Chapter 39
Thirty-Nine
Colter
I had become one with my role.
Standing backstage while the first act rolled through, watching Swayze command the stage with an effortless charisma that made every eye in the theater lock onto her, I understood completely how Sam felt.
The way he’d let Donna slip through his fingers because he’d been too caught up in what he thought was right instead of fighting for what he wanted.
History was repeating itself, and I was letting it happen.
“You’re brooding.” Dean materialized beside me. “Stop brooding. You’re supposed to be Sam, not Hamlet.”
“I’m not brooding.”
“You’ve been staring at her for the last three minutes without blinking.”
I had. Swayze was in the middle of “Dancing Queen” with Adalyn and Blair, and she was radiant.
The kind of radiant that belonged on bigger stages than Gibson Hollow’s renovated theater.
The kind that deserved audiences larger than the couple hundred people we’d packed in tonight, even with the livestream expanding our reach.
She deserved the world.
That was the problem.
“She got a job offer,” I said quietly. “From Gerald Peyton.”
Dean’s eyebrows shot up. “The billionaire?”
“That’s the one.”
“What kind of offer?”
“The dream kind. Traveling the world, highlighting small towns and businesses, using her platform for exactly the kind of work she loves.”
“And?”
“And it’s perfect for her.” The words scraped my throat raw. “It’s everything she came here looking for. Everything she lost when she got cancelled. It’s redemption and validation and opportunity all wrapped up in one.”
Dean was quiet for a long moment. On stage, the song ended to thunderous applause. Swayze’s laugh carried through the wings, bright and genuine.
“You’re not going to ask her to stay.”
It wasn’t a question.
“How can I?” I turned to face my brother. “How can I ask her to give up something like that? To stay here in this tiny town? I’d be holding her back.”
“Or you’d be giving her a reason to stay.”
“Lisa said the same thing.”
“Then maybe you should listen.” Dean’s hand landed on my shoulder. “You’re doing that thing again. Where you decide what’s best for everyone else without actually asking what they want.”
“I’m being realistic.”
“You’re being scared.”
The accusation hit harder than I expected. Before I could respond, the stage manager signaled my entrance was coming up. Dean squeezed my shoulder once and disappeared back toward his own position.
My mind stayed full as the show rolled on.
By the time I walked onto that stage to confront Donna about Sophie wanting her dad to walk her down the aisle, the words came automatically.
We’d rehearsed this dozens of times. But when Swayze turned to face me as Donna, something in her eyes made my chest tighten.
The argument played out. Sam’s confusion. Donna’s fury at having the past dragged back into her present.
Then the music started.
Swayze’s voice wrapped around the opening lines of “The Winner Takes It All,” and I forgot how to breathe.
I’d heard her sing this in rehearsals. We’d blocked the movements, worked through the staging. But this was different. Raw. Every note dripped with emotion that seemed less like Donna and more like Swayze herself, and I couldn’t look away.
The gods may throw the dice, their minds as cold as ice.
Was that how she saw this? Some cosmic game where neither of us had real control?
But somewhere deep inside, you must know I miss you.
Her voice cracked slightly on the last word, so subtle that most of the audience probably missed it. I didn’t.
The winner takes it all.
She moved across the stage, and I tracked her without thinking. This wasn’t in the blocking. But nothing about this moment felt rehearsed anymore.
The judges will decide, the likes of me abide.
Something crystallized in my chest. Sharp and sudden and absolutely terrifying.
I’d been so focused on being supportive, on not being selfish, on doing what I thought was right that I’d never actually told her what I wanted. I’d said I loved her, but I hadn’t fought for her. Hadn’t made it clear that I wanted her to stay, wanted to build a life together, wanted everything.
Just like Sam.
And twenty-one years later, Donna was still singing about the pain of it.
I wasn’t doing that again. Not to Swayze. Not to myself. Not to us.
The song ended. The lights shifted. The scene continued.
But something fundamental had changed.
When the lights faded at the end of the scene, I knew exactly what I had to do.
Stagehands rushed around us in practiced silence, shifting pieces for the next scene. I snagged Swayze’s hand and pulled her into the alcove behind the main curtain—the same spot where I’d kissed her senseless a month ago, after we’d helped Gunner and Bristol find the heart of their scene.
“Colter, what—”
“I need to say this.” The words tumbled out before I could second-guess them. “I know I have no right. I know it’s selfish as hell, but I love you. I love you so damned much, and I’m asking you to stay. Build a life here. With me. Please don’t go.”
Her eyes widened. On stage, Adalyn’s voice carried through the wings, launching into “Take a Chance on Me” with Dean. The bright, bouncy melody was completely at odds with the way my heart hammered against my ribs.
