“Look at you!” His mother’s excited voice greeted him as he hit the bottom of the steps after a run.

He had a new running prosthetic, something he’d never thought to look into until after his trip with Beth.

The thought of her sent a wash of sorrow through him, a physical ache that he felt to his marrow. He wasn’t sure why he’d been so surprised when he’d come home to find her packed and leaving. That was her M.O., but he’d had such high hopes for them, and the disappointment had been crushing.

“Feels good,” he said to his mom and she stepped back, letting him stand next to her on the porch. “Didn’t know if I’d ever get this far.”

“You amaze me every day. First your trip and how well you recovered. Then applying for the PA program. Now this!”

He chuckled at her excitement. His life finally felt like it was coming together after the loss of his leg. His road trip with Beth, aside from the disastrous ending, had cleared some things up for him.

There was no need to stop living his life; there were reasons to carry on. He’d known that deep down, but he hadn’t felt the joy of life in so long, he’d forgotten.

Beth had reminded him. So, he’d taken charge of his life. He’d applied for a Physician’s Assistant program and had been accepted. His recommendation letters from the navy helped, as well as his experience in the field. He wouldn’t start for a few months, but there were prospects on the horizon.

He’d gotten two new prosthetics, both meant for physical activity, so he could run and exercise, similar to how he used to. He’d made some adjustments to his workouts, but the end result was the same. He felt better about himself, more confident and strong, and he knew he was on the right track.

He hadn’t meant to stay with his mother for so long. The original plan had been to stay a few days and then drive back to Connecticut with Beth, but since she’d run out, he ended up staying.

He and his mom had spent some much-needed time together, relearning each other’s quirks and habits. It had been fun, but their time was up.

He was heading back to Connecticut to return Tucker’s car and then to Freehope for Jenna’s big softball tournament. He’d promised her he’d go and he refused to back out, even if it meant running into Beth. So far, he’d been lucky, avoiding whispers and talk of her like it was his job. Last he’d heard, she was working at some resort up there, waiting until the weather turned warm to teach surfing for the summer.

“Do you want to talk about her?” his mother asked, her hand soft on his shoulder.

Logan realized he’d been staring out off the porch into nothingness for a few minutes. His mother, God bless her, just let him.

He shook his head. “Nothing to talk about.”

His mom scoffed. “Nothing, my behind. Logan Beau Hallowell, don’t you lie to your own mother’s face. You’ve been pining for that woman since the second she walked out this door.”

“Ran,” he corrected. “Since the second she ran out this door.”

His mother shrugged. “I do believe I’ve told you that women are complicated creatures and Beth is no different. She had a sadness hanging on her, even when she smiled.”

He looked down at her, her wise eyes pinning him in place.

“I promised you I wouldn’t read her leaves or tarot cards, but I’m not blind.”

“Beth’s a runner, Mama. It’s just who she is. She’s got commitment issues and I don’t have time for that anymore. I’ve wasted more than a year chasing her around. There aren’t many more ways a woman can tell a man she isn’t interested, no matter how much he loves her.”

“Isn’t interested?” She laughed. “How did I raise a man that doesn’t know what love looks like when it’s staring him in the face? That scared look on her face is what someone looks like when they realize they’re in love, Logan. I don’t know why she ran off, but that girl loves you.”

He lowered himself to the porch swing, letting his mother get on next to him before he set it to rocking.

“Maybe love just isn’t enough, sometimes,” he told her. “Look at you and Daddy.”

He nearly winced at the offended look she sent him. “Your daddy didn’t love anyone but himself and the bottle. But he at least had the brains to come crawling back to me when he realized what a mistake he made crossing me. You’ve been hiding here for over a month, trying to pretend that woman doesn’t exist when we both know she’s the best thing that ever happened to you. I’ve cut you some slack so you can get back on your feet, but don’t you think now that you have, it’s time to go get your girl?”

“I just worry that we’re going to do this song and dance for the rest of our lives. How many times do I chase her down or watch as she leaves, Mama? That’s not what I want for my life.”

She leaned back, mollified for just a second while she thought about it.

“I know that love is patient and love is kind,” he said quietly, remembering everything his mama had ever taught him about love and finding the right woman. “And I do love Beth.” He let out a humorless laugh. “I love her so much, I don’t know if I can ever love anyone as much as I love her. But I want to spend my life loving someone, not wondering if they’re going to get up one day and be gone.”

