“You’re sure?” she asked, clutching his shirt. “Absolutely sure?”
“I’ve never been surer of anything in my life.”
Looking reassured—if somewhat tentatively so—she let out a sigh. “It’s going to be hard to be away from you so long. But we’ll make sure we do this right. I don’t want you to ever have regrets.”
“No regrets,” he promised. “This is what I want.”
Her smile was bright enough to warm him through. “Me, too.”
After several more long, celebratory kisses, he drew back far enough to ask, “By the way...where’s our son?”
A breathy laugh escaped her. “He’s with Maddie.”
“He didn’t come with you?”
“They’re in a suite in Gull’s Nest Lodge. Maddie’s taking another long weekend. I told her she’d probably get fired, but she just shrugged and said she has a lot of sick leave and vacation time built up. I wouldn’t be surprised if she starts looking for work in South Carolina eventually. She’s pretty taken with your buddy Walt.”
“Wait—you’re saying Simon is here? At the resort?”
She laughed. “As if I could get him to stay behind. He wanted to find you the minute we arrived, but I convinced him to let me talk to you first. Maybe you’d like to walk back with me and tuck him in for the night.”
“I’d like that very much,” he said, his voice gruff with emotion again.
“I know you’re going to be busy, and we won’t get in your way. We can entertain ourselves, maybe have meals with you and see you when you get a few extra minutes to breathe. If I’m going through with the move to Seattle, I’ll have to go back soon to finish packing, but Simon will enjoy the chance to have a few more days with you here first. He’s going to be so excited to hear you’ll be joining us in Seattle—unless you’d rather wait and tell him later. You know, in case something changes.”
He could tell it was going to take some time before she was convinced he wouldn’t change his mind. He could be patient. “We’ll tell him now. I won’t disappoint him.”
She nodded bravely.
“There’s just one more thing.”
Swiping at the traces of tears on her cheeks with one hand, she asked shakily, “What?”
“I love you, JoJo.” The words sounded awkward coming from him. Rusty. He figured he’d get better at saying them with practice.
Joanna seemed to have no complaints. She nestled close and smiled up at him, fresh tears spilling from her eyes. Happy tears, he was relieved to note. “I love you, too, Adam.”
Would he get used to hearing the words eventually? Would he ever take them for granted? As he drew her into a kiss that echoed every promise he’d made to her, he knew without doubt that he would never tire of hearing Joanna tell him she loved him.
He hadn’t been looking for companionship when he’d come to this resort six years ago. He certainly hadn’t expected to find everything he’d ever wished for on a moon-washed beach. Because he’d been too mired in the past to expect a better future, he’d almost thrown it all away. Not once, but several times. He was the luckiest man on earth to have been given yet another chance at the family he’d thought he didn’t deserve.
He would never walk away again.
* * * * *