Page 101 of A Quick Stop in Paradise

She always did just… take a look, decide right away what she wanted, dive right in. She and Allison were still only just getting to know each other. But what was stopping her from leaving later if it didn’t work? What was stopping her from doing what felt right now, and changing course later if she needed to?

What was stoppingme?

Oh, god, I wasn’t doing this. I wasn’t going to spend my time glazed over while working, thinking about Brooklyn every time my mind had a spare moment to wander, always wondering what life would look like if I’d tried. I wanted to see for myself.

I stood up on shaky footing, my pulse pounding, and my voice was wobbly as I said, “You can—go ahead and use the hotel room all you like, I’m—”

“Shut up and go,” she laughed, and I did. Barely managed to pull myself together enough to be seen in public, stumbling out the door, wondering what the hell I was doing and what had gotten into me—wondering what the hell I’d been doing that had convinced me not to do this earlier. I didn’t care. I ran, practically threw myself into the rental car, and I didn’t have one conscious thought on the whole drive over to Brooklyn’s house, pulling up to the courtyard next to her car where the palm trees rocked and rustled in the ocean wind.

I went fumbling out of the door with my heart in my mouth, down the path until I kicked off my loafers and stumbled across cool sand, the ocean breeze salty on my lips and the sand slipping between my toes. Ran through the milky white glow of lanterns along the old wood fence at the top of the beach strand, and I slowed to a stop in front of where Brooklyn Sterling was such a romantic sight, standing up from the weathered wood table by the rocks overlooking the water, cast in a pale moonlight glow as she turned to me with a gleam in her eyes.

She looked at me like we were the only two people in the world. At that moment, I thought maybe we were.

“Jet-setter like you must miss flights all the time,” she said playfully, and I felt my breath catch. I’d said goodbye to the sound of her voice once before, and I’d thought she’d said the last words that I’d ever hear in that voice. I wasn’t making it saying goodbye to that sound a second time.

“You could have texted,” I laughed, my voice thick, tears stinging my eyes. Crying over a girl. I guess I was back in high school. I didn’t mind. “What’s with the dramatic stunt?”

She smiled wider, stepping closer to me, and I felt my chest ache for her as she reached a hand out, caressing my cheek. “Calling me out for the dramatic stunt when you released a whole article gushing to the world about me…”

“I… I regret nothing,” I laughed thickly, going to wipe a tear away. Brooklyn got to it first, the touch of her thumb tender as she brushed it away. “I just… I couldn’t bear letting everything that we’d done… disappear. I wanted it to exist. Physically.”

She looked down, her expression strained. “Ryan… you know you’re too good to me. I’m just another random person on the trail of your adventures, going around the world, making it a better place. I’m just the bartender.”

Dammit.To think I’d almost left—almost left Brooklyn to keep telling herself that forever. To keep going on mentally consigning herself to irrelevance when she was such a powerful, beautiful person, a… a masterpiece of a human being. That was so damn corny of me. I didn’t even care anymore. I cupped my hands on her cheeks, the wind blowing her jacket against me, sand sweeping over my bare feet, as I took in every inch of her face that I could in the moonlight.

“You’re notjustanything, Brooklyn,” I whispered. “You’re the woman who would have lived forever in my memories if I’d left it at that. But I don’t… I don’t want to leave it at that. I like you. So much. I’ve loved every second we’ve gotten together. I’ve loved getting to know who you are. I’ve loved getting to know whoIam. I like the person I am when I’m with you, and I just… god, but you’re so beautiful.”

She laughed, a thick and wet sound, pursing her lips through a smile, clearly trying not to cry. Because she just wanted me to be the only one out here crying. Sure. The jerk. “Sorry for getting all your readers cheering for us to get together.”

I choked on a laugh. “They don’t know the half of it,” I said. “Also—when did you even sign up?”

“Sneakily, that time you went off to meet with your family… I went and stalked all your posts.”

“You were planning on just reading all my posts forever?”

“Wouldn’t you, if I had something like that?”

“Ugh. Yes.” I let out a soft sigh, squeezing my hand on her arm. “Brooklyn… I know this is a little wild. Maybe a lot. But I don’t want to say goodbye to this. To us. Can you… can we… can we make this work? I’m always traveling. It doesn’t matter where my home base of operations is. I’ll have to be away a lot of the time too, but there’s no reason this can’t be a place I keep coming back to—”

“Babe,” she laugh-whispered, stroking my cheek. “You don’t even have to ask. That spot you like on the terrace would always have been yours even if you never came back.”

My heart caught, a thick feeling in my throat, head spinning, just… disbelief. Amazement. “That’s so cute,” I laughed, and she looked past me, her gaze uncharacteristically shy.

“I’m not good at this whole, uh… you know…”

“Being serious.”

“This wholebeing seriousthing. Yeah.”

“None of us are good at anything until we do it.Being seriousdoesn’t have to look different. It can look like what we’ve been doing. Just… having a really, really good time together. And figuring out what comes next.”

She smiled sweetly, eyes crinkling, the first tears budding there in the corners. Because apparently she’d finally decided to join me in crying on the beach. Took her long enough. “Tell me you can still get a refund on that new flight you scheduled.”

“Still within the refund window, yeah,” I laughed, bubbling up uncontrollably. She rested her forehead on mine.

“Stay at my place tonight. There’s leftover pizza.”

“Pizza? That’s what we’re going with? You’ve upended my entire life in a week, changed my family, my relationship, the trajectory of my career and my future, and I’m putting everything on the line for more time with you, running into your arms, and you’re trying to lure me in withpizza?”

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