Page 93 of Tackle

Her hand came up to cover his that still rested on her jaw. A lone tear fell over the bridge of her nose but her smile grew broader. “Okay.”

The tightness in his gut unfurled, elation taking its place. “I love you.” He swallowed past the lump of emotion that unexpectedly formed in his throat. “So damn much,” he croaked.

Her fingers trailed up his arm and he pulled her into an embrace. “I love you too,” she murmured into his neck. “So very much.”

Cupping the back of her head, his lips found hers. And he kissed her long, slow, and sweet, marveling at the unpredictability of life.

One of his worst days had just become one of his best.

Epilogue

Oz was so fucking nervous his heart was pounding as he turned into the quiet residential neighborhood in the Northwest District a few minutes from the pub. Emerson thought he was taking her to a new renovation project he’d just bought.

He knew it was a bit more than that.

It had been a long two months of recovery for Emerson, both mentally and physically. Her knee was healing nicely. She’d been downgraded from the brace to an Ace bandage, though it still gave her some pain when she stood on it for too many hours.

Oz made sure that didn’t happen.

After a short—unavoidable—visit to her parents, they’d stayed in seclusion in their apartment for over a week after the fire until real life intruded.

The pub reopened and business was even better than before. The events of the fire and the subsequent arrests of Britney and Keith Costello made the news and all her old customers and many new, rallied to show her support, practically beating down the door on her grand reopening.

And somewhere between Emerson’s knee healing and the pub reopening, they’d gone on their tour of Ireland. Starting in Dublin, they went south to Cork, then back north to Galway, and finally, their last stop, Belfast.

It was while in a small town, on the outskirts of Cork, that Emerson had finally found her ring. A ring Oz had been trying to buy for her for weeks. Lying in bed, perusing magazines and scouring the internet while Emerson recovered, nothing had caught her interest. Not big diamonds or little ones. He must have pointed out hundreds. But in a tiny antique shop thousands of miles away, wedged between a bakery and a bookstore, is where she’d made her discovery.

Emerson said it had been fate. Oz had thought so too and they took their vows in a tiny church, Oz slipping the Claddagh ring on her finger. The heart was an emerald, the crown encrusted with diamonds, and both were nestled between two cupped hands—love, friendship, loyalty—their vows to each other.

“Oh, Oz, it’s beautiful,” Emerson said as she gazed at the house after he helped her from the car.

Well it would be after he and Emerson got done with it. The two-story, three thousand square foot house was currently an unappealing light blue that would need to go, and the landscaping had been neglected for too long, making the overall appearance far from beautiful. But it could be, and he knew the finished product was what she saw now as she gazed at it.

Walking up the stairs to the front porch, he opened the door and they stepped inside. A set of stairs leading to the second floor and a spare downstairs bedroom were immediately to the right while straight ahead was the living room, dining room, and beyond that, the kitchen.

“Wow, this place is huge,” Emerson said, head turning this way and that, taking everything in. “The size is deceptive from the front yard.”

He took her hand walking her farther in. “I was thinking of tearing out this wall to make an oversized kitchen.”

“Oh that’s a great idea. Nobody really uses dining rooms anymore.” She walked to a sliding glass door at the back of the kitchen that stepped out onto a deck. “Especially not, when they have such a huge backyard to entertain in.

He came up behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist, leaning down to place his chin on her shoulder. He stared at her reflection in the window. “You like it?”

He saw her smile. “Yes. It will be magnificent once it’s finished.”

He kissed her neck and reached into his front pocket. “Good.” He held up a set of keys. “Because it’s yours.”

She spun in his arms, eyes wide. “What?”

“You remember when I told you we were building something?” He took her hand, dropped the keys into her palm and folded her fingers over them. “This is where it starts. The two of us, turning this house into a home.”

Her head tipped back to look up at him, tears shining in her eyes. “Best day of my life was when you walked into my bar.”

He brought his lips to hers, but before he kissed her, he said, “Best day of mine was every day after that.”

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