Arlo lay down beside her. She rolled on top of him automatically, planting her elbows either side of his head.
“Thank you,” she said. “For chasing after me and making me see reason.”
“Thank you for giving me another chance.”
She stroked his cheek. “I spent so long chasing a dream I couldn’t have. I forgot that sometimes dreams do come true.”
She’d come so close to giving up, to letting her pain twist her up until she couldn’t see how many wonderful things the universe had left in it.
Even if she would never have the home full of children she’d longed for…
A shadow of concern passed over Arlo’s face.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Just a thought.” Arlo pulled her down to kiss her. “About dreams.”
“A good thought?”
“I think so.” He rolled over until they were lying side by side and combed his fingers through her hair. “I have an idea…”
He whispered it to her and she covered her mouth, barely daring to believe what she’d just heard. “Really?”
“Really.”
“You think it’ll work?”
“If I know Hideaway Cove, it will.”
Jacqueline kissed him, joy singing in her veins.
Maybe dreams can come true, after all. All of them.
22
Arlo
Jacqueline woke up first; Arlo drifted into wakefulness with the same slight unease he always had waking up on solid land, and then heard her moving elsewhere in the house.
Something that sounded like china shattered, and Jacqueline’s laughter drove away any trace of landsickness.
Arlo sat up. The bed creaked.
“Arlo?” There was the sound of footsteps, and then Jacqueline poked her head around the door. “I was going to make pancakes but, er, it just occurred to me that I smashed my only mixing bowl last night…”
Arlo frowned, going over her parade of destruction. “The one with the ducklings on it?”
“Ugh, yes.” Jacqueline grinned and smoothed down her shirt. To Arlo’s slight disappointment, she was wearing far more clothes than she’d gone to sleep in. “So I thought we could pick up something on the way.”
Arlo’s wolf stirred. He jumped up, its excitement firing up his body. “Great idea.”
Harrison’s truck was a stick shift, and the road to Hideaway wound up, down and around so many bends that Arlo was almost mad with not touching Jacqueline before they were halfway there.
You just spent the night with her! he reminded himself, but it didn’t help.
He glanced sideways and caught Jacqueline looking at him. Her lips curved into a smile and she reached over to put a hand on his shoulder.
Arlo hadn’t realized he’d been tense, but that simple touch relaxed him better than a whole week at anchor in a sunny bay full of fish. He sighed.