by JoAnn Ross
“I’ve always thought so. I’ve also come to realize how there are no guarantees in life. That we can lose the ones we love in the blink of an eye.”
“I’ve noticed the same thing.”
“So, in the interest of not wasting any more time, do you still want to marry me?”
His smile widened to that bold, buccaneer’s grin Savannah knew would always have the power to thrill her. “Sweetheart, I thought you’d never ask.”
The Far Harbor lighthouse stood atop the cliff, looking like a dowager dressed in her best jewels. A rare snow had fallen the night before, spreading a white cloak over the ground that sparkled like diamond-studded velvet in the winter sunshine.
The fragrant evergreen boughs John had draped across the top of the lantern room windows added an even more festive note to this special day.
They’d decided that since Dan’s house was larger and had more room for the growing family they planned, they’d live there. Savannah would continue to use the first floor of the lighthouse as her office. They’d also agreed that the lantern room she’d loved from the first would be a perfect romantic hideaway.
Dan had grumbled a bit, but had helped her temporarily move the bed out to allow for the gathering of O’Hallorans and Lindstroms who’d come together to celebrate the forging of another link between the families.
John, his grin broad in his still bruised face, seemed to revel in his role as his uncle’s best man. Despite having been released from the hospital only two days earlier, he’d insisted on creating Savannah’s bouquet. The arrangement of white roses and holly was more precious to her than emeralds.
Ida had arrived on Henry’s arm, leaning on her Christmas gift—a polished wooden cane on which he’d carved the universal symbol of her profession, the coiled snakes of a caduceus.
As she exchanged vows with Dan, Savannah thought how Lucy had pledged the same promise right here in the Far Harbor lighthouse. She hadn’t felt the ghost’s presence since the day she’d read the last journal entry; she and Dan had decided that, having succeeded in revealing the truth about her death, Lucy’s spirit had finally been freed to join with that of her beloved husband’s.
Savannah had also been relieved when Doris Anderson, president of the Coldwater Cove historical society, had contacted a fellow history buff in San Francisco who’d unearthed a newspaper article revealing that Hannah had remarried a prosperous local banker. She had more children and lived a long and apparently happy life.
Proving again, Savannah had thought, the power of hope over experience.
The words they’d chosen were simple. Traditional. Timeless.
To love. To honor. To cherish.
When her lips touched Dan’s in their first kiss as man and wife, Savannah knew that her heart—and the Far Harbor lighthouse—had led her to exactly where she belonged.
Here, among her family, with the man she would love until the end of forever, Savannah was finally home.
About the Author
JOANN ROSS, the author of more than ninety novels, has been published in twenty-six countries. She is a member of the Romance Writers of America’s Honor Roll of bestselling authors and has won several writing awards, including being named Storyteller of the Year by Romantic Times. Her work has been excerpted in Cosmopolitan and featured by the Doubleday and Literary Guild book clubs.
With her husband and two fuzzy little dogs, she divides her time between the mountains of East Tennessee and the coastal lowlands of South Carolina.
Visit JoAnn on the web to subscribe to her electronic newsletter at www.joannross.com.