by Sarah Sundin
A sea breeze tossed curls against Tess’s cheek, and she brushed them away and faced into the breeze.
One figure in white caught her eye—a naval officer with a familiar determined gait.
Tess’s breath leaked from pain-stabbed lungs. “Dan?”
Although his stride didn’t waver, he gazed from side to side like a lost child at Filene’s, frowning and squinting.
Oh goodness. Now was her chance. Not some hideously strained meeting at the office in public, but just the two of them. He could ignore her or rant or pout or whatever he wanted to do.
Tess scanned the bandstand, frantic. Where was her purse with the letter? “Oh no. That’s right.” After church, she’d put subway change in her pocket and sent her purse with Mary so she wouldn’t have to fuss with it.
But Dan—he deserved that letter.
He came closer and closer. Then his gaze swept up the bandstand. He spotted Tess, and the frown and squint disappeared. His face stretched, raw with regret and longing.
“Oh, Dan.” That wasn’t polite military distance, and this was no time for letters, no time to hesitate, no time to hold back.
Tess scrambled down the stairs and ran to him, dodging startled passersby. “Dan! Dan! Danny!”
His face darted in and out of view, shifting to surprise, to hope.
Oh goodness, he’d forgiven her! He’d forgiven her, and she hadn’t even apologized yet. “Danny! I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I love you, I love you, I love you!”
He stepped off the path onto the grass, the hope broadening to joy.
She launched herself at him, flung her arms around his neck, and kissed him full on the lips. He grunted but kissed her back, one arm tight around her waist.
She had too much to say, so she pulled back an inch. “I’m sorry. I really am. I was selfish and horrible, and I shouldn’t have run away, and I’ll never run away again. Never. I promise. If only you’ll give me another chance . . . Oh, you already have, haven’t you?”
His eyes, his incredible dark eyes, swam with so many emotions. “You—you love me?”
“Very much.” She caressed the back of his neck, his hair springy from a fresh haircut. “You’ve forgiven me?”
“Of course, and it seems you’ve forgiven me too.” He lifted something in his free hand. “Guess I didn’t need to bring you this bouquet.”
Tess twisted in his embrace to see a brown paper grocery bag with the top rolled in his grip. “A bouquet? Darling, you don’t need to apologize to me, but you will need to apologize to those poor flowers.”
He laughed. Oh, it really was the loveliest sound in the world. “Flowers? I wouldn’t dare give you flowers.”
She gave him a quizzical look, but the sight of his firm mouth open in laughter almost dissolved her leg muscles.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s go somewhere else. We’ve given these folks enough of a show.”
Oh dear. Tess glanced at the amused faces of a dozen park-goers. “Oh no. The Navy has rules.”
“Yes, we do.” Dan took her hand and led her over a knoll and up a side path. “As for the bouquet, you once told me never to buy you pretty things. Flowers are pretty. That wouldn’t do. So I bought you a useful bouquet.”
“A useful bouquet?”
“I bought out the store on the Bogue and in Argentia.” Dan traipsed up the slope to a bench shielded behind an elm tree. He set the bag on the bench, looked inside, mumbled something about kisses making a mess of things, and tinkered inside the bag.
“What are you grumbling about, Dan Avery?”
“Here you go.” He handed her a drinking glass stuffed with pencils and a toothbrush and a comb and a ruler and a spoon and a fork, tied with two black shoestrings in a sloppy bow. “Every item is completely practical.”
“Oh, Dan.” She fingered the two shoestrings—one wouldn’t be practical, would it?—and everything inside her felt soft and warm. “It’s the most . . . the most beautiful gift ever.” A giggle popped up.
Dan’s face split in a smile. “You like it then.”
“I love it.”
“And I love you.”
That was the first time she’d heard the words from his mouth, seen them in his eyes. He looked all the way inside her, knowing her and loving her.
Without breaking his gaze, he nudged aside her hand that held the bouquet, and he lowered his mouth to hers, one hand on her waist and the other stroking her cheek, her jaw, her hair.
