While Keaton put on a show for the adults, running from one end of the terrace to the other with the cats and Cody giving chase, Silas wandered over to the fountain. Maggie felt herself drawn to him. She intertwined her fingers through his and squeezed, hoping she hadn’t ruined this. Not with everything that she’d realized today.

He returned the squeeze and brought her knuckles to his mouth.

She loved him. Fiercely. And that scared the hell out of her. She thought there wasn’t anything worse until the sun set. Then Silas said his goodbyes, collected his dog, and drove home.

“Where’s Sy going?” Dayana asked, approaching her with a glass of wine in one hand and a Popsicle wrapper in the other.

“He’s giving me some space,” Maggie said evenly.

Dayana shot her a “have you lost your damn mind?” look. “Did you ask for space?”

Maggie shook her head. “He saw me looking at property listings and an offer from a network.”

“You’re leaving?” Dayana asked, dark eyebrows skyrocketing.

“I don’t know,” she said honestly. “I always leave. I always move on to the next thing. This is the first time I’ve even thought about a ‘what if I stay.’ But I don’t make decisions like he does. He jumps. I weigh options, outcomes, consequences.” She paced the tile she’d spent hours researching.

“Because you want it to be right.”

“Yes! Exactly! He can’t just demand that I commit to him on the spot. He can’t possibly understand the consequences of a decision like that,” she complained. “He acts like it’s easy to just go for it. But he’s not even considering how resentful he might get if he comes with me or how resentful I might get if I decide to stay.”

“Hold it. This sounds vaguely familiar,” Dean mused, joining them near the fountain. Cody followed him.

“It should. You resent choosing me over Will. I shouldn’t have made you feel like it was your job to keep me happy or make things up to me. And you,” she said, pointing at Cody. “You say you want to come on the road with me. But you’re eighteen years old. Do you even know what that entails? How do you know you really want to or that you won’t change your mind six months into it? What if you get homesick for Kinship?”

“Uh, then I come back?” Cody said, looking at her like the answer was obvious.

“Most decisions can be undone. Minds can change,” Dayana pointed out.

“Are you going to change your mind and go back to Donald? You came here to get away from it all. What will you do if I put up a FOR SALE sign and decide I’m going to rehab a house in Arizona or Kansas?”