‘We… I thought you might not,’ he confessed. ‘I wasn’t sure there was enough here for you, not when it would be so much easier to go elsewhere.’

Anna looked around. ‘You’re right,’ she admitted. ‘Taking Taymar’s offer would be easier.’

He took another step closer. ‘Then why stay?’

Anna was aware she was looking anywhere but his face. She took a deep breath, and then looked up at him.

‘This is home,’ she said simply. ‘And I don’t want to be anywhere else. And there are things here… people… I can’t imagine ever being able to leave without leaving a part of myself behind, too.’

He smiled, and Anna thought, not for the first time, that she could spend a lot of time watching him do that. Robert moved closer still, until they were almost toe-to-toe. He hesitated for a moment and then reached out to take her hand. He rubbed his thumb across her palm, his eyes downcast to her fingers. Anna’s heart was out of control. She wondered what he was waiting for, whether he needed her to be the one to make the first move, and then worried that he wasn’t on the same page at all, that this was nothing more than another show of friendship, of the kind Auld Robbie MacKenzie had been offering her so steadfastly since before she had even moved into the Fishergirl’s Luck.

‘I—’ she said, desperate to break the tension. ‘Oh!’

The sensation took her utterly by surprise. Something fluttering in her belly.

‘What?’ Robbie asked. ‘What is it?’

‘I think—’ There it was again. The faintest tickle, a curl of bubbles unfurling. ‘I think I felt the baby!’

Anna moved his hand to her stomach, pressing it to her. They stood silent, for another moment, and then—

‘There! You feel it?’

‘Yes!’

‘God, that’s weird,’ Anna laughed, her hand still over his. ‘Poor thing must be protesting at my heart rate.’

His laugh resolved into a smile and a raised eyebrow. His hand was still on her belly. He moved it, sliding it around Anna’s waist and pulling her closer, until she was pressed against him. ‘Your heart rate?’ he said. ‘Why, what’s wrong with it?’

She couldn’t breathe. He was warm and so very close. ‘Oh,’ she managed. ‘A bit fast, maybe.’

He grinned. ‘Really? Why?’

Anna shook her head. ‘No idea.’

He dipped his head. ‘None?’

‘None at a—’

The rest of the word was lost against his lips. They moved over hers, gentle and soft, and to Anna it felt both like home and like nothing she’d ever felt before.

Later, they left the Fishergirl’s Luck and walked hand in hand to stand outside the Inn.

‘Do you think we can do it?’ Anna asked, looking up at the peeling paint, the faded sign.