“Do you want to come inside for a sec?” she asked.
It seemed Amos was unable to say no. He followed her, removing his shoes in the foyer and going to the sink to pour them two glasses of water. Nina changed into a tank top and a pair of loose-fitting shorts and led them to the porch overlooking the ink-black Nantucket Sound. It was where their friendship had begun; it was where they’d shared truths and drawn their souls close. It was where she wanted to be.
That night, Amos told Nina how alone he’d been over the years.
“I never learned how to build anything with anyone,” he said. “I went on many dates, you know. I even went on practice dates with people I knew.”
Nina laughed gently. “Who did you practice date?”
“You remember Stacy from the diner?”
Nina smiled. “Your friend’s wife.”
“Yes. Isn’t that embarrassing? She told me I needed to figure out how to represent myself, so she had me get dressed up and take her out to a restaurant, where we had a painstaking conversation. I was hyperaware that she was judging me the entire time. And I knew she would go home and tell Calvin all about it.” Amos laughed at himself. “It was mortifying.”
“It was a kindness,” Nina said. “Maybe?”
“Totally! Stacy did it out of love. But it killed my confidence even more,” Amos said.
Nina sipped her water and studied his handsome face. It was hard for her to imagine that a hundred women, if not more, hadn’t fantasized about him taking them out. Probably he just hadn’t noticed them. His ego had probably been too bruised, and his heart was too heavy.
“Listen,” she said, her voice wavering. “I’m no expert on dating. I only ever really dated Daniel, and you saw how that wound up.”
Amos chuckled.
“But I would be happy to, um, go on a practice date with you?” Nina tried.
Amos tilted his head. Confusion marred his face.
“I mean,” Nina hurried to fix it, “I mean, a real date. Like I wouldn’t be grading you. I would be genuinely enjoying myself, probably. Because that’s what I always do when I’m around you. It’s weird. I’ve never felt this comfortable before.”
Amos’s eyes shone. He reached over to slip his fingers through hers. “Let me take you out,” he said. “Let me take you sailing. I’ll buy champagne and strawberries and chocolate, and we can go around the whole island and swim in the sea. When we’re done, we’ll get cleaned up and go out to dinner. Anywhere you want to go.”
Nina felt like she was floating.
“And let’s not talk about the Whitmores,” she added.
Amos touched her hair. “Is it smart for the assistant to date the detective?”
“It’s certainly interesting,” Nina said with a smile.
“But I have a hunch that you’ll be five steps ahead of me the whole way,” he said.
“Dating me isn’t a race,” Nina assured him. “It isn’t a game, either.”
Not like with Daniel—a race to tenure, a race to see who was smarter, a race to the end.
They shared their first kiss on the porch as the Nantucket moon shone down upon them. It was the most beautiful kiss of Nina’s life.
At thirty-eight, there was still so much more to come.
Nina met Amos at the dock four days later for their agreed upon sailing date. Charlotte had helped her pick out a brand-new white lace dress and a black swimsuit and forced her to pack fifty-proof sunscreen, saying, “When you get to be forty-five, you’ll thank me.” This tickled Nina. She couldn’t believe her older sister was still bossing her around. She couldn’t believe how much she was enjoying it.
“He’s a dream,” Charlotte had said of Amos. “I honestly already thought you were in love.”
“We sort of already are,” Nina said. “But it’s fast. Maybe it’s too fast.”
“What are the rules?” Charlotte asked. “Throw them out the window.”