Epilogue

Maeve, Three Weeks Later

"Yes, Dad, I'm doing great," I say as I walk through the Airbnb I've been renting for the last few days. "Things are about to start, and I want to get there before that happens." Excitement and nervousness well up inside me as I pick up my purse and take a fueling breath.

"Are you sure you know what you're doing?" Dad asks.

"I'm positive."

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked that. Of course, you know what you're doing. Old habits die hard."

I laugh at that. "Dad, thank you. Thank you for loving me, and protecting me, and most importantly, thank you for letting me go when I needed it."

"Okay, kiddo, go do your thing. You know your mother and I are behind this one hundred percent."

With their warmth and love curling around me, I end the call, drop my phone into my bag and give myself a once over in the mirror. This evening, I have my hair pulled back, and a light touch of makeup on my face. I dab on some lipstick, and put my hand on the doorknob.

You got this, girl.

I walk out of my room and the warmth of Santorini washes over me. Off in the distance, the sun is beginning its descent, streaking the sky with a gorgeous orange glow. I have never seen such amazing sunsets in my entire life and this is my third one since coming to the island.

Voices reach my ears as I make my way to the venue, where the wedding party and friends are gathered for the rehearsal dinner, which starts in thirty minutes, giving me time to talk to Tanner and not interrupt the festivities. I'd never want to do that.

I catch sight of his tall, muscular body, dressed in a fitted suit and my heart thumps harder. I wipe my damp palms on my dress and take deep breaths as I get closer. Will he even want to talk to me? It's been three long weeks of silence from both of us. I used those weeks wisely, and I hope he did too.

An attractive woman walks up to him and from the resemblance, I instantly know it's his mother. My steps slow as my heart speeds up even more. What is his mother doing here in Santorini? As soon as I ask myself that question, the answer jumps into my brain. She's here to meet Tanner's plus one. That makes me laugh. Annie was right. She was gunning for him.

As I get closer, their conversation carries in the wind and reaches my ears. "Mom, I still can't believe you're here." Just then an attractive elderly man steps up beside his mom and I know it's his father, Lars. I've seen him play.

"We thought we'd get away from the cold, and since you were going to be here." She glances around. "Where is she?"

My chest constricts. The last thing Tanner ever wanted to do with deceive or hurt his mother, and right now, it looks like he has no choice but to do that.

He shifts from one foot to another. "Mom, it's a…just that…we…she…"

"Sorry I'm late," I say hurrying to his side and sliding my arm into his. "I couldn't find my lipstick." His parents beam as they see me, but Tanner's eyes nearly bulge out of his head when he turns to face me. He keeps blinking, like I might be an apparition. "Tanner, aren't you going to introduce us?"

"Um…Maeve…what?"

"Introduce us," I gently probe.

"Right, uh, Mom, Dad, this is Maeve, my plus one. You know, the reason you're really here in Santorini."

His mom laughs. "We wanted to see you too, Tanner."

He rolls his eyes. "Yeah, sure. Maeve, this is Stella and Lars Bang."

I hold my hand out and shake theirs, and it's clear how happy they are to see that I'm a real person and not some made up girl to keep them off Tanner's back.

"My, she is such a beauty," his mom states.

"She sure is," Tanner agrees. "But she's also a fabulous physiotherapist who worked hard to get where she is, and believe me, she's where she is because of her skills and commitment to the team, not because of her connections." My heart wobbles, and I fight back the tears. "She's also an amazing cook, and an amazing singer." I smile up at him, my heart so full it physically aches. "She's brave and courageous, has a brain and a voice. She's a woman who loves adventure, and trusts in herself to make the right decisions."

"T," I murmur, barely able to talk, and when I catch sight of who can only be Jay, the groom, and the bride, Gabrielle, coming toward us, I inch closer to him. "We should go somewhere private. I don't want to upstage anyone's rehearsal party."