Ellie was quiet for a few seconds. “Like Daddy?”

He shook his head, wanting to deny it. He wasn’t a therapist by any means but he didn’t think his issues stemmed from that event, but what did he know? Maybe they did.

Maybe, his fear of Beth abandoning him at every turn only enforced what he’d learned from his father. Someone else he’d put his love and trust into that hadn’t come through for him in the end.

“Love also doesn’t hold grudges, Logan. It doesn’t keep score. When you were falling down, who helped you back up?”

“Beth,” he admitted, savoring the memory of her striptease at his cousins’ house.

“Maybe she’s falling down and needs a hand. Who’s going to help her back up?”

“And if she doesn’t? If she ran because she just flat-out isn’t interested in having me in her life?” he countered.

“Then you know. Then you can go on with your life and know you did everything that you could. It’s got to be better than wondering.”

She wasn’t wrong, but the idea of Beth sending him packing shook him more than being hit by a roadside bomb had.

“I can’t,” he admitted, quietly ashamed. “I can’t go through it again. I can’t go after her again.”

“Why?” Ellie asked, curious. When he said nothing, she continued. “Honey, don’t tell me you think she ran because she didn’t love you enough or didn’t want to be with you. It was plain as day how she felt about you. Think about it.”

His mind jumped to their confessions at the Canyon and her cathartic scream.

Beth couldn’t have kids and something about those words stood between them. Since then, their relationship had shifted in a way that he thought brought them closer, but looking back had really pulled her away.

“She can’t have kids,” he told his mother, thinking about everything that had happened since then. Their trip to New Orleans and all the small things in between all lead him back to that moment. “She can’t have kids,” he repeated, dumbly.

“Oh shit,” she whispered, her hand covering her mouth.

“What?”

“That day, the one Beth left. I’d mentioned something about you making her a mother and giving me grandchildren. I didn’t know,” she explained as her voice climbed to a high pitch. “I had no idea. But she left right after we spoke. Logan, I’m afraid this is all my fault.”

He consoled her that it wasn’t her fault, because she had no idea what kind of land mine she’d been stepping on. He thought back to all the things he’d said to Beth in the past about wanting a family; hell, he’d even whispered words to her about seeing her barefoot and pregnant.

He imagined what that must have felt like for her, hearing those words and knowing she’d never be the woman to do it.

He wanted to compare it to the loss of his leg, but he’d been able to recover most of his lost activities with his prosthetics. A few months ago, he couldn’t run or jump, but now he could. It wasn’t hard to remember the fury he felt at not being able to do the things he wanted to do.

He wondered if Beth felt the same.

“I think I have to get going, Mama,” he said, hugging her. “It’ll take me a few days to get there, and I don’t want to miss Jenna’s softball game.”

She looked up at him, her familiar green eyes soft and wise.

“You listen to me, honey. Love may be patient and kind, and all those other things the Good Book says it is. But it’s also compromise. Love isn’t as strong as steel and it bends when you need it to; it flexes with you as you grow. It’s not one size fits all; not everyone needs the same thing. We have to learn when the people we love need our support and when they want to stand on their own accord. You give Beth her space if she needs it, but you make damn sure she knows that your love doesn’t depend on her uterus to make you happy.”

“Mama—”

“That must be a horrible feeling, Logan. To love someone and let them go because she doesn’t feel like she’s enough for you.”

God, when she put it like that it felt like a knife to the chest. Beth was more than enough for him. If she couldn’t have kids, they’d figure something else out. If she wanted to foster or adopt, he was in.

If she didn’t want kids, they’d start a damn dog rescue.

As long as he had her, and she wasn’t running, he wouldn’t ask for anything else. If what his mama was suggesting was really how Beth felt, then he felt terrible.

Is that what she’d been living with for the last year? Fear and doubt that she wasn’t enough for him?

He stood, ready to pack his things and get on the road, right away.

“Thank you,” he told her. “For always letting me come home and telling me like it is.”

“You’ll always have a home with me, Logan. Always.”

* * *

Had Logan known that his three cousins were going to pile into the car with him, he might have skipped the stop in Connecticut.

Cole and Tucker chatted amiably in the backseat while Elliot rode stoically next to him, a sign signaling their approach to Freehope just ahead.

“Who the hell would want to live in a town called Littlehope?” Elliot commented, noting the name of the small town next to Freehope.

