sunday brunch at his place, he’d said, “I think it’s time to get married, combine our lives. Your daughters are off and my son is happy and . . .”

She’d looked at him with a confused expression. Yes, she loved him. Yes, she’d thought about marriage—who doesn’t? But, no, she didn’t want a logical ask. This kind of proposal that assumed that life circumstances and not the heart determined marriage? That’s not what she wanted. Not at all. And that’s what she’d told him.

“Okay. That’s fair,” he’d said. And then he’d dropped to one knee, using a kitchen chair to help him as his battered knees from an old marathon-running habit kept him from being limber. “I love you with all my heart and soul, Beatrice McLain. Let’s get married. Please.” He’d grinned up at her.

She’d held out her hand. “Lachlan, get up.”

He stood. “Well?”

“We aren’t ready,” she’d told him, her heart pounding against her ribs like a ten-pound hammer.

“You aren’t ready,” he’d said and turned back to the eggs he’d been casually whisking only moments before.

They’d talked about it all morning—why she wasn’t ready (she wasn’t sure); how her reticence had nothing to do with how much she loved him; how their life was just as beautiful as any she’d dreamed of, so why change it? They were more of a couple than any married couple they knew.

In the end, every last bite of their breakfast gone, and the dishes done, he’d told her. “When I ask again . . . if I ask again . . . I won’t ask a third time.” The words weren’t said cruelly, but with a soft kiss and the truth.

She’d be ready next time; she was quite sure.

She’d nodded in agreement and stood, walked over and slipped onto his lap, kissed him. “I love you. I hear you.” His kiss tasted like cheese and croissant, soft and buttery. They barely made it to his bed to make love, stumbling down the hallway and sloughing off their lounging Sunday sweatpants and T-shirts. They didn’t leave that bed until late afternoon and only for a long walk to the river.

Beatrice now stood in her kitchen and remembered it all with a flush of love. He would not ask again. That was clear.

So she would ask him. That’s what she’d do.

She searched the kitchen for her reading glasses, found them by the computer, and picked up her phone.

Nothing. He hadn’t answered.

She’d really done it this time. There she stood: hungover and ridiculous in her too-sunny unrelentingly cheery kitchen because the word “yes” wouldn’t fall out of her mouth.

She would seek him out today and tell him yes. Fear or no fear, this was absurd. She loved him. Her reluctance to marry had nothing to do with him, and everything to do with the past, like echoes that wouldn’t end.

It was almost inconceivable that he hadn’t answered: to be ignored was an insult worse than rudeness. To be ignored—she’d felt it before: the memory of Tom’s abandonment that crawled across her skin in a cold sweat.

She poured her coffee and sat at the kitchen counter, and noticed she’d kept her laptop open to email where there blinked messages from the flock. She wondered, briefly, if something was wrong. Her heart hammered—the last time there were that many messages in a string had been twelve years ago when they’d lost their beloved Dani, their oystercatcher, their fragile and beautiful friend.

Her heart picked up a pace and she opened the string to make sure nothing was wrong.

I can do it!, wrote Rose.

I’m in. Booking flights now, wrote Victoria.

Absolutely. See you in four days in Savannah. Details?, wrote Daisy.

Then a barrage of questions—what time should they fly in? Daisy would drive—she was only two hours away. Had a house been found and booked?

It took Beatrice longer than it should have to stare at these messages, to wonder where they were all going and why.

Then the memory of her own proposal came rushing back. She’d invited and promised her “birds” a beach reunion, a house where they’d all meet; an all-expenses paid trip to help her decide whether to marry Lachlan.

What had she been thinking? Or more rightly, what had the champagne been thinking?

She didn’t need them to help her decide. She would go tell Lachlan “yes” today, and this trip would be null and void. She didn’t have that kind of cash and that kind of time. She didn’t . . . and yet it seemed she did.

Beatrice ran her hands through her hair and groaned. She’d done it this time. To back out would not only be embarrassing but also rude, and with Rose now alone in what had once been a very full nest, she had been the first to say yes. And Victoria booked her flights?

After pacing the house, putting away the art supplies in the hallway, and eating a plate full of scrambled eggs, Beatrice called Lachlan. This was fixable with a single call to him. She could reimburse Victoria her ticket, and they’d all laugh about her drunken night wandering Savannah. She’d tell Lachlan about it, too, about her drunk emailing with the flock.

He’d laugh softly and kiss her.

But he didn’t laugh. He didn’t even answer the phone.

She knew he wasn’t teaching on Wednesdays and there was no reason to ignore her phone call, except to ignore her.

What the hell now? Okay, play a bit of the ridiculous hard-to-catch and then make it up to him? Send a gift? Show up? She had no idea what to do next. She paced; she checked her phone; she cleaned up the kitchen, and then she decided.

She would go to him. She would show up on his doorstep only a few blocks away and he would never turn her away. Even the thought