“Colter—”
“I’ve been an idiot.” I couldn’t stop now that I’d started. “I thought I was being supportive by giving you space to think, but really I was just… giving up. Preparing myself for you to leave instead of fighting for you to stay. And that’s not fair to either of us.”
Movement in my peripheral vision—other cast members gathering in the wings to watch Adalyn and Dean’s scene. We didn’t have much time before our next entrance.
Swayze stepped closer, lifting her hands to cup my face. The gesture stopped my spiral of words more effectively than anything else could have.
“I’m not going anywhere,” she said softly. “Not permanently, anyway.”
My breath caught.
“I can’t promise I won’t want to pop off to do some travel from time to time.” Her thumbs brushed across my cheekbones. “But I’d rather do it with you.”
Relief hit so hard I swayed. Weeks of tension I’d been carrying without fully acknowledging drained out of me all at once, leaving me almost dizzy.
“Do you mean it?”
“If reopening the door to being an influencer has shown me anything, it’s that I’m over that lifestyle.
” Her smile was soft, certain. “I’d rather not be the center of attention and use the skills I learned to help others instead.
I can do that here. I am doing that here.
And I’m good with it.” She leaned in until our foreheads touched. “I’m good with you. With us.”
“You’re staying?” I needed to hear it again. Needed the words to sink past the fear that had been gnawing at me for days.
“I’m absolutely staying.” Her arms wound around my shoulders, pulling me close. “I love you. No buts, no qualifiers. I love you.”
I bent to kiss her, needing to seal this promise with something physical, something real—
“Places for church scene!” One of the crew members materialized beside us, clipboard in hand and a knowing smirk on her face. “Sorry to interrupt, but you’re on in thirty seconds.”
Swayze laughed against my mouth. “To be continued?”
“Absolutely.”
We broke apart reluctantly. I turned toward the stage, trying to orient myself back into the world of the show, and froze.
Adalyn and Dean were still in the middle of “Take a Chance on Me.” Adalyn’s character was trying to convince Bill to take a chance on her, on them, despite his fears. But the way they were moving around each other—the heat in it, the barely contained want—that wasn’t acting.
At least, not entirely.
Dean pulled Adalyn against him as the song built toward its climax, and she melted into him like she’d been made to fit there.
When the final notes faded, they stayed locked together for a beat too long.
Then Dean’s mouth crashed down on hers, and she kissed him back with enough enthusiasm to make several people in the wings whistle softly.
I blinked. Well. That was new.
The stage manager made a cutting motion, and Dean and Adalyn finally broke apart, both looking slightly dazed. The stagehands scrambled to finish the scene change.
The stage manager waved us forward. Time to pull it together and finish this show.
I walked onto the stage for the church scene—Sophie’s almost-wedding, where all three potential fathers showed up. The chaos and confusion that led up to the truth coming out and Sophie calling the whole thing off. The proposal.
“… I’m a divorced man who’s loved you for twenty-one years, and ever since I got on this island, I’ve been bursting to show you. Come on, Donna—it’s only the rest of your life.”
I sank down on one knee and launched into the opening lines of “I Do, I Do, I Do.”
We’d run this number hundreds of times by now, and it had always played as a little hammed up. But there felt like something more in Swayze’s face as she said her own ‘I do’. Then I got to kiss her… finally.
And forgot completely where we were.
Her mouth opened under mine, soft and eager, and everything else—the lights, the music swelling around us, the audience beyond the footlights—disappeared. There was only Swayze. Only this woman I’d almost let slip away because I’d been too afraid to fight.
Her fingers threaded into my hair. Mine tightened at her waist, pulling her closer. She made a small sound against my mouth that went straight through me, and I angled deeper, tasting her smile, feeling the way she pressed into me like she couldn’t get close enough.
The kiss stretched. Lingered. Turned into something that definitely wasn’t appropriate for a family-friendly musical.
Something sharp jabbed between my shoulder blades.
I jerked back, disoriented. Swayze’s eyes were dark, her lips swollen. Behind us, Gunner cleared his throat meaningfully while Adalyn tried unsuccessfully to hide her laughter.
Right. The show. We had lines.
Swayze’s grin turned wicked as she delivered Donna’s next piece of dialogue, but her hand stayed locked in mine.
Worth it.
The rest of the show flew by in a blur of music and movement. The goodbyes to Sophie and Sky at the jetty. And then the finale—all of us on stage for “Waterloo,” the cast and crew pouring everything we had into those final notes.
The audience erupted.
Standing ovations from the theater. Flowers and cheers and whistles. The energy was electric, celebratory.
But when I looked at Swayze—flushed and laughing and squeezing my hand as we took our bows—none of the external celebration mattered as much as the private one happening between us.
She was staying.
She chose me. Chose us. Chose this life we were building together.
That was basically the best gift ever.