“From what the Walkers say, it isn’t the nicest area,” he replied, thankful that Elliot had at least kept up the inane conversation during the drive.

He much preferred that to Cole and Tucker’s pestering about what had happened to Beth and where she was. He hated to admit that he might have let her get away, again.

“Well, that’s a no-brainer,” Cole interjected, taking him back to the conversation about Littlehope.

“Spencer said there’s a motorcycle gang there or something,” he told them. “The Scorpions if I remember correctly.”

“Holy shit,” Tucker said. “What the hell kind of place are we going to?”

“Freehope is no different than where you live,” Logan told them. “Nice little town with a lot of really nosy people.”

“I hate people,” Elliot said offhand.

“They generally don’t like you either,” Cole said with a smile and pat on his brother’s shoulder. “Isn’t that why you moved ten miles outside of town? So you don’t have to see all those pesky people?”

“Six miles,” Elliot corrected. “And I live on a lake. There’s people around all the time.”

“Just because you can see someone in the lake, doesn’t mean there are people around,” Tucker corrected. “They’re clear across the other side as you’ve got trespassing signs posted all over your property.”

They continued on with their banter while Logan drove. He kept one ear on them while they made their way into town, but was continually thinking about Beth. He was hoping she was going to be at this softball thing. Owen had told him she was going to be there, though Jenna was keeping tight-lipped about what her aunt had been up to. Even Owen was evading any outright questions about where Beth was or what she was doing. Finding out she was going to be at the softball thing had made going seem like a no-brainer.

He’d practiced all the things he was going to say to her, how he was going to finally just lay out how he felt about her and their future. She could take it or leave it, but he was going to do his best to get her to take it. God, did he want her to take it.

But like his mama said, if he didn’t try, then he’d never know.

Without much effort, he made his way to Andy and Owen’s home. It was the Walker’s childhood home, and Owen had bought it for Andy, wanting to raise their daughter in a place that held such sweet memories for them. Logan liked the Walkers and their appreciation for nostalgia. He supposed that’s why so many of them still lived in Freehope, not necessarily hanging onto the past, but adding their own touch to it.

He pulled into the driveway and noted Spencer’s truck as the only one that wasn’t usually parked at the house. He didn’t know if that meant Beth was around or not, but he filed the information away as they all piled out of Tucker’s car.

Owen materialized behind the front door and slapped the screen open, a smile on his face.

“You brought a cheering section,” he said, noting the Williams brothers filing up the porch behind him.

They all met and grasped hands, pulling each other in for one-armed hugs.

“Wouldn’t want Jenna to think I wasn’t in it a hundred percent,” he joked. “Besides, they’re hard to get rid of.”

Owen had met Logan’s cousins before, during a visit after his accident. He had to stop calling it that, he thought. It sounded so inane, but anything else sounded too dramatic. His cousins and Owen greeted each other, the rumble of their voices bringing Beth’s brother, Spencer, out onto the porch, as well.

Before long, all six of them were catching up, and Spencer was giving them the lowdown on the recent happenings in town.

“Then Ms. Ross lost it. Totally threw her groceries all over the ground and pummeled the poor guy with her cane,” he said, finishing his tale of how the town biddy exacted her revenge on her landscaper.

“She’s got a temper,” Owen put it. “She stomped my foot with her cane once, too and it hurt like hell.”

“It is just like Troy,” Elliot complained, referring to the town where he and his cousins lived. “It’s like Cheers, only worse.”

Owen shrugged. “I missed it when I wasn’t here. I didn’t think I would, but I did.”

“And where’s my star softball player?” Logan asked. “I was expecting a warmer welcome than just your ugly mug.”

Owen winced. “I don’t know if I’d expect too warm of a welcome, Doc. Some of the Walker female contingent is less than thrilled at the moment.”

Spencer scoffed. “Less than thrilled? That’s putting it mildly.”

“They’ve been warned to play nice,” Owen insisted.

Logan’s forehead crinkled. “They’re mad at me?”

Spencer shook his head. “Don’t rock the boat, man. There’s no talking them down from that ledge when they’re up there, holding hands and singing Kumbaya. Besides, they aren’t fighting with each other for once, so just let it lie for a minute or two. I’m in no rush to go back to playing referee.”

