Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 98264 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 328(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98264 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 328(@300wpm)
It would have been wasteful, stupid, and flat-out disrespectful to the Lord.
And. I. Was. Stoked.
Nora shrugged and told me to follow my heart.
I bulldozed the house by the end of the week. It took six months to build our new four-bedroom, three-bath two-story, complete with wraparound porches on both levels and our very own hot tub out back. But when it was done, the awe on Nora’s face as she walked through the door for the first time made it the best money I’d ever spent.
“Whoa,” Thea breathed as Ramsey and I made it to the living room. “Is that thing going to fit in here?”
“It better,” I replied. “Otherwise, we’re laying it on its side and having a Christmas log this year.”
“It’ll fit. I measured,” Nora said, walking into the room, her hair a mess, flour covering her black-and-pink apron.
I cocked an eyebrow at her. “What happened to you? Did you lose another fight with the new mixer?”
“Ha. Ha. Ha,” she deadpanned. “And also yes. I knew I should have brought mine down with us. Next year, remind me.”
“Right. I’ll add it to next year’s mental packing list right now.” I smiled.
She stuck her tongue out at me. “Just put the tree in the corner, smartass.”
Nora and I still lived in New York most of the year. Much to my surprise, she loved the big-city life. Well, strike that—she loved visiting the city. We lived in a sleepy suburb of New Jersey where she taught at an elementary school not far from our house. I might have been biased, but I’d always thought the kids who ended up in Miss Stewart’s—eventually Mrs. Cole’s—class won the lottery of sorts.
Nora and I had taken our time building our relationship—a lot of time. As much as I would love to say it was all hearts and flowers, that would be a lie. Like most things in life, we were a constant work in progress—changing and evolving faster than the seasons. But through it all, we held on to each other, leaned on each other, and loved each other without condition or restraint.
Around the five-year mark, time sped up for us. People had been asking us for years when we were going to settle down and get married. We always laughed because we were as settled as two people could get. It was just without a ring on her finger, which somehow made it less permanent. We didn’t need a ring or a piece of paper though. Nora and I were happy.
Until Thea had a baby.
Joseph James Stewart changed our lives all over again.
With Ramsey and Thea living in Washington State, we didn’t get to see them as often as any of us would have liked, but for Joseph’s first Thanksgiving, the whole Stewart/Hull/Cole family flew out.
Watching Nora’s blinding smile as she smothered that baby in kisses breathed an urgency into my veins that was somehow as primal as it was romantic.
We’d talked about kids. We both wanted them. It just never seemed like the right time.
But hadn’t I been the one to once tell her that time was wasting?
We were lying in bed later that night when she announced, “I want a baby.”
“Oh, thank God,” I breathed, slapping a hand over my heart. “I’ve been sitting here for the last three hours trying to figure out how to ask you for a baby when I haven’t even proposed yet.”
She laughed. “You don’t have to propose. I locked you down years ago.”
Rolling onto my side, I brushed the hair off her face and asked, “Okay, but what if I want to get married? And not just because I want babies, but also because I want a baby and have loved you my entire life and, while our love has never been anything other than forever, maybe it’s time we let the world in on that?”
She leaned in and brushed her nose with mine, murmuring, “Then let’s get married.”
It wasn’t exactly a proposal, but it was us.
We went ring shopping as soon as we got home, where she picked out a modest diamond that made me roll my eyes. It was safe to say it was not the rock I slid onto her finger when I got down on one knee later that night after a candlelit dinner that, while cliché, also made her cry, so I took it as a win.
We might have dated for five years, but Nora and I went from zero to sixty in a matter of weeks after that. Not even a month later, we surprised the whole family with a beach wedding in Jamaica. It was something fun and different for us, even if Thea was pissed we hadn’t let her plan the trip. It also served as something Nora would later call a babymoon because Owen Ramsey Cole was born nine months later.