Page 96 of Coming Home to Sturcombe Bay
* * *
Cassie stared at him. “You’re wet.” Stupid, but it was the only thing she could think of to say.
“It’s raining.” He ran a hand back over his hair, sprinkling raindrops everywhere. “Don’t go.”
Her laughter was bitter, humourless. “You’ve left it a bit late. Couldn’t you have said this on Saturday night? Or even yesterday?”
“I should. I can’t give you any excuse. I was stupid.” He took three paces across the room towards her, but seemed to sense the invisible ‘don’t touch me’ forcefield she had spun around herself. “Ever since you came back . . . I’ve been an idiot. I was so sure you’d leave again that I was afraid to take the risk of asking you to stay. But I’m asking you now. Please don’t go. I know I’m not offering you anything more than I did before, and it wasn’t what you wanted then. But . . . Maybe . . . Might you change your mind?”
She sat down heavily on the bed. Even if she could have thought of something to say, she doubted it would get past the tension in her throat.
He knelt and took both her hands in his. “I loved you before, but we were not much more than kids then. I was hurt when you left, but I recovered. Now . . . I love you as a man loves a woman — truly and for ever. So I’m asking you to stay — I’m asking you to marry me. That’s all I have.”
Cassie didn’t realise that there were tears streaming down her face until they splashed on her hands. Her globe of the Earth was there on the table beside her, lighting up all those places she had dreamed of going, all those adventures. But she had done that now. It was time for a new adventure.
“Yes.” The word had slipped out before she had consciously realised she was going to say it. “Yes, I will.”
* * *
Cassie had had a dream, many times, that she was walking down the aisle of a church to her wedding, but the aisle kept getting longer and fading into a distant mist.
It wasn’t like that today. Cassie glanced up at her dad with a crooked smile. He returned the smile, his eyes warm, and patted her hand where it rested on his arm.
“Ready?”
She drew in a long, deep breath. “As I’ll ever be.”
She really was walking down the aisle. In a long white satin dress with a boat-shaped neckline and bracelet-length sleeves, and a skirt that flowed out into a short train, her hair coiled up on her head and laced with small white silk flowers.
The church was gaily decked out for Christmas, with the nativity scene she remembered from her childhood in its usual place on one side of the altar, a large Christmas tree on the other. The end of each pew was trimmed with a garland of holly, shiny scarlet baubles and a bow of scarlet ribbon.
The pews were fuller than she had anticipated, with family and friends of both her and Liam. They hadn’t wanted to separate them into his and hers, so everyone was jumbled together. Natalie’s mum and dad were there too, smiling bravely and dabbing away a tear.
And there at the front was Liam, turning to look back at her and holding out his hand. She put hers in it, feeling the reassuring squeeze of his fingers. As she drew level with him she managed a flicker of a smile.
“I can’t believe we’re going through this pantomime just to get married.”
He laughed softly. “I know. You’d have preferred to slip away to the Register Office and get married in jeans, wouldn’t you?”
“So would you.”
“Right.”
“Remind me again why we’re doing this?”
His eyes lit with amusement as he nodded his head slightly down towards the small blonde angel standing behind them in a pretty pink dress of crinkle chiffon, with a puffed-out skirt and a satin sash at her waist, and an expression of pure rapturous delight on her sweet face.
“Oh, yes.”
He lifted Cassie’s hand to his lips and placed a light kiss on her fingers. “Let’s do this.”
Eva stepped into her place in front of the altar. “Dear friends and family, we welcome you today to witness and celebrate the marriage of Cassandra and Liam.”
Yes, she really was doing this. Never mind all the fuss about flowers and dresses and getting her hair done — that was all just froth. She was marrying Liam Ellis, the love of her life — for better or worse, richer or poorer.
And as he slipped the slim gold ring on her finger, and she slipped a matching one on his — to rest beside the one Natalie had put there seven years ago — she felt as though they were exchanging pieces of their hearts.
The formal ceremony seemed to be over very quickly. Eva was pronouncing them husband and wife, and Liam was kissing her, and she felt as if she was dancing on air as they walked hand in hand back down the aisle and out to the churchyard, blinking in the cool December sunshine.