“What the hell did I do?” Logan asked, fists at his side. Sure, he was chasing after Beth and wanted to lay it all out there for her, but he hadn’t done anything to her.

Just then, Jenna came flying out the door, the screen creaking and slapping behind her. Her long, brown hair was in two braids, bouncing and waving behind her as she raced toward him. Without hesitating, he opened his arms and let her launch herself at him. He was thankful for his recent workouts, his leg strong underneath him as he caught her.

“There she is,” he crooned. He loved Jenna to pieces. She was the niece he’d never have and she’d adopted him as her own almost from the first. She sent him funny texts and kept him up to date with everything that was going on in Freehope, even when he or Owen dropped the ball on keeping in touch. The one thing she hadn’t told him was anything about Beth.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” she said, sliding down and letting him hold her at arm’s length.

She was wearing her uniform, a baby-blue top and black softball pants, black streaks under her eyes.

“Nice warpaint,” he commented.

“Mom did it,” she said, her braces winking at him in the sunlight as she smiled. “She says this is the only kind of makeup I can wear ’til I’m thirty.”

At the chuckle that went around the porch, Jenna eyed all the men. “Are you all coming to my game?” At their nod, she let out a little laugh. “They’ll talk about this for weeks.”

“Go get your stuff, honey.” Andy appeared at the door, Alex behind her.

They made a stunning sight as they joined the men on the porch, Jenna scampering off to get her things.

“Oh man,” Logan heard Cole whisper. “They look pissed.”

Did they ever. He’d seen Andy upset before, but not what he’d call angry. There was a fire to her blue eyes, so similar to Beth’s, but so different. He stood, rooted in place, waiting for her approach. Her twin Alex, or as Beth called her–Lexi, stalked up to him, just as her sister did.

Neither of them said a word, they just stared at him, sizing him up. Finally, without preamble, Alex reared her foot back and kicked him in the shin. She made sure to get his real leg and it smarted.

He hissed in a breath but didn’t argue. In fact, he liked that after all they’d been through, Alex and Beth were finally on the same team.

No matter what had transpired between he and Beth, she’d obviously turned to her sisters in her time of upheaval. He felt a sense of pride for her, that after all of her running, she’d finally run in the right direction when she’d needed help.

He wished like hell that she’d never run in the first place, but if she had to, he was glad she’d gone to them.

Family needed each other. His lips turned up at the thought of Beth calling on her sisters.

“You’re a moron,” Alexa ground out. “A grade A, first class idiot.”

“Ouch,” Tucker murmured behind him.

Andy nodded her head in agreement, arms crossed over her chest.

“I love her,” Logan said in answer.

Alex rolled her eyes but said nothing.

“I came here, hoping she would be here,” he continued. “One of these days, we’re going get it right.”

“She isn’t here,” Andy told him, dashing his hopes of a fast reconciliation. “She left this morning.”

“Because I was coming?” he asked the question even if he already knew the answer.

Andy surprised him then, asserting herself in a way she didn’t do very often.

“Everyone go get in a car and we’ll go to the game. Logan and I need a minute.”

“Andy,” Alex protested.

“You too,” Andy told her sister, similar in looks but so different in personality. Where Alex was brash and could be construed as angry, Andy was calmer, far more of a peacemaker than Alex. “I’ll be right there.” She looked to Owen. “Make sure Jenna’s got all her catcher’s gear. I don’t want one of us to have to run home in the middle of the game again to grab shin guards.” She looked at the Williams brothers. “It’s nice to meet you. We’ll be right along.”

Effectively dismissed, they went to the car, Tucker in the driver’s seat this time.

“It’s been a month and half,” Andy said plainly when they were alone.

“I’m a slow learner,” he shot back, leaning on the porch rail.

“I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt,” she said. “Because there was a time when I wasn’t ready to let Owen back in, but you were kind enough to take me aside and give me some words of wisdom. I know Beth is a tough nut to crack sometimes. She takes losses really hard, maybe even harder than the rest of us, and she holds them really close. It’s hard for her to let those things go, so instead of letting go, she takes what she knows and runs with them.”

He knew all of this, but he let her continue. Andy’s words made the love she had for her sister very clear and it made him happy to hear her protectiveness.

“Right now, she lost you.”

“She didn’t lose me,” he argued. “She left me. Again.”

“She lost you,” Andy spoke over him. “And she ran with her loss. I can tell you where she is and you can go running down to get her, but unless you’re willing to take her for who she is, there’s no point.”

