She looks at my hand and then nods. I lead her onto the floor. The band eases into a slow one. My palm finds the small of her back, and her other hand settles in mine. We move, and it's better than perfect. It is ours.
I bend my head to Kassi's ear. "There is one more thing," I say.
She smiles like she knew this was coming. "What is that?"
"Come live with me," I say. "Bring Emma. Bring the brush she loves, the fairy lights, and all her toys. Bring your books and your coffee mugs and the sound you make when you’re thinking hard."
She pulls back an inch, and the lights turn gold in her eyes. "Asher," she says, soft and unsure. "I just moved into the cabin.Emma picked her room. We hung lights. It finally feels like we have a place that is ours and not borrowed."
"It is yours because you are in it," I say. "And it will be ours because you will move into mine. One last move. Then no more. I’m not letting you go. I want to make a home where you can stop bracing and where Emma can hang her drawings on my fridge and where I can put your boots next to mine by the door."
She laughs on a breath that breaks and mends at once. "You are very sure."
"I am," I say. "I’m sure like sunrise. Sure as the smell of rain before you see it. Sure as a rope in my hand that found its mark a thousand times."
She looks around the room. Candy catches her eye, nodding with a soft smile. She looks at my brothers and sees that they are still here—and will still be here. Then she turns back to me and sets her palm flat on my chest.
"Say it again," she whispers. "So I can hear it where it matters."
"I love you," I say, steady. "I love you, and I love Emma. I want to spend my mornings showing you both this land until it belongs to you as much as it does to me. I want to protect you with my name, my walls, and my body if it comes to that. I want to share the work and the quiet and the stupid jokes that only make sense at dawn."
Her eyes shine, and she nods once like a person accepting a gift that is heavy and worth carrying.
“Then I say yes, but one last move. You can tell Candy she wins this round."
"I will never hear the end of it," I say, and the laugh that rises in my throat I haven’t felt for too long.
"Good," she says. "You needed to laugh."
She steps in close enough that the noise goes soft around her. "I love you," she says, and the words slot into me like a bolt through two boards that have waited years to be joined.
"I wanted to say it. But I didn't because I thought loving you meant stepping aside so you could keep your family."
"You and Emma are my family too," I say simply.
"Then kiss me," she says, and I do. I keep it clean because my mother raised me, and this town knows my middle name, but I still put every feeling I have for her into it.
The song ends, but we don’t leave the floor right away. People brush past and clap my shoulder or squeeze her hand. A few who had kept their distance step closer and say small things that mean large things.
Welcome.
Proud of you.
About time.
You need a truck, call me.
Need any boxes? I have a stack behind the feed.
If you need pie, there will be three on your porch by noon.
This is how a town forgives. Not with speeches. With help.
We slip outside when the air inside grows thick. Kassi leans into me, and I put my arm around her, kissing the top of her head. The porch is crowded with people cooling off and talking about calves, weather, and the game on Sunday.
"Where is Emma?" I ask into Kassi's hair.
"With Jenna," she says. "Helping with evening chores, checking on the new horse, and eating too much popcorn. She won’t be going to sleep until midnight."