His lips said things to her, more than any words could. His was a love that appreciated her as she was but would also challenge her and steady her and cause her to grow.
Dan murmured and pressed his forehead to hers. “A kiss like that makes a man want to go to sea just so he can come home.”
Tess trailed her fingers over the roughness of his jaw. “I heard about your new assignment. I’m so excited for you. When do you report?”
“June 15. I thought I’d have the longest, most brutal two weeks of my life.”
“Two weeks. Now it seems too short.”
“Plenty of time.” He rearranged his arms around her waist and studied the leaves of the elm tree. “Let’s see. Today’s Sunday. Are you free on Saturday?”
“Well, yes.” She frowned at his chin. She didn’t want to wait until Saturday to see him.
“Good. That should be enough time to get a license. We’ll get married on Saturday.”
“What?” She gaped at him. “Married?”
“Why not? I love you, you’re the right woman for me, and I want to marry you.”
The man certainly knew his mind. But he was choosing a wife, not a blouse for his mother. “Six days? It’s so soon. I mean, we just now . . .”
“Oh.” He released her and sank down onto the bench. “I suppose I’ve had longer to think about this than you have. I’ve been in love with you for months, but you . . . ?”
“You’re not the only one who guarded your feelings.” She raised a mysterious smile. “I had a crush on you before I joined the WAVES, and I’ve been falling in love with you ever since.”
His mouth crept up on one side. “You have?”
“I’m madly in love with you.” She rested her hand on his shoulder and kissed the tip of his nose. “But I never let myself think about marriage. Goodness, at first I thought you didn’t even like me. I never let myself dream about love, much less a life with you.”
“So you need time.”
“I do. Let me get used to this. Let me dream. And let’s just enjoy ourselves.”
“Speaking of enjoying ourselves.” He plucked the bouquet from her hand and stashed it in the bag. “There’s something fun I’ve always wanted to do here.”
“Fun? Shouldn’t you be at the office?”
He arched one eyebrow, handed her some papers from the bag, grabbed her hand, and marched her up the slope.
Tess glanced at the papers, but she had to watch her step on the uneven ground. “Your sailboats.”
“Our sailboats. That’s why I want to marry you. I’m the straight lines, the black-and-white, the structure.”
“That’s why I love you.”
A surprised little smile, then he nodded at the paper, never slowing his pace. “You provide the color, the perspective, the life. That’s why I love you. But something was missing from the drawings.”
“What?” She glanced at the papers but stumbled on a root.
Dan stopped and faced her, his face solemn. “I was alone. In both pictures, at work and at play, I was alone. I don’t want to be alone anymore.”
She heard the hurt of a little boy who’d forced himself to become a man too young, of a man who’d deprived himself of love for too long. “Oh, Danny.”
He tapped the papers. “I fixed them. You’ll have to do your part with paint or crayon or whatever you use.”
“All right.” In the first picture, “Dan at work,” he’d drawn a little woman in a WAVES uniform standing beside him at the helm. “That’s darling.”
>
In the second picture, “Danny at play,” he lounged on his sailboat. The woman knelt behind him in a modest bathing suit. And her hands . . . Tess frowned. “Why am I strangling you?”
“You’re giving me a neck rub.” The eagerness in his expression . . .
She laughed. “I thought you hated it. You grumbled the whole time.”
His eyes turned smoky. “You don’t know how much I wanted to pull you onto my lap and kiss you.”
Her cheeks warmed. “I wish you had.”
“Maybe I should have.” He huffed out a breath and marched up the slope. “But there’s a time for work and a time for play. And now is a time for play.”
“Where are we going?” She peered ahead. “The Frog Pond?”
“This winter we all walked up this way. I told you I hadn’t played since I was eleven.”
She squeezed his hand. “I remember.”
“We were standing over there.” He pointed west. “I was looking at the Frog Pond, thinking of the kids wading in the summer. That’s what I want to do.”
“Today?” It wasn’t even seventy degrees.
“Today.” Dan sat on a bench beside the bean-shaped concrete pond, and he plucked off his shoes and socks.