“I’ve always taken her for who she is, Andy. I fell in love with her in less than twenty-four hours and I still feel the same way. Nothing has changed.”

“Everything has changed,” Andy pointed out. “This has been a heck of a year for both of you.” She made for the steps, telling him clearly that she was finished with the conversation. “I’ll give you the length of Jenna’s game to think about it. If you still want Beth, for exactly who she is and what she can or cannot give you in life, then we’ll talk about where she’s at.”

* * *

Three hours later, nothing had changed. If anything, Logan wanted to get to Beth more than ever.

He’d deduced from Andy’s words that Beth did indeed think he didn’t want a future with her because she couldn’t have his kids. And damn him, but he’d never done a thing to dissuade her of that notion after she’d told him the truth.

He felt like a grade A, first class idiot, just like Alex had accused him of being. The longer he thought about it, the worse he felt.

He’d watched the softball game, hoping for a distraction. Jenna was a natural athlete and played softball with the same skill and enthusiasm she did hockey. It was impressive to watch.

It also warmed his heart to see Owen on the sidelines, playing coach and dad all at the same time. The thought of the hardships Owen and Andy went through to get to this point made him hopeful for his own future. If two people who despised each other as much as Owen and Andy had could make it, he and Beth could make it too.

He was sure of it.

* * *

Again, he hadn’t intended for the trip to be a group adventure.

After the game, they’d all gone back to Owen and Andy’s, where they’d played host, grilling steaks and hosting a celebration dinner. Though he’d been itching to get to Beth, he’d also wanted to make sure that Jenna knew he was there for her and her needs, not just looking for her aunt. When Andy and Own opened their home to them overnight, they’d all graciously accepted and spent the night.

Elliot had complained mildly, but after a sullen game of darts with Charlie Walker, Beth’s father, he’d perked up and acquiesced.

When he’d woken the next morning, everyone had been ready for a road trip to Rhode Island. Even Jenna had a pair of sunglasses on top of her head, a backpack over her shoulder. No amount of arguing had worked, and he found himself following Owen and Andy’s car down the highway.

This was not how he’d envisioned things going, but the more he thought about it, the better it seemed. Maybe having a crowd on his side would help her see that he was there for her. Maybe she’d listen to him if they all told her to.

Doubtful, but he had his hopes.

They were in three cars, Spencer refusing to be a passenger to anyone else. Logan checked his rearview mirror, seeing Spencer and Elliot’s faces looking back at him, Alex’s shorter head in the middle between them.

Jenna sat in the backseat of Tucker’s car with Cole, reviewing some new app on her phone that everyone was using, while Tucker rode shotgun, Logan driving.

The ride had been nearly silent, everyone knowing what was on the line: his entire future, what he hoped would be with Beth, if he could just get her to listen.

“She’ll say yes,” Tucker interrupted his thoughts, saying aloud what they were all thinking.

“Yeah, she will,” Cole agreed.

“She told me that sometimes, if you love someone you have to let them go,” Jenna intoned, her words sounding far more like Beth’s than her own. Beth tended to tell Jenna things she might not say to anyone else, so Logan was inclined to listen. “She said she let Logan go because he deserved to have a happy life. That’s dumb if she loves him, I thought, but she just said it was complicated.”

“It is,” Tucker agreed.

Logan agreed that he deserved to have a happy life, but what Beth didn’t seem to understand was that he wouldn’t, couldn’t, have that without her.

“Sometimes,” he began. “We do really stupid things when we love someone else. Your aunt, she likes to run when she gets scared. Sometimes she runs far, like on a cruise ship. Sometimes, she just runs home, but she likes to run.”

“What do you do?” Jenna asked, no guile in her questioning tone, just honest curiosity.

“I do the same damn thing,” he admitted. “I used to ship overseas if I could, catch an assignment with a unit that needed a medic. Sometimes, I run to my cousins’ house and hide out, hoping the world forgets about me.”

“I could never forget about you,” Jenna told him with a small smile.

“What do you do when you’re scared?” he asked, his eyes meeting hers in the rearview mirror.

She shrugged. “Go to my mom.”

For her, it was as simple as that, but when he put that tiny piece into the great big puzzle of the Walker family, it brought him right back to Beth and why she ran.

