“Hey, now, what’s this?” Pops asked, approaching our table. He set down baskets of burgers, fries, and other goodies. “I thought tonight was a celebration and here I find you pretty ladies crying.”
I grabbed one of the napkins on the table and wiped the tears from my face. “I’m okay, Pops. Just having a little man trouble.”
The older man raised one of his bushy gray eyebrows. “You need me to have a little one-on-one with him, if you get my meanin’? Or do you need me to tell him about how Ellie and I ended up together? Two totally different approaches to try and get to the same outcome.”
Stuffing a fried pickle into my mouth, I thought about the options. “How long did you wait until you had your wedding? Did you have any doubts?”
Pops placed his hands on his hips and leaned back, looking out at the orange sky reflecting off of the Atlantic Ocean. “I knew I was gonna marry Ellie the second I laid eyes on her cantankerous hide. It took a full two years and thirteen different proposals before I could get her to say yes. She even broke up with me once and dated a guy just to vex me. But I never gave up, and now we’ve been married for fifty-two years. Most of them pretty wonderful.”
“Why did she keep refusing your proposals?” I asked, a little too tipsy to be polite.
The fry cook scratched his head. “Sometimes a person needs the reassurance that their partner isn’t going anywhere. That they’ll stick with them through thick and thin. And that even when they show them their bad side that they’re loved for it anyway.”
I sniffed, feeling a little foolish and a whole lot guilty for my feelings about the wedding. “Pops, let me ask you one more thing. Once you married Ellie, did you share everything with each other?”
He grinned at me with twinkling eyes. “The second she said, ‘I do,’ that was it. We were partners in every sense of the word. She knows me inside and out as I do her.”
Cate cradled her head in her hands as she leaned against the table. “That’s so sweet.”
“Odie and me are the same,” Crystal agreed, stuffing a ketchup-covered fry into her mouth.
As much as I enjoyed the man’s story, I couldn’t help the tendrils of doubt that crawled in my belly. “Thanks, Pops.”
He chucked me under my chin. “You send him my way, and I’ll get his head on straight. Well, y’all enjoy your food, and don’t worry about the bill. Harrison’s got you covered.” With a wink, he left the bar to return to his diner next door.
I kept my worries to myself, staying quiet while I devoured an Ellie burger. The tasty food helped to soak up the alcohol a little, and I felt less woozy by the time I licked my fingers clean.
“So, clearly you’re worried that Luke isn’t sharing everything with you,” Crystal said, batting away the napkin Cate tossed at her. “What do you think is going on?”
I slumped on the stool. “I don’t know. I’ve told you how he’s always kept a lot of his past to himself. And I thought when he finally told me about Isabella that we were making progress. Giving me a ring that once belonged to her was…well, touching. Made me feel like he really trusted me.”
“What do you know about his sister?” Cate asked.
I shrugged. “That her name was Isabella. Luke loved her so much. Still does, I think. And that her death was a deep blow to him.”
“She was a vampire, right? How could she die?” Crystal set her drink down and dragged the basket of fries closer to her.
I’d asked Luke the same question. How had his sister died? It had to be something pretty serious to still upset him centuries later.
I blew out a long breath. “The truth is, I don’t know. And that’s why I haven’t set a wedding date. Granny Jo’s ready to hit Luke upside the head with one of her skillets, but Dad told her that sometimes a man needed patience.”
High-pitched giggles burst out of Dani Jo, and I stared at my cousin. “What’s so funny?”
“The thought of our ghostly great-grandmother laying into a vampire. I almost want it to happen,” she tittered.
“Want what to happen?” Gloria asked, dragging a stool over to join us. Azalea followed her lead and squeezed in between Cate and my cousin.
I gave both the new girls sloppy high fives across the table. “What are you two doing here?”
Azalea waved at her husband. “Harrison called because he figured none of you should be driving. So, we’ll act as your lifts home.”
Gloria dipped a fried pickle into the ranch sauce. “Now, if nobody else is claiming this Ellie burger, I’m gonna eat it while you catch us up.”
Even the addition of two sober minds didn’t help us come up with a solution to my problem. Unwilling to let my worries drag down our girls’ night, I steered the conversation to safer waters and let them suggest what types of wedding dresses they thought I should wear. In the midst of discussions about mermaid styles, A-lines, and long trains, my mind waded back into the murky depths of doubt to wallow.
Azalea filled us in on all the ins and outs of her wedding preparation as she drove Crystal and me back to our places. The two of us managed to guide our stumbling
