Firefly Island by Lisa Wingate Read Free Book Online Page A

to buy endless romance novels? Try to sublet my apartment?
    Call my mother?
    Ohhh . . . my mother. I was supposed to go home to Maryland for Easter next week. I did not want to deliver this news in person. I didn’t want to deliver this news on the phone, either. I didn’t want to deliver this news. Period.
    My mother would flip her lid so high, it would landsomewhere in Boston harbor. She’d have me committed. My father would hire private investigators to look into Daniel’s background, or find an interventionist to deprogram me. I couldn’t possibly make them understand this. I didn’t fully understand it. I hadn’t even told them about Daniel and Nick yet. And now I had to inform them that I planned to get married and move to Texas? Next month?
    â€œYou know what, forget I said anything.” Daniel broke into my thoughts. I realized that Nick had come over from the television to climb into his dad’s lap. The Bambi credits were rolling, the DVD getting ready to cycle back to the main menu. I’d watched it enough this weekend to know. “Forget I asked, okay?”
    For half a second, I was relieved. I actually had the fleeting realization that, if I didn’t get married and move to Texas, I wouldn’t have to tell my mother. Then Forget I asked hit me like an unexpected right cross. He was having second thoughts? Already?
    Daniel backpedaled. “I mean, don’t forget I asked, but just pretend it didn’t happen. When we’re old and gray, and our grandkids ask how I popped the question, I don’t want the story to be about a trip to the newsstand and egg drop soup with soda crackers. Let me rewind and do it right, okay? You only get to do it once.”
    Nick, completely confused, partially dehydrated with his eyelids drooping, burrowed under his dad’s chin. My chest swelled, filling with the sight of them until I thought it might break me open. Old and gray, grandkids, only once. This was it. This was it, and we both knew it. I wanted to tell him that the proposal was perfect just the way he’d said it. Instead, I blinked, giving him a blank look. “What? Did you say something? So how was your trip to the conference?”
    Pointing a finger at me, he winked and grinned.
    The next day, at the very hour I’d first met Daniel Webster Everson, in the very same spot just off the Capitol rotunda, Daniel and Nick showed up, spit shined in their Easter suits, carrying two dozen red roses. Each gave me a ring. Daniel’s came in a burgundy velvet box from a jewelry store. Nick’s came in the plastic bubble from a gumball machine. Both were equally precious, but even more amazing was the fact that Daniel had secured the help of the grouchy personal assistant in Congressman Faber’s office. It confirmed my suspicion that he was, indeed, Superman. My Superman.
    Cheers went up in the Capitol building at an hour of the morning normally quiet. Even the Gymies were there. Kaylyn and Josh had written a special video game segment just for Daniel and me. We watched it on Daniel’s computer later that evening. Daniel’s little cowboy figure chased mine through a maze, and when the two finally met, he lassoed his sweetheart and said “Yee-haw!” Nick thought it was awesome. By the time he was ready for bed, we’d watched the video game over and over and over.
    After Nick was down for the count, Daniel and I made plans to go home to my parents’ place together for Easter, to deliver the news in person. We’d decided that, given the short time frame and all the practical details of moving across country, a quick trip to a wedding chapel made the most sense.
    Everything seemed to be clicking into place . . . until the parents actually got involved. After the initial attempts to talk sense into us, the dads threw up their hands and the moms began talking on the phone daily. Daniel and I were having a real