Page 92 of Beached Wedding

“It’s hard for me,” I said softly. “To imagine I’m allowed to go after a bigger bite of the world.” I didn’t have a surf champion for a mom who had taught me that it was completely normal to follow the sun and my dreams.

Fox didn’t either, but he had learned to be ambitious. Izzy was like that, too, even though her parents were like my mom—careful and content with a quiet, secure, conventional life. Maybe the biggest thing Izzy had revealed to me today was that underneath all that bravery, everyone was scared in their own way. No one liked to fail or be rejected or lose.

But you didn’t get what you wanted unless you went for it, whatever ‘it’ was.

“Spit it out,” Fox urged. “There are no wrong answers. You want marriage?”

“What?” My eyes almost fell out of my head. “No.”

“What then?” He withdrew slightly.

“I mean...” I set a placating hand on his chest. “Maybe. One day. I’m still sorting through my feelings on marriage. I was going into it for all the wrong reasons and it’s not something I see as a goal anymore.” I felt a little foolish that I ever did. “I was using marriage as something to give me independence. Because I saw it as the only way I could pry myself away from Mom and Pine Grove. No, I just think it would be nice if you and I could be together and see what we have.”

“That would be nice.” His gaze softened and he set a tender kiss on my mouth.

For a few seconds, as we held onto each other, all the shaking in me stopped. I hadn’t destroyed what we had. Fox and I were okay. In this moment, everything was okay.

And maybe this was as much security as anyone had—moments of believing everything would be fine, even if it wouldn’t. Even if you didn’t know the way out of the mess you were in.

“You’ll come to Australia?” he asked quietly. “We don’t have to stay there, but you have to get your things and I have to move out.” He sighed and stroked my hair. “We’ll have to find a place to stay. Get jobs that might suck. But let’s aim for spectacular and get there eventually.”

“I envy your confidence.”

“You doubt me? Us?” He frowned down at me.

“No?” My heart was pounding with equal parts excitement and overwhelm. “I don’t want to look too far into the future.” Monsters abided there. That was life. “Do you think we have it, though?” I asked cautiously. “Get-through-anything love?” Because this thing between us was very new and fragile and I didn’t want to delude myself again.

Fox sobered. Then snorted with self-deprecation. “I was a prick to ask Shane that, wasn’t I? But you don’t know until you’re tested and this has been a fucking week, Ash.” He wasn’t talkingabout the shortness of timeframe. He was referring to all the shit we’d been through since he landed.

“I definitely feel tested,” I said on a strangled laugh, splaying my hand on my side. “What I do know is, Shane and I wouldn’t have gotten as far as a wedding if you hadn’t been on the other side, picking up his slack. He and I definitely didn’t have it. But I’m right here with you now.” I stroked my hand across the contours of his waist and lower back. “Even though I’ve wanted to kill you more than once since you landed.”

He slid his around me again, but his expression was somber. “I do think we have it,” he said. I’m gutted about Shane and his parents and I’m not giving up hope there, but if I lose my share in the business and the house... I can weather that. I don’t want to loseyou.”

A fine tremble went through me, one that shifted tiny polarities in me to align with points inside him. It was recognition and connection and yes, a strange little bond that I suspected would only strengthen throughout our life together.

“That’s how I feel,” I said huskily. “I don’t care where I work or if we can only afford a crappy little flat as long as I’m coming home to you.”

“Babe.” His hazel eyes were shiny as he touched his mouth to mine.

My heart turned over.

“I mean it,” I murmured.

“I know you do. And I mean it when I tell you to expect more. It won’t be acrappyflat. Be greedy. We’re going to have it all.”

And if we didn’t, we would still have each other.

All the angst and worries churning inside me fell away. Beams of joy and gratitude and love glimmered through me, suffusing me with a radiance I could hardly contain.

We kissed again and it was better than all the ones that had come before. It was no longer stolen. This kiss was pure. Certain.It was given back and forth without reserve. Without guilt or hovering what-ifs.

It was the first of many deeply set stones that were the foundation of our future. The next was his lips pressing to the point of my shoulder. I closed my eyes and absorbed that beautiful imprint before I grazed my mouth against his Adam’s apple. He swallowed.

We pressed our cheeks and breathed in each other’s scent.

He said, “Every time I touch you, I wonder how I didn’t realize sooner...”

“I know. I keep thinking this is how it’s supposed to feel.” I smoothed my hand across the muscles of his chest. The feel of him caused sensations to swirl and swell within me. “When I touch you, I feel it inside me.”

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