The loss of her mother had literally, crushed her. She’d spent long years running, avoiding the loss, pretending she didn’t need somewhere to turn when she got scared.

He sat up straighter in the driver’s seat, pressing the gas.

He was about to show her exactly where she could turn when she needed to.

* * *

The Sunday brunch shift was generally busy but tended to drop off around lunchtime.

That’s why Beth was surprised when a table of ten showed up so late. Glad for the money a big table would bring, she turned the corner, menus in hand, and skidded to a stop.

They were all seated, waiting for her. Some of them wore smiles, some didn’t. It was hard to see any of them past Logan, who’d stood when she appeared.

He looked spectacular. Healthy and whole, he looked like he’d been taking care of himself. His blond hair was longer but kept neat, the beard on his face full and trimmed. His green eyes watched her carefully, the anger of their last goodbye somewhere far away and long behind them.

When he sent her a small, sexy smile, and she felt her lips turn up in reciprocation.

“Hey,” he said, his voice barely reaching where she stood, still halfway across the room.

“Hi.” She walked to their table, her eyes never leaving his.

How many times over the last six weeks had she wished him here with her? She’d taken up a job, gotten a temporary little apartment, but was just going through the motions of living.

She wanted Logan and no amount of martyrdom could cure her second thoughts. She wanted him to have kids and the family he deserved, but she could not let go of hating the idea that he’d do it with someone else. She wanted to be his and she wanted that life with him.

She just hadn’t figured out a way to tell him, worried that it was too late and she’d missed her shot.

The look in his eye gave her hope that maybe, just maybe, she hadn’t.

“What are you all doing here?” She laughed as she handed out menus.

What a trip it was seeing her family and Logan’s at the same table, enjoying a meal. She could feel his eyes on her as she listened to Jenna tell a story about her softball game.

“Sorry I missed it, squirt. I’ll make the next one,” Beth said when she was done.

“There’s always swim meets this summer,” Jenna told her casually as Andy and Owen seemed to steel themselves for the long summer ahead.

“Sounds like a plan,” Beth agreed.

“Come sit,” Logan said, pulling out the chair next to his. “Take a minute.”

“I can’t,” she told him, checking her watch. “I’ve still got another hour on my shift.”

“I’ll take the table,” one of the other waitresses, Amanda, cut in front the waitress station. “It’s not busy and I don’t mind.”

Beth looked from Logan and then back to Amanda. “Really?”

Amanda smiled as she approached, holding a hand out for Beth’s pad of tickets. “Not a problem.”

Without hesitation, Logan put a hand around her elbow and gave it a small squeeze.

“Can I talk to you outside for a minute?”

She nodded, knowing they had things to talk about. The feeling of just seeing him again made her heart soar. She loved this man; every piece of him in any shape they came, she loved him.

She was not going to let him go until he heard what she had to say.

Logan led her out the back door which dumped them directly onto the beach. It made for a beautiful backdrop, and Beth liked the hotel she’d been working at. During high season, it was a luxurious resort that hosted celebrity guests looking for a relatively unknown oasis and weddings on the beach.

She liked low season though, and found something beautiful in the vastness of the beach without people on it.

They trudged through the sand until he stopped at the water’s edge and turned to her.

“You look great,” she told him before he could say a word. “Healthy,” she amended. “Strong.”

“Not strong enough to keep you with me,” he replied, his head titling in her direction.

“Awfully tough to catch me,” Beth joked, the words falling flat between them.

“So far,” he argued. “I’d like to change that, if you’d let me.”

She shook her head, even knowing that he was exactly what she wanted for her future. Before she could argue, he continued.

“It occurred to me, that there are things between you and me that went unsaid. Big things,” he elaborated as he stepped directly in front of her. “Things that we both need to hear. I want to say them now.” His hands held her cheeks, thumbs caressing her face as he spoke. “I love you, Beth. I love everything about you. Even the things I hate, I love because they’re part of you.”

“Logan,” she whispered, her eyes prickling at the corners as he pinned her with his stare.

“I don’t need anything else in this world but you. You, not being able to have children, doesn’t make me want to wake up beside you any less. It doesn’t make me want to hold you during the night any less, and it sure as hell doesn’t make me love you any less.”

“I want that for you though, Logan. I know how important that is to you.”

He shook his head. “It’s not as important as you. What am I going to do, raise kids on my own without you? Have kids with someone I’ll never love because the only woman I’ll ever love won’t have me?”

