“Alex refused to let him do it,” Renee said. “But Gerald can be just as stubborn as these Holmes men, so don’t be surprised if you have a reimbursement from the cruise company on your credit card statement.”
If he did, Indina would give the money right back to Gerald.
A thought occurred to her. Maybe she would get his permission to put it toward whatever she and her brothers finally decided to create to honor their mother’s memory. They were still debating whether they should institute a scholarship fund, or some other kind of education-centered program. All they knew was that Diane Holmes’s legacy needed to live on. They would need to settle on the details as soon as they returned home. Her mother’s birthday was in a couple of months and Indina wanted everything in place by then.
She looked over at Willow after it occurred to her that the last couple of emails she’d sent her regarding the memorial had gone unanswered. That should have been Indina’s first clue that something weird was going on with her sister-in-law.
“You sure you don’t want to get in, Willow?” Indina asked. She’d taken the deck chair next to Sienna, who couldn’t get in the hot tub because of her pregnancy. “It’s pretty nice in here.”
Willow gave her a small smile and shook her head. “This is just fine.”
The smile was encouraging, but Indina would have felt better if it had reached her sister-in-law’s eyes. She wasn’t sure what to make of Willow’s subdued demeanor. Not that she had ever been outspoken. Her brother’s petite wife had a calmness about her that Indina admired. But she could speak her mind when the situation warranted, which was one of the reasons she and Indina got along so well.
But something was off. The Willow she’d encountered on this cruise ship was not the woman she’d come to know over the past seventeen years.
“Oh, did I tell you all about my anniversary present from Alex?” Renee asked, grabbing everyone’s attention. She beamed with excitement as she described how Alex had presented her with a surprise trip to the Blue Ridge Mountains, where the couple had been married four years ago. Indina had missed the wedding, yet another regret.
“He wanted to rent the cabin where we were married, but I told him that was way too big for just the two of us.”
“Hey, Eli and I would be happy to come along,” Monica said. “I would love to go back to that house.”
“I think we should all go back to the house where you and Eli got married in the Virgin Islands,” Sienna said. “Tell Alex to switch.”
“Thanks, but no.” Renee laughed. “This time it will be just me and my hubby. It’s been ages since we’ve had quiet time together.” She looked over at Sienna. “But we’re both afraid we’ll miss the new baby’s birth.”
Sienna waved off her concern. “It’s not as if this is the first one. Little Jonah will be waiting for y’all when y’all get back.”
“I thought you all weren’t finding out the baby’s sex!” Monica quickly pounced on her.
“We haven’t. I just have a feeling that it’s a boy,” Sienna said.
“You’ve decided on Jonah for a name? I like that,” Indina said.
“Zenobia picked it. Her Grandma Margo has been reading her stories from the bible, and Jonah and the Whale is her favorite so far.”
Indina laughed as they all chimed in on potential names, just in case Sienna’s hunch was wrong and she had a girl. She relished having these women in her life. As much as she loved being spoiled as the only girl in the family, she’d been jealous of her friends who had sisters.
Indina could still remember when Harrison had met and married Willow back when they were in college. Her sister-in-law had filled the void of growing up surrounded by testosterone. As each of her three cousins’ wives were added to the family, the feeling just continued to grow. They were all the sisters she’d never had, and she couldn’t be more grateful for them.
The discussion moved from baby names to the chaos of family life, and what Sienna could expect with the addition of yet another little one pitter-pattering around the house. They all laughed when Sienna mentioned that she and Toby had flipped a coin over diaper duty, and he’d lost.
As they chatted about the roles their husbands had all played in helping with their newborns, Indina felt a twinge of something that was so foreign to her she hardly recognized it.
Was that…envy?
No. It couldn’t be. Why would she feel envious over something she was certain she didn’t want or need?
She’d decided back in her twenties that she just wasn’t the motherly type, and she was still one hundred percent okay with that. She excelled at being the world’s best aunt. She didn’t need anything more than that.
But the thought of having someone to come home to every day? Someone to sit with on a lazy Sunday afternoon and watch the world go by as they talked about the week ahead? Someone who joined her in the kitchen to cook the pre-portioned meals that were delivered every week, then sat with her at the bar in her kitchen to eat them?
Someone to wrap their arms around her as she drifted to sleep every night. Someone who would still be there in the morning with his arms around her.
Indina refused to allow her eyes to close, because she knew if she did she would envision Griffin in that role.
But why did that have to be a bad thing? No matter how much she tried to deny it, Indina knew something had shifted over these past twenty-four hours. She’d gotten only the tiniest peek into the man Griffin Sims was outside of the workplace and his bedroom, and already Indina found herself wanting to know more. She wanted to know so much more.
Could she finally start to peel back that armor she’d been encapsulated