Only two children splashed in the far end of the pond, and they were shooed out by their scolding mother. “It’s still too cold.”
“Not for a sailor.” He rolled up his white trousers to reveal calves Tess had never seen . . . so masculine. He stood and tossed his cover onto the bench. “Come on.”
“Me? I can’t. My stockings. I—there’s no place to take them off. And we don’t have a towel.”
He shook his head and marched straight into the shallow pond. “That’s the problem with you, Miss Beaumont. You’re too practical.”
She laughed and sat on the bench. “And you, Mr. Avery. You’re too silly.”
“I’ll try to be more serious.” He put on a stern expression and marched, knees high.
Tess watched in wonder and amusement. It might not be “conduct unbecoming an officer,” but he was pushing the limits, probably for the first time in his career, and it was adorable.
Dan marched past again and snapped her a salute, water splashing around his bare ankles.
One day he would indeed make admiral, and Admiral Avery would be the finest sort of leader, firm and fair, brilliant and compassionate. She would be honored to be his wife.
He flashed a smile and flicked water in her direction, nowhere near enough to splash her, but she squealed to make him happy.
How she’d love making him happy all his life, letting him be Danny with her.
Affection for him welled inside, bolstered by certainty. “Yes!” she yelled.
He turned to her. “Yes what?”
“Yes, I’ll marry you. But not next week.”
He didn’t smile. Not one bit. He walked to her, hands and feet dripping. Leaning over, he braced his hands on the back of the bench behind her.
His hair was mussed up in irresistible black waves. The wildness of it.
He was going to kiss her with all the passion she’d seen when he talked of ships and the sea, and she raised her face to accept it.
She wasn’t disappointed.
48
Boston
Saturday, August 28, 1943
How could this be real? She was walking down the aisle of Park Street Church—to him.
Dan hadn’t seen her in anything but her WAVES uniform for almost a year, and she didn’t look like his Tess with all those layers of white swishing around her feet, her face veiled.
She looked like a bride. His bride. It couldn’t be real.
Yet the air in his lungs felt real, the sweat on his palms, the weight of his dress whites on his shoulders. So did the presence of dozens of family and friends in the wooden pews and the wedding party beside him—Arch and Jim and Bill and Lillian and Mary and Nora.
Arch and Lillian had planned an autumn wedding, but when Jim’s ship came to Mare Island in California for refitting and he received a month’s leave, Arch and Lillian moved up their wedding date so Jim could attend. The Bogue had docked in Norfolk on August 23, and Dan had spent the first two days convincing Tess to make it a double wedding.
Now he wanted to run. Not because he doubted his love for Tess. He never would.
Not because of Admiral Howard’s advice. He had a hunch his mentor would grudgingly approve of Tess’s influence on him.
But at that moment, Dan needed more time. He couldn’t believe this lovely creature was about to join herself to him. Forever.
And she was smiling about it.
Dr. Ockenga asked Mr. Beaumont who was giving this woman to this man, and Mr. Beaumont said he was, and he lifted his daughter’s veil to reveal all her light and color.
Something kicked the back of his foot. Dan glanced to his side, and Jim jerked his head toward Tess.
Time to get underway. Dan lifted anchor, started his engines, and heaved to alongside his bride.
She slipped her warm hand in his, and love glistened in her golden-green eyes. Yes, he wanted to run—but to her, with her, all the days of his life.
Dan wandered around the reception room on the first floor of the church, accepting congratulations. So many naval personnel in dress whites—men from ASWU and the Bogue. Crew from Arch’s former ships, the Atwood and the Ettinger. And WAVES. Lots of WAVES.
Plenty of civilians too—Lillian’s coworkers from the drugstore, Arch’s from his insurance company, and the Avery, Beaumont, and Vandenberg families.
Jim and Mary approached, and Jim gave Dan a broad grin. “Never thought I’d see my big brother take a wife.”
Dan chuckled. “Never thought I’d worry about my little brother outranking me.”
