They were quiet the rest of the way home and quickly absorbed into their usual routines when they got there. Paul took off to get in half a day at work, while Hope sent Daisy on her way and took over with Marion. Hope and Ethan weren’t at dinner, and he didn’t see her until nine o’clock that night when he took a beer out to the back porch and saw her coming out of the cabin.

“I was just coming to find you.” She came down the stairs from the cabin and crossed the yard, stopping just in front of where he was seated on the top step. “We’re still on the nine o’clock boat in the morning?”

“Yep. I talked to Joe earlier, and it’s all set.”

“Okay. I’ve got Ethan packed up to spend a few nights at your house with Jenny and Alex. It’s good of them to have him.”

“They don’t mind.” He looked up at her. “I called the place in Yarmouth. They only had one room available for the next two nights. I told them to hold it for us and I’d check with you about whether that’s okay.”

She crossed her arms into her favorite defensive pose. “It’s okay with me if it is with you.”

The words were strong and confident, but the waver in her voice gave away her true feelings.

Paul held out a hand to her. “Come sit for a minute.”

She took his hand and sat next to him on the step.

“We can go somewhere else if you’d be more comfortable with separate rooms.”

“I-I’m looking forward to the time alone with you,” she said. “It would be foolish to have separate rooms.”

“Before we go, there’s one thing we need to talk about.” Paul hated that he had to bring this up, but he had to know before he spent more time with her, before he fell deeper into whatever this was between them.

“What’s that?”

“What you said this morning to Jenny…”

“What did I say?” she asked, seeming genuinely baffled.

“About how you’d never get married again.”

“What about it?”

How to say this in a way that would make sense to both of them… “I’m thirty-four years old, Hope. At some point, I’d like to be married and have a family. I’ve done all the casual dating I want to do. If there’s absolutely no hope of ever getting there with you, I’d prefer to know that now rather than when it’s too late to turn back.”

“Oh.”

“Did you mean it?”

“Sort of.”

He wanted to ask her what that meant, but he waited, hoping she’d say more.