“Yeah, well, I’m afraid she’ll run me through the entire eighteenth century or something if I do tell her.”
I laughed. There were more ships coming and going that night than usual, I thought. I had been toying with taking a cruise as the way to leave if and when I had to. Out there, I could feel safer, I thought. Daddy had told me about cruises he had been on, the times he crossed on the Queen Mary, taking one of my sisters, but they did nothing unusual until after they had docked and walked in some European city.
“You’re quiet,” Liam said. “I hope you don’t mind what I just said about you.”
“Oh, no. Of course not.”
“Good, but I think you still need something to put a glow into that beautiful face, not that it doesn’t glow all the time.”
“Now, what do you have in mind, Liam Dolan?” I asked, turning to him.
He already had it out and in his open right palm. I looked at the small velvet box and felt an overwhelming chill at first, and then, as if some invisible large hand was around me, I felt the chill driven off and replaced with a warm excitement.
“Liam?”
“Go on. Open it,” he urged.
I plucked it timidly from his palm and opened it to see a very large diamond engagement ring.
“I thought it should be a good size, because my great-auntie Amelia once told me the larger the diamond, the shorter the period of the engagement. And I agree.”
I shook my head.
“Don’t say no, if that’s rolling around in your head. Take it and think about it. You don’t have to wear it. Just think about it. Please,” he begged.
“Liam, you know so little about me, really.”
“I know enough. What I want to do, Lorelei, is start your life from the day we set eyes on each other. Nothing else matters.”
How I wish that were true, I thought, but didn’t say. I just stared at the ring.
“I know I’m not making a mistake, Lorelei.”
“But it’s so quick. How can you be so sure?”
“I spend all my spare time thinking about you. I go to sleep with your face in my eyes, the scent of your hair in my nose, the softness of your lips on mine. How much surer can I be?”
I could feel my arm moving forward as if it had a mind of its own, pushing the ring back at him, but I took a deep breath and fought back.
“I’ll think about it,” I said.
“Good. I’m confident you’ll make the right decision.”
He leaned forward, and we kissed.
Then, without either of us speaking, he started the engine, and floating and drifting on our own sea of thoughts and feelings, we were silent all the way back.
17
I’m sure Liam was afraid that if he rushed me, I would turn him down. For days, it was as if he had never given me the ring. At night, I put it on my bed and sat with my legs folded beneath me, staring down at it, letting the diamond seize on the starlight to twinkle in my eyes.
Do I dare? Can I dare?
From the night I had fled until now, I was truly in a whirlwind. I read romantic novels and articles about love and relationships like any other young girl. I knew what it meant to have a rebound affair after a lost love, and I knew how easily anyone could warn me that I didn’t have the experience to fall in love so quickly a second time. Does having many past romances really equip you better to find your true love? Is it like trying on pairs of shoes until you find the most comfortable? And therefore, is it not true after all that there was someone special out there for you, whether you called him your soul mate or not?
Did I love Liam enough to want to spend my life with him? How much was enough? Except for when I was busy at work and the times I worried about being pursued, he was always on my mind. Recalling his smile comforted me whenever I was anxious about anything, and he had been so truthful and forthcoming about his own failures and weaknesses that I felt the sincerity two people had to feel in order to trust each other. Of course, there was a limit to what I could tell him now. Buddy didn’t believe me at first, and when he had found out that I was telling the truth, he said it didn’t matter, but I couldn’t help wondering if that would have been true the following day, the following month, even the following year. Would the tension and the fear eventually beat down whatever love and affection he had for me? Wasn’t it better to keep the truth from Liam somehow?
Could I?