Chapter 47
LEVI
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
For eleven years, I hadn’t allowed myself to visit this place that had once held so many memories. Telling myself the lie that I didn’t deserve to be here. And I sure as hell didn’t deserve the solace or comfort it provided. I still felt that way, deep down.
That was a daily struggle that wasn’t suddenly going to disappear. But I was working on it, slowly trying to rewrite the narrative I’d been spinning to myself for so long. Slowly trying to forgive myself. It wasn’t going to happen today or tomorrow or next week. Probably not even next year. But sometime, I hoped. There were no quick fixes for wounds that ran this deep. I knew that. But having Harper by my side—having my family’s support—while I did so made it feel like I’d be able to get there. One day.
The waves lapped at the shore, a soft breeze blowing across our skin as Harper and I sat on a soft, worn blanket, spread out beneath an old oak tree on the resort property. The same tree my mom used to read under on sunny summer days or crisp fall afternoons. The same one she’d taken me and my siblings to hundreds of times in our lives.
My head was in Harper’s lap as she gently ran her fingers through my hair, the two of us talking about everything and nothing at once because I didn’t know what else to do.
She hummed, her gaze set on the beach and the crashing waves before she looked down at me with nothing but love shining in her eyes. “Do you think we hit all the highlights?”
We’d given an abbreviated version of why she was back in town and why she’d left in the first place. Talked about my business expansion plans and that I was considering taking on an apprentice in the spring. Addison and Chase’s baby, Brady and Luna’s upcoming wedding, Harper’s job offer, Chase’s new hockey multiplex, the resort renovations, and about a hundred other things that had slipped in.
But even factoring in all that, did I think we’d been able to touch on every aspect of our lives over the past eleven years in the short while we’d been sitting here? Not even close. It would take months…years…to share it all.
But it didn’t matter.
It didn’t matter if we’d forgotten something or if it was another eleven years before I settled in this spot.
Because this wasn’t where my mom lived.
As soon as Harper and I had walked up to this tree, standing tall and sturdy and so much larger than I remembered, and the grave marker below it, I’d known Mom wasn’t here. Her name might’ve been on the gravestone below beloved wife, mother, and friend, and this might’ve been her final resting place, but she wasn’t here.
Which meant this wasn’t the place I needed to be in order to connect with her spirit or feel her presence in my life.
I’d tried my hardest to deny myself of her over the years—deny myself of anything good at all. But I knew now just how impossible that had been. Realized now that she never would’ve left my side, regardless of if I thought I deserved her there or not.
She’d been with me during every trip out to sea, through every lonely day spent in my workshop. She was there in every crack of thunder, every wave against the shore, every whistle of wind through my hair. She was there in Brady’s unwavering protection, in Aiden’s eye for detail, in every scone Beck made, in each new planter Ford built, in every flower Addison planted. She was in the eyes of my siblings, in their laughter and their tears. In their quiet resolve and steadfast support.
She’d been with me even when I’d felt as if I was all alone…as if I’d deserved to be alone.
And nothing I could do would ever change that. She’d continue to be with me. Regardless of where I went or how far I roamed. Even if the resort was no more…even if I no longer lived in Starlight Cove. She’d be with me—with all six of us—no matter what happened in this life.
“I think we probably missed a few things,” I finally said, brushing my thumb against Harper’s leg. “But that’s okay. She already knows.”
Harper smiled down at me, the late-afternoon sun casting a halo around her golden hair, the wind blowing a strand across her face. My beautiful angel. An angel I had never thought I would deserve. But it didn’t matter because I wouldn’t let it.
I vowed to spend every day of the rest of my life trying to be the kind of man worthy of Harper’s love. The kind of man I knew my mom would be proud of.
I’d get there. One day at a time. And each one of those would be spent with Harper by my side.