Chapter 7 - The Same Water, A Different Life
At seven that evening, I walked through the stone gate.
There were definitely three signs.
PRIVATE PROPERTY.
AUTHORIZED ACCESS ONLY.
MORETTI RESIDENCE.
I stopped.
Dante stood beside the spring wearing a black suit.
“Three signs,” he said.
“Shut up.”
He smiled.
Autumn had returned to Hollow Pine.
Exactly one year had passed since I'd fallen asleep in that water.
The shelter program had already helped sixty-three families.
My mother volunteered twice a week.
Marco pretended he hated organizing charity events.
Nobody believed him.
And Dante?
Dante was still feared.
Just differently.
People no longer lowered their voices because they thought he might destroy them.
Now men like Evan Mercer lowered their voices because they knew Dante had become something far more dangerous to them.
A powerful man willing to testify.
A powerful man willing to expose corruption.
A powerful man who no longer needed criminals to protect his empire.
Dante held out his hand.
“Come here.”
I walked toward him.
“Last year,” he said, “I found a stranger sleeping in my spring.”
“Trespassing.”
“Correct.”
“Apparently ignoring three signs.”
“Correct.”
“Are you going to mention that forever?”
“Yes.”
I rolled my eyes.
He smiled.
“Then I saw bruises.”
The humor disappeared.
“You asked one question.”
“Who did that to you?”
I nodded.
Dante took my hand.
“That question cost me a brother.”
My smile faded.
“Dante—”
“It cost me businesses. Money. Friends.”
“I know.”
“It nearly destroyed everything I'd built.”
He paused.
“And it gave me everything I should have been building instead.”
My eyes filled.
“You promised not to get dramatic.”
“I lied.”
“That explains the mafia career.”
He laughed.
Then he lowered himself onto one knee.
I covered my mouth.
“Claire Dawson.”
“Yes?”
“You are the most exhausting woman I've ever met.”
“That is a terrible opening.”
“You interrupt constantly.”
“Dante.”
“You challenge every decision I make.”
“Dante.”
“You stole my robe.”
“You gave me that robe!”
“And somehow, against every instinct I've spent forty years developing, I can't imagine one morning without you arguing with me.”
He opened the box.
The diamond caught the last orange light over the mountains.
“Marry me.”
I looked at him.
At the man who hadn't rescued me.
That mattered.
He'd simply stood beside me until I remembered I could rescue myself.
“Yes.”
Dante blinked.
“Yes?”
“Yes.”
He stood.
I threw my arms around him.
Somewhere behind the trees, someone cheered.
Dante froze.
I pulled away.
“Was that Marco?”
“No.”
“Dante.”
Marco stepped from behind a cedar tree holding champagne.
My mother followed him.
Then Trish.
Then half the resort staff.
I stared at Dante.
“You told everyone?”
“I was confident.”
“You arrogant—”
He kissed me before I finished.
Everyone laughed.
Later, after the champagne and photographs, after my mother cried and Marco gave a speech nobody asked for, Dante and I sat alone beside the spring.
I rested my head against his shoulder.
“Do you ever think about what would've happened if that gate had been closed?”
Dante considered it.
“You would've found another way.”
“To meet you?”
“No.”
He looked at me.
“To get out.”
I watched steam rise from the water.
For three years, I'd thought survival meant making myself smaller.
Speaking carefully.
Apologizing quickly.
Hiding bruises.
Protecting everyone except myself.
Then one exhausted afternoon, I'd walked through the wrong gate.
I'd fallen asleep where I wasn't supposed to be.
And I'd awakened to a stranger asking the question everyone else had been too polite, too uncomfortable, or too frightened to ask.
Who did that to you?
That question didn't save me.
It reminded me that I deserved an answer.
I looked at Dante.
“There's one problem.”
“What?”
“I still have your robe.”
He stared at me.
“You stole it.”
“You put it on me.”
“A technicality.”
“Do you want it back?”
Dante looked at the engagement ring on my hand.
Then he smiled.
“No.”
“Why?”
He wrapped an arm around me.
“Looks better on you.”
Above Hollow Pine, the last sunlight disappeared behind the mountains.
The water stayed warm.
May you like
And this time, I wasn't hiding.
I was home.
