Page 175 of 10 Rings I Hate About You
Just as clearly as though my aunt was speaking to me, I heard her whisper, “Yes.” And an image of her blowing me kisses, standing in front of Sacred Serenity, formed in my mind’s eye. Pure joy filled my body, along with this sense of knowing, that without a doubt she was thrilled with the decision.
As I examined the “yes,”I realized it felt like a hug from Aunt Jem, and a sense of rightness settled within my bones.
“You’re right,” I said. “She would. I’m going to call Aunt Jem’s lawyer, Mr. Harris, this week. Get the papers drawn up.”
Marc kissed the top of my head. “Good.”
I don’t know when I fell asleep. One minute, I was watching Chaos’s rib cage rise and fall with the slow rhythm of an animal asleep, and then it was dark and Marc’s voice was echoing somewhere close.
“Hey.” His hand was warm on my shoulder. “Delaney.”
I surfaced slowly. My neck had an opinion about the angle I’d been sleeping at. Marc was sitting next to me, hair a disaster, eyes tired, and Chaos was asleep in his crate.
“Hey, babe,” he said. “Let’s get you to bed for a little bit.”
“Is he okay?” I asked, still half asleep.
“Seems fine. I’ll check on him again in an hour.” He helped me up, and I let him, leaning into his side as we made our way out of the room and down the hall. The light through the nearby window filled the house with that particular gray-pink early light that made everything look slightly unreal. I was still mostly asleep, operating on autopilot, when my foot tripped over the hallway rug.
I looked down and had to blink a few times because there was no way what I was seeing was real.
There, wedged on the edge of the rug, partially caught in the weave, was a small glint of gold. Possibly a band catching the faintest ray of light from the nearby sconce, it glinted like it was waiting for us.
“Marc,” I whispered.
He crouched down and then looked up at me.
“Is that—” I started.
“Don’t move,” he said, already reaching for it.
He grabbed it and held his palm up for me to see, a satisfied look settling on his face.
A stunning diamond surrounded by pink sapphires lay there, and for the first time tonight, I was able to breathe a sigh of relief.
Thirty-Two
MARC
I’d helped build things before. The farmhouse, mostly—the walls, the floor, and the kitchen I’d redesigned three times before I got it right, each version slightly better than the last. I understood the satisfaction of standing in front of something finished and knowing your hands had been part of making it.
This was different, but the same feeling lived inside it.
We’d pulled the Ruby River Animal Shelter, “Fur a Good Paws Fair,” together in only eight days, and I hoped it was enough to get the attention of the grant committee.
The Ruby River Commons had been transformed practically overnight—not by just me or my family—but by the town. By the collective energy of a community that had decided the animal shelter mattered. They’d shown up with tables, string lights, extension cords, opinions about where the band should be set up, and whether the animals’ pens needed more shade. The answer to the shade question was “yes,”and it was already being handled.
Grace created a marketing plan. Glamma called in favors. My parents and Ellie contracted local vendors to sell, and most were donating a portion of their sales. My brothers handled permits, music, raffle donations, and probably a whole host of things I was forgetting. Delaney had made calls this week and helped set up the space for today. Ruby River had done the rest, the way it always did when one of its own needed it. It was done cheerfully—for the most part—and with fifty percent more opinions than were necessary.
I stood at the edge of the Commons at eight in the morning, watching the fair come together and felt something I didn’t have an immediate word for. Not relief—the grant call hadn’t happened yet, and it might not have the positive outcome we needed. Yet I was feeling better about the entire situation either way. It wasn’t pride exactly, although that was there. It was joy and happiness. And oddly, enough evidence. Evidence that everything that I’d been fighting for was going to happen.
That it had always been the future, waiting to happen. That Theo’s five years of relentless work, my name on a grant application that had made it further than any of the others we applied for, and a yoga class of animals with no concept of professional composure had been, all along, pointing toward this exact moment.
Delaney appeared at my elbow with two coffees and the keyed-up energy of someone who had been awake since five a.m. She handed me mine without looking at me, already tracking three things simultaneously—the vendor set up on the left, an animal pen situation on the right, and whatever Grace was doing with the sound system that had just produced a God-awful sound that required investigation.
“How do you think it’s looking?” she asked.
I slipped my arm around her waist. “Like something great we built together.”
