Page 96 of One Bride for Three Single Dads

As we pack up the remaining stuff and get it into the back of the bus, a dark knot twists my stomach. I’m going to miss this place, I suddenly realize. I’m going to miss it a lot.

“Did you have a nice visit?” the driver asks me, the same stout woman wearing the same sweater.

“Yes, I really did,” I answer. “You have a lovely country.”

“Best in the world!” she answers loyally.

Even Harmony is a little bit fussy today. She knows things are changing again. Or maybe she sort of remembers the flight out here. But now it’s going to be different. I won’t have to do it by myself.

Amber is going to help.

“Just take it,” she tells Boone confidentially.

He grimaces at the hand she holds out to him.

“What’s it going to do?” he fusses.

“It’s going to make you think you’re the pilot,” she answers sarcastically.

“Seriously?” he asks with his eyebrows raised.

“No, you goober, it’s going to put you to sleep. Probably for the whole time. Now put it in your pocket and take it before we get on the jet.”

Reluctantly he agrees, and when she turns around she rolls her eyes at me in commiseration.

Girl, I feel you.

It isn’t the same pilot, I realize when the staircase drops down. I don’t know why I thought it would be. I imagine there are thousands and thousands of private pilots.

This is a woman, early forties, with a short blonde bob that curls under her ears and steely gray eyes. Her cheekbones are so sharp they could cut paper.

“Welcome,” she says in a clipped accent.

Norwegian? Something like that?

Who am I kidding… I did not suddenly become a world traveler. How would I know what Norwegian is?

The cabin is noisy with the air vents, and Cole begins to look nervous.

“Here is your sketchbook, buddy,” I tell him reassuringly as I pull the book from his special bag.

He takes it from me gratefully, and allows me to buckle him in to the chair. What a little trouper.

In almost no time at all we are back in the sky, shooting through the clouds, aimed like a dart toward the United States. Toward home.

Below us, I can barely make out the ocean. There, it is different again. Now it looks vast. Unknowable.

Ambrose comes and takes the seat next to me, settling into the leather cushions with a whoosh.

He reaches out and slides his hand under mine, holding it. I twined my fingers in his, then automatically pull back. Anyone could see us.

He won’t let go.

“No, let’s. This is nice,” he murmurs, drawing close.

Nervously I look over my shoulder. “But the kids…”

“Are asleep,” he finishes for me. “And besides, they’re going to have to start to get used to this, don’t you think?”

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