Page 114 of Falling Overboard

It was just a simple necklace. Diamonds would have been my first choice but I knew she would prefer something simple. Again, I was left wanting to punch every dirtbag who had treated her so poorly before. She deserved the entire world. “I’m glad you like it.”

“I love it,” she whispered.

I wanted her to love me. To forgive me.

To give me a chance.

“Would it be too much for me to ask you to forgive me for this, too?”

I held my breath.

After a moment she reached over to put her hand on top of mine and I felt so much gratitude and relief that I wanted to burst.

I didn’t know what I would have done if she’d told me to stay away from her. I was so thankful for her capacity to love and forgive, for her kind and sweet heart. I hated that I’d hurt it.

“Is there anything else you need to confess first? Is this it? Or do you have a wife and child somewhere like François? Do you secretly kidnap puppies and hold them for ransom?” She said it lightly, but I heard the serious part behind it.

“This is everything. I swear it. There isn’t anything else I’m lying about.”

“Stop doing stuff you have to ask to be forgiven for,” she said sternly.

“I promise,” I said, raising her hand to my lips and kissing it softly. I would earn her trust back.

“Then we’re okay. I forgive you.”

I finally did what I’d been dying to do since we’d started talking. I pulled her into my arms and she immediately sank against me.

I promised myself that I would stop screwing up. I would do better. She was the best thing that had ever happened to me and I didn’t want to ruin it before we ever really started.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Lucky

Dinner that night was ... interesting, to say the least. The first problem was that I couldn’t find my phone. I checked my cabin thoroughly, but nothing.

The last place I remembered having it was in the primary cabin, when Georgia had texted me about Hunter’s break. I told him my fear that I’d left my phone in his parents’ room.

He said, “Do you want me to ask them if they’ve seen it?”

That was the last thing I wanted. I had no desire to come across as incompetent. Especially not to his family. “When they’re eating I’ll go down and look for it.”

I was still a little wrecked emotionally from my conversation with him. I did forgive him. I was touched by his thoughtfulness, the gift he’d given me. And it would have been silly to get so hung up over him hiding his name when he’d done so for a good reason—to keep his job.

Wasn’t that why I had been keeping him at bay? It would have made me a hypocrite to be furious with him.

I knew that he was a good man. He wasn’t like the others I had dated. This time was going to be different.

In five months. Which seemed so very far away.

When the Cartwrights were seated, I began pouring them some water and asking what they’d like to drink with dinner.

“Anything you have will be fine,” Susan said. “I want to hear about you, Lucky. Where are you from?”

Guests didn’t typically ask me questions about myself. “East Haven, Connecticut.” I refrained from adding “Why?” on to the end of my sentence. “How are you enjoying your yacht?”

“It’s always been Hank’s dream to own one,” she said, looking lovingly at her husband.

Her husband took her by the hand. “Although she is constantly reminding me that a boat is a hole in the water you throw money into.”

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