Lily didn’t remember how she’d answered her mother that day, but looking back, she didn’t think she’d ever liked Wyatt, with his ego and his manipulation. She’d loved him, but she had doubts that she was ever in love with him. She was in love with Mack, and even better, she really, really liked him.

“I’d ask you to move in with me”—he chuckled—“but you kind of already have, and besides, it wouldn’t be a good example for the children for us to sleep together with them in the house. So what are we going to do about us?”

“I guess we’ll take one day at a time and do the best we can with whatever life throws at us. I’m glad you’re here with me to help me with whatever that might be,” she answered.

“I want so much more than just friendship or even this relationship we’re in right now,” he said.

“So do I,” she admitted.

A soft southern breeze blew her blonde hair across her face. Mack reached over and tucked it back behind her ear and then kissed her on the cheek. “I’ll leave the timing to you, but I do want you to know that I’m ready when you are.”

“Mack, are you proposing to me?”

“Not in a cemetery.” He shook his head. “Although I like to think that maybe your mother wouldn’t mind, since she’s right here with us. I’d rather my proposal be a little more romantic, though. Maybe this is just a commitment toward that end, if you’d be willing for that much.”

“I’m willing.” She laid a hand on her parents’ tombstone. Her mother’s name was on one side, her father’s on the other. Their marriage date was engraved below a set of entwined wedding bands. There it was right there—dates of birth, dates of their deaths, and the most important thing to Lily that day, a symbol of their commitment to each other. That’s what she wanted when she was finished with this life and Holly took over the family journal. She had been born. She had died. But the most important thing in her life, other than her children, would be when she became Mrs. Mack Cooper.

“Ready?” Mack asked.