Page 134 of At First Dance
Her gaze sharpens, then softens.
“Oh,” she says, gentle and almost reverent.
I smile sheepishly. “We haven’t told anyone yet.”
She sets the tray down on the table, wipes her palms on her apron, and wraps me in a hug so tight it knocks the breath out of me.
“You don’t have to tell anyone,” she murmurs into my hair. “You’ve already told each other.”
When she pulls back, her eyes are glassy, and Rowan’s are suspiciously shiny too.
“Mom,” he says, voice low.
“I know, baby. I’m just happy.” She presses a kiss to his cheek, then mine, and bustles off like nothing happened.
The rest of the night floats by in a blur of laughter and stories. Bailey finally lets Crew hand her a plate of cobbler, but vanishes before he can do more than blink. Holt challenges the kids to a watermelon-eating contest and ends up with juice in his scruffy beard. Someone starts a round of karaoke on the stage, and I hear a warbly version of “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” echoing through the trees.
Rowan doesn’t leave my side.
Every time someone pulls me into conversation, he’s there—hand brushing my back, fingers lacing through mine, and his mouth at my ear with whispered jokes that make me giggle like a teenager.
“You’re touching me a lot tonight,” I murmur as we drift away from the crowd again.
“Can’t help it,” he says, slipping his hand into my back pocket and tugging me close. “You’re mine now. Officially.”
“I was yours the second you showed me that cottage and gave me sweet tea in a Mason jar.”
He hums like that memory is sweeter than anything we’re drinking tonight.
“You were always mine,” he murmurs. “Even before I had the guts to believe it.”
The night stretches long and lazy, stars dancing above the park and the buzz of the party fading into a background hum. I know we’ll have to tell more people. Face more headlines. Maybe even deal with more of my past.
But tonight? Tonight, I’m just Ivy. Just his.
Back at the house, we settle on the swing. It’s quickly become one of my favorite places.
“I think we should tell people tomorrow,” I say eventually, curling my fingers around his. His mom and Bailey know, but everyone else seemed to be too oblivious to notice at the festival. Not that I could blame them, plus twirling the ring around so that the stone pressed against my palm helped.
“Tell them what?”
“That I’m engaged to a cowboy who doesn’t write flyers but makes the best damn sun tea I’ve ever had.”
He laughs, low and rough. “And who comes in his jeans on the porch swings?”
I gasp-laugh, swatting at him. “Stop!”
He catches my hand and kisses it.
“No one else gets to see this version of you,” he says. “The barefoot goddess who sings in barns and ruins me without trying.”
I kiss him again, long and deep. “Only you, Rowan. Always.”
The lights twinkle above us, the moon high, and somewhere in the distance, the first crackle of a fireworkbreaks through the stillness—Coral Bell Cove’s unofficial end-of-summer tradition.
I lean back in his arms, and for the first time, I don’t flinch at the sound. I don’t run. I don’t brace.
Because I’ve already found home.
