Chapter Fourteen

“You saved my life.” Fen and Seb stood hand in hand on the littered beach, surveying what had once been Fen’s Fancy Ice Cream Parlor. “If I’d been in there—”

“Don’t say it,” Seb told her. “Don’t even go there in your mind.”

The rogue storm, finished plundering their part of the coast