"You're not," Jay pipes in loudly. "Please, you need to do something to get Tanner out of his funk."

Tanner growls at Jay, but it's playful.

Gabrielle touches my arm, and her smile is warm and welcoming, and I know we're going to be great friends. "The stage is yours, Maeve. It's what I want."

I turn to Tanner. "I traveled here on my own three days ago."

"You came here on your own?" He puts his palm on my cheek, his eyes shining with love. "Courageous."

"It was something I needed to do. I took the ferry, explored the island, and checked out the restaurants and the evening shows." The pride on his face wraps around me like a comforting hug. "I didn't want to fly here with you, because I needed to stand on my own two feet and trust in my own decisions."

"I'm really happy to hear that Maeve."

"I know why you left, Tanner," I say, my voice uneven as more tears threaten. "I can't trust in you, or anyone else, until I learn to trust in myself. I hated that I was scared of you, even for a moment. I hated that I thought you were acting possessive like my ex. Do you understand, Tanner? I needed to find myself, before I can give myself, or even a part of myself to anyone else."

"Believe me, I understand that you needed to trust in yourself before you could trust in anyone else."

"I do trust in myself, and what I've discovered is that I can do things, like travel on my own, go to restaurants on my own, and go to bed alone and wake up alone. I can also make good decisions on my own. But…"

His eyes narrow. "But what?"

"While I can do those things, I don't want to. I want to travel with you, go to restaurants with you, go to bed with you and more importantly, wake up with you. I can make good decisions on my own, but I want to make them with you."

"What about your father?" I nod, totally understanding. "He hasn't said much to me in the last three weeks."

"He stayed quiet, letting us figure this out ourselves, but believe me, he's as happy as I am that I'm here. He knows what you did for me that night, how you figured it all out and protected me from Kate. He's happy to let me go, and trusts in my decisions." I smile at him. "He loves you like a son, you know." I laugh. "That doesn't make us brother and sister."

We both laugh at that and it lightens the tension. Then he goes serious, and his throat makes a sound as he swallows. "I'm so happy to hear all this." He reaches into his pocket to pull out a velvet box and a gasp falls over the crowd as he drops to his knees.

I stumble a bit. "What…where?"

"I brought it just in case," he tells me with the cutest grin spreading across his face. "Maeve, from the moment I met you, the very first time you worked on my shoulder in training camp, I knew you were the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. I never once wavered on that. Not once. There were so many reasons we couldn't be together. I was miserable."

"I heard he was so damn miserable back in college after he came home from training camp," Jesse points out and we all laugh. "We couldn't even get him to go out."

Tanner glares at Jesse and we laugh harder. "Can't you see I'm in the middle of something?"

Jesse rolls his hand. "Carry on."

"The first thing I saw when I looked at you was how beautiful you were. But I also saw more. I saw a woman who'd been hurt, was afraid of the world, of trusting herself and others. I also saw a woman with courage and talent, a woman who had it in her to fight her demons and find her happiness again. I wanted to be the man to help you with that. I wanted to be there for you. We had some roadblocks for sure, a lot of issues to work through, and I had my mom pushing me to get married. How could I get married when you were the woman with my heart and you couldn't trust in me until you trusted in yourself?"

I sniff. "T, I do trust in you."

He turns to look at his mother. "I guess in some small way, you were behind all this. You got the ball rolling for me, pressuring me about bringing a plus one. If you hadn't done that, I'm might not ever have asked Maeve to come here. So, thanks, Mom. You can congratulate yourself on being behind all your kids' happy love lives."

"You're welcome," Tanner's mom responds with a self-satisfied grin, and we all laugh.

"But I guess I might be jumping ahead here." He turns back to me, and holds the ring out. "You didn't answer me."

"Tanner," I back up a bit, my heart hammering.

"Maeve, I want to be there for you. I want to make you happy every day of your life. I want sunrises and sunsets. Breakfast in bed and bike rides in the park. I want you to live the perfect life you deserve."