Jim wore two stripes for a full lieutenant and a bunch of medals on his chest. He pointed to Dan’s shoulder boards, which now bore a third thin stripe. “You always stay one step ahead of me, Lieutenant Commander.”
Dan nudged his sister-in-law. “That pipsqueak of a husband of yours is making a name for himself, I’ve heard.”
“I know.” She looked up at Jim adoringly. “But I’ll keep him in line.”
“Tess will have a harder job keeping this man in line.” Jim jutted his chin at Dan. “The Bogue is singlehandedly responsible for ending the Battle of the Atlantic.”
Dan broke out laughing. “Not true at all, and you know it.” But the Bogue had sunk five U-boats and damaged many more. “You know full well there are many factors.”
Jim nodded. Convoys, technology, air cover, intelligence, and massive production—combined with the courage of Allied sailors and merchant marines.
Dan sobered. “And you know full well the battle isn’t over.”
“But the tide has turned. The Allies finally have the upper hand.”
“We do.” Dan was thrilled to be playing a role.
Arch and Lillian Vandenberg strolled over, hand in hand. Lillian wore her twin sister Lucy’s wedding dress, much frillier than Lillian’s usual style, but she looked radiant.
Dan kissed his sister on the cheek, then shook Arch’s hand with a solemn face. “My deepest sympathies.”
“Daniel!” Lillian gasped.
Mary laughed. “I’m glad I don’t have brothers.”
“Now you do. Tons of them.” Dan tugged a lock of Mary’s hair.
“And I have brothers and sisters for the first time ever.” Wonder shone on Arch’s face. He’d done well for himself since his medical discharge from the Navy. His Boston branch of the family insurance company was flourishing. More importantly, Arch was flourishing as he hired former servicemen who had been injured and maimed in the line of duty.
Dan clapped his new brother-in-law on the shoulder. “In all seriousness, we’re glad to have you in the family, and we know you’ll take good care of our Lilliput.”
“Thanks, Dan.” Lillian smiled and leaned her head on Arch’s shoulder. His sister had never looked so ha
ppy, open, and confident. “And what about you? You aren’t our ship-monk anymore.”
“No, I’m not.” But where was the responsible party? Dan gazed around the room.
There were Bill and Nora, talking to each other as if no one else existed. They’d get married soon, no doubt.
And there were his parents, looking happily dazed at the increase in the Avery Aviary. Wait until the newlyweds added more grandchildren to the flock. For Dan and Tess, babies would have to wait until after the war so Tess could continue to serve in the WAVES. But Dan didn’t want to wait one minute longer than necessary.
Dad caught his eye and nodded.
Warmth filled Dan’s chest, and he raised a smile. With Tess’s encouragement, Dan had written a long letter to his father, asking forgiveness for judging him and withholding respect. Thanks to Tess, Dan had seen the truth—George Avery was the best sort of man, and Dan was honored to be his son.
Where was Tess? His . . . his wife?
Her laughter floated from the corner, where she stood with a dozen WAVES.
He couldn’t be prouder of her. She did excellent work at the Navy Yard, and she knew how to keep secrets vital to national security. When he’d asked about Yvette and the spy case, she’d merely shown him two newspaper articles and stated which elements were true. Tess had been involved in something bigger than rescuing one woman from a fire, but Dan knew better than to ask questions.
Right now, he needed her in his arms. Dan excused himself and weaved through the crowd, eyes on his goal.
Tess met his gaze, and her color rose. She stepped away from her friends. “My, you look like a man on a mission.”
“I am.” He wrapped his arms around her waist.
Her cheeks turned bright pink, and she pressed her forehead to his shoulder. “I’ve always loved your determination, how you know your mind.”
He sighed. “Yet you’re the one who changed my mind.”
“Aren’t you glad?”
Dan pressed a kiss to the top of her head, to the blonde curls that fit perfectly around his fingers. “You know I am. I have the most useful bride in the world.”
“You sweet-talker, you.” She raised her face to him, so close, so lovely.
“And you’re beautiful. So, so beautiful.”