“Wow. He’s Mr. Romance lately. So why didn’t you eat lunch then? Too much romance going on?” Emma said, winking.

“No. A tourist came running through saying that her dog was missing, so I felt like we needed to spend the time to help her. Ended up barely making it back in time to teach my class and only having a few bites of food for lunch.”

“I imagine William was not happy about that?”

“You imagine right. I got the feeling that he might be popping the question again. But I could be totally wrong and overthinking this. Maybe he’s just trying to do something romantic, but he’s not actually going to ask me.”

“Have you ever thought about flipping the tables and asking him instead?”

Janine pondered that for a moment. “I’ve thought about it, but I guess I’m too traditionally southern. I just feel like the man should ask.”

“I have to agree with you there. Some things are just set in stone for me.”

“Listen, I didn’t actually come here to talk to you about William and me.”

Emma finished doling the spaghetti out onto plates and put them into the microwave to heat up. Then, she popped the garlic bread into the toaster.

“Oh yeah? What’s up?”

“I don’t know how to say this exactly… I’ve been trying to figure it out the whole time I was waiting for you to come out of the lighthouse.”

“Now you’re starting to scare me a little bit.”

“Emma, I know.”

“You know what?”

“I know what happened.”

“Janine, you’re gonna have to be a little more specific. You know what happened? What does that mean?”

Janine blew out a long breath. “I know that you were a police officer and that you were in an officer involved shooting.”

Emma was holding the dirty serving spoon in her hand, covered with tomato sauce. She immediately dropped it, causing a loud clanging sound on the tile floor in the kitchen. It felt like all of the blood had drained from her face, and there was a really distinct possibility that she might just pass out. She had only done that once in her life, so she knew exactly what it felt like. So she braced herself against the counter, her hands gripping the granite. She could see the blood leaving her fingers as they looked white from holding onto the countertop so hard.

“Are you okay?” Janine said, immediately realizing something was wrong. She jumped up and put her arm around Emma’s waist. “Why don’t we sit down?”

They walked over to the dining table and Emma slowly slid down into one of the chairs. She had figured at some point someone would know who she was, but this wasn’t the reaction she expected from herself. She had been in so many adrenaline inducing situations in her career that she should’ve been able to handle any kind of stress, but right now she felt like she could be knocked over with a feather.