"No."

"No?" he mimics, hurt and confusion moving into his eyes as everyone gasps again.

"While all those things sound lovely, that's not what marriage is about, that's not what I want from you, or deserve from you, and it's not what you deserve from me."

He takes a labored breath. "What are you saying?"

"Love and marriage and everything that goes along with it is messy, Tanner. I'm not perfect and neither are you, and we can't pretend we are. I might have tricked the world into thinking I was perfect on the runaway, but real life is different."

"What do you need, Maeve?"

"I want a relationship where one can steal the covers at night, and the other will love them, not despite it, but because of it. I want a relationship where one snores, and the love is so strong it prevents the other from smothering them in their sleep."

Laughter erupts around us. "Hey, I don't snore."

"Seriously, Tanner, I want to be able to fight over stupid things, have long periods where we don't talk, but in our hearts, we know the other isn't leaving because our love is strong. I want stubbornness, yelling and fighting followed by forgiveness and love."

"Make-up sex is great," someone shouts out and I laugh.

"I want to be able to do silly things, like sing in the rain, and when you sing badly, I won't laugh…much." He grins at me. "When I'm sick, I want to know you're going to hold my hair back, and when you're sick, I'm going to make you soup, and warm your blankets. Marriage is both easy and hard. I want to do the easy things with you, Tanner, but more importantly, I want to do the hard things too."

"I want to do the hard things too, Maeve." He winces. "Wait, did that come out right?"

"Oh, dear," Stella chuckles and covers her face as everyone bursts out laughing.

I smile up at him. "If you can get behind all that…"

"I can," he says quickly.

"Good, then I need you to know I'm pulling a Maeve."

Murmurs reach my ears. Everyone is trying to figure out what the heck I'm talking about.

"Pulling a Maeve?" Tanner asks, fear in his eyes. "You're second guessing us?"

"Here's the thing, and I need to tell you this. We both had it all wrong, calling it pulling a Maeve that night in the hotel. You see, I didn't second guess myself. I figured something out a little while ago. It wasn't me who sent that text to you, it was Kate."

"I don't understand."

"She was texting Tanner Davis." His head rears back. "She was setting me up with Tanner Davis. I didn't want to do it, he was my friend, but back then I thought Kate knew what was best for me, so I went along."

"She texted me, though."

"I know, and you showed up. Talk about a surprise." I drop to my knees and cup his face. "Being with you that night, that was actually me making a good decision. That was me pulling a Maeve."

"That's all kinds of confusing. Wait, you, or rather Kate, texted Tanner Davis. I was the wrong Tanner."

"The right text went to the wrong Tanner, but you were always the right Tanner for me." I take in his confusion. "Are you upset?"

He shakes his head. "Hell no, and I'm glad to see that you've been making good decisions all along. Now you know you can trust in yourself and have always been able to."

I believe Kate sent that text to Tanner Bang on purpose. A test of sorts, after calling dibs on him. Then she got to play the victim again. One more thing to add to her Maeve hate list. It made getting back at me, hurting me, all the more justifiable. But I keep that to myself. This whole crowd already knows more than enough, and I don't want to ever think about Kate again.

"So, yes, I am pulling a Maeve, and making good decisions." I hold my hand out and the crowd cheers as he places the gorgeous Tiffany ring on my finger, the same ring I admired in a storefront in New York.

"Get a room, you two," Jay calls out and we laugh. "I'm serious," he adds. "We can do the rehearsal without you."

Tanner glances at his mom and dad and they wave us off with big smiles on their faces. Tanner stands and pulls me to my feet. We practically run to his room, which is closer than mine, and when we get inside the cold air-conditioned room, I shiver.

"I think it might be a good time to give you your Christmas present."

I hold my hand out and examine the gorgeous ring. "You mean this, wasn't it?"

"No," he whispers and hands me a box. "I brought it just in case."

