Page 65 of Because You Loved Me

“They’ll get over it.” She pressed her lips together in a perfectly lipsticked line. “So will everyone else. Because the only reason you should get married is because you are desperately, madly in love with your person.”

Something deep inside her sparked, and it had nothing to do with Ryan.

“What you don’t do,” Grandma Rose continued, “is get married for any other reason.” She looked Noa directly in the eyes. “And you definitely never get married for other people or to make them happy.”

She knew.

Noa shouldn’t be surprised. She’d always had a special connection with her grandmother.

“That’s not why…” She stopped herself before the lie slipped out. “I do love Ryan.”

“But you’re not in love with him.”

It wasn’t a question. Still, she shook her head.

“Ryan is a good man. He’s thoughtful and kind and…” She let her thoughts drift to Asher and the last few days. The way he’d been able to get her to open up and share things with him that she’d never dared speak aloud before. She let herself think about the passion he brought out in her. The way she felt when he was around. The way they laughed together. How he’d selflessly driven her to the lodge when she knew being there would be difficult for him.

She imagined how it would feel to let Asher drive away, back to his cabin in the woods, alone. What it might mean if she didn’t go with him, but stayed instead with her family to pick up where she’d left off in a life she could no longer imagine.

Her throat constricted and it was hard to swallow. Her fingers instinctively reached for the gold rose.

“Did I ever tell you that I married your grandfather two weeks after meeting him?”

“What?” Noa’s mouth hung open as she stared at the sweet, unassuming little old lady who was her grandmother. “I didn’t know that.”

Grandma Rose laughed a little. “It’s true. Much like you, Noa, I was engaged to another man. Unlike you, I thought he was the one.”

She gave Noa a look that confirmed what she’d suspected. Grandma Rose knew exactly why she’d agreed to marry Ryan.

“I didn’t have cold feet at all,” she continued. “Everything was planned for the fifth of May. It was to be a lovely garden wedding. But two weeks before the big day, Mother sent me to my father’s office with his lunch, and that’s where I met your grandfather. He was an intern at the law firm in the office, across the hall from my father’s.” Grandma Rose squeezed her eyes shut as she relived the memory. “It only took one look and I knew. There was a flutter in my stomach and the moment he introduced himself, my voice was stuck in my throat and I couldn’t manage to say my name.” Her eyes opened, a little glassy now with the memory.

“And that was that?”

Grandma Rose laughed. “Well, it wasn’t quite as simple as that. But I knew that day that I couldn’t marry George. He was a good man. Kind and thoughtful. He would have been an excellent provider and an excellent father. I would have had a good life with him. But it wouldn’t have been fair. Not to either of us. Because I had never, not even once, felt the way with him that I felt the very first time I met Frank. And I knew, even back then, that kind of magic doesn’t come along every day. And it can’t be ignored.”

“Wow.”

“Wow indeed. I broke his heart when I ended things that afternoon, but George went on to have exactly the life and love he deserved.”

“And you, Grandma?” Noa already knew the answer. She’d seen her grandparents’ love with her own eyes.

“Frank felt it, too. We spent the next two weeks courting, and it didn’t take long before I knew everything I needed to know. We were married on the fifth of May in that lovely garden ceremony.”

Noa pressed a hand to her chest.

“Sometimes, you have to take a chance, my dear. And it’s okay to be a little selfish. You only get one life. Live it well. And live it for yourself.”

Noa let her grandmother’s words sink in as she turned and scanned the busy hotel lobby. Movement by the oversized, wooden entry doors caught her attention. Noa watched as a bellboy opened the large door for a guest, and that’s when she saw him. Asher was outside, sitting on a bench in the cold.

“Grandma?” She turned. “About dinner…”

Grandma Rose smiled knowingly. “There’ll be more Christmas dinners, my dear. Follow your heart.”

She kissed her grandma on the cheek and gave her a tight hug. “I love you. Thank you.”

Noa didn’t look back as she crossed the floor of the lobby, headed straight for the door and the man sitting on the bench outside who made it hard for her to swallow.

Asher looked surprised to see her when he looked up.

---