“I’d always have you, Logan. I love you, too, but I can’t give you what you need.”

“Yes, you can,” he argued. “I just need you. We can figure the rest out later. You have to know, I have to say the words so we’re on the same page. You and I have a habit of letting things go unspoken and I need you to hear me. I love you, Beth Hollis Walker.”

“Bethany,” she corrected on a whisper.

Logan let out a laugh. “See. There’s still so much I need to learn about you. I love you Bethany Hollis Walker. I have since the minute I laid eyes on you. If you never want kids, I will love you with everything that I have, until my dying breath, no regrets.”

“It’s not that I don’t want kids, Logan,” she explained, desperate for him to understand. “The idea of getting to build a family with you is more than I could ever hope for. That’s not why I did what I did.”

“Then why?” he asked quietly, his big palms stroking her shoulders.

“I tested positive for the mutated gene that means my mother’s cancer was hereditary. I didn’t want to die the way she did so I figured I’d cut it off at the pass. I had the hysterectomy and it cut my chances down; I just didn’t think far enough ahead to know how this was all going to turn out.”

“How could you know?” he asked, his eyes soft as he listened and maybe, finally understood why she’d been running for so long. “Sugar, I’m telling you right now, I’d rather have you than anything else. If you not being able to have kids means I get to keep you forever, then that’s what I want.”

Beth felt the fist that had been squeezing her heart for the last month and a half let go, her hot blood filling her veins again. The rush was heady and she leaned into him.

“I love you,” she said, her hands snaking around his waist and holding him tight.

“Please don’t leave me again. Please.”

She grabbed his face and pulled him in for a kiss. “I didn’t want to,” she explained. “I just wanted you to have a chance at the future you envisioned. I didn’t want you stuck with me.”

“I can’t envision a future for myself without you in it, Sugar.”

“I was going to come for you,” Beth said, her fingers running through his beard as he held her in his arms. “I was going to fly down to your mom’s and throw myself at your feet and beg forgiveness.”

There was an empathy in his gaze, and she knew he’d been going through the same torture she had, that the last six weeks were as painful for him as it had been for her.

“No need,” he whispered, the whiskers of his beard soft and ticklish against her chin as he kissed her.

The sound of slow clapping made them both look. Their families, Andy, Owen and Jenna, Spencer and Alex, Elliot, Tucker and Cole Williams, all stood on the sand, clapping. The cheers got louder, Alex whooping and even Elliot adding a loud whistle to the mix.

Beth felt a little silly for the attention, but when she turned back to Logan, he was flushed with happiness.

They deserved the round of applause for all they’d been through. Beth grabbed Logan’s hand, lifting it between them, and took a bow. Good sport that he was, Logan obliged and joined her.

There were hugs and hearty back slaps all around. Beth supposed they all earned it too, having been a part of her and Logan’s love story in one way or another.

Beth held her arms open and brought Alex in for a hug, not letting go quickly and squeezing her sister tight. “I love you, you know,” she choked out. “Even if you’re an asshole.”

“I love you, too,” Alex said, her voice strained in Beth’s ear. “Even if you’re a bitchy brat.”

“Language,” Andy cried, tears in her eyes and wrapping them both in her arms, creating a ball of Walker sisters wrapped up in each other.

“Mom’s a stickler for language,” Jenna piped in. “She told me Aunt Alex must’ve eaten an entire bar of soap when she was ten.”

They all laughed.

“Some things never change,” Alex added, breaking the huddle and holding Beth by her shoulders. “You don’t forget my offer, brat. I said it and I meant it. The offer stands for as long as you need.”

Beth softened. Alex, who had been one of her harshest critics in the past, was now one of her closest allies.

“I won’t,” she promised on a whisper.

Big arms wrapped around her waist from behind, and she reveled in the feel of Logan so close. She’d missed him.

“What’s this offer that has you both so weepy?”

She turned in his arms, wrapping herself around him.

“I’ll tell you later,” she said.

“Yeah?”

“After.”

His brows arched up as Beth watched their families turn and head back to the restaurant, leaving them alone.

“After what?” he asked.

She bet he had a pretty good idea, but she’d play along.

“After I get you alone and show you how much I missed you.”

“When do I get to show you how much I missed you?”

“We can take turns,” she whispered, reaching up on her toes and holding her lips a breath away from his. “I’ll go first.”