I eye him cautiously. "What's this?

"Open it and see."

I take the lid off and laugh when I pull out hand-knitted slippers and mittens. But honestly, I'm so touched. There is no denying the man knows me and knows what I need and the work that went into these is not going unnoticed by me.

"For my girl with the cold hands, cold feet and warm heart."

"I love them." I go up on my toes and kiss him with all the love inside me. When I break the kiss, I shake my head. "Well, this is kind of a coincidence," I laugh, and crinkle my nose.

"What?"

"I have a present for you too."

His eyes light up. "You do?"

"In the last three weeks, I learned to knit. It's not great, but I made you something."

"Really?" I reach into my purse and pull out his gift. His eyes narrow and confusion moves over his face. "Ah, what the hell is this?" he asks as he scratches his head.

"I thought I should start with a small project." He turns the knitting over in his hands still unable to figure out what he's holding. "It's a willy warmer," I finally tell him and try not to laugh. "You know, for when you wear a kilt for me. I think I remember you promising that."

"You mean this is for..." He glances at his crotch. "Wait, did you just say it was small?"

No longer able to hold back my laughter, I let loose a big howl, and run to the bedroom. He follows me in, and jumps on the bed beside me.

"First, there is nothing small about this." He takes my hand and puts it over his growing erection. "And two, I have better ways to keep Mr. Willy warm."

He rolls over me and presses his lips to mine. "I believe you're right, T. Let's make love and warm each other up."

He laughs. "Look at you, pulling a Maeve and making more good decisions."

My heart is so full I fear it's going to explode. "I love you T."

"I love you too, Sweetness."

New Year's Eve,

Dear Diane,

Well, it looks like Lars was right—and you know I don't say that often. ? But time does heal broken hearts. That doesn't mean I don't miss you or think about you every day and when I do, the waves of anguish are still there, they're just not as debilitating as they once were. It's funny, we've been friends for so long and you showed me how to live life. You just didn't show me how to live it without you. Happier memories, however, are now filling my heart with warmth, love and contentment, and it's those memories that are pushing back the pain.

I'm in a good place, Diane, and I wish you could see the smile on my face right now. Actually, I bet you can because I know you're always looking down at me and I have no doubt you were with me all along, the driving force behind me helping my children find their soul mates.

Did you ever think Jakob would find love again? Gardenia is amazing with him and his boys. Who would have thought that Kingston would fall head over heels for Rory after having his heart broken? Well, I did, because I had a hand in it! ? How about commitment phobic Leif, totally committing to Cami, the woman of his dreams. Then there's Jensen. He's the most loving partner to Bailey, even when they're in the spotlight, which they're still getting used to. Oh, and don't even get me started on Annie. My goodness, she hated Logan with her entire being, now they're in love. Even I didn't see that one coming, but the two of them together…pure magic. Last but not least, the baby of the family, Tanner, has finally settled down and found his match. Can you believe he asked Maeve to marry him, right in front of me in Santorini? Watching my last child profess his love, and involving me, was the icing on the wedding cake.

Honestly, it's hard to believe I have them all home for New Year's Eve. They're waiting downstairs with their loved ones, and I have to admit, the noise and even the fighting brings on a sense of peace. Although Tanner has grown to be such a big man, Jakob is going to want to rethink putting him in a headlock like he always used to do, which I think he's trying to do right now. Wait, I can also hear Annie gloating about winning yet another thumb war with Leif. Oh, those two, still thick as thieves.

I guess now it's time for me to stop my meddling and get down there with my family before the New Year's Eve ball drops. How lucky am I to kiss Lars at midnight for the thirty-sixth time? And let's be honest, I can't quit meddling entirely. There are more grandbabies to be had. I'm not getting any younger, you know.

Anyway, my friend, with a full heart, and warm memories to take me into the next year, I am closing the cover on this diary for the last time, but never closing the pages of our friendship. I love you, Diane, and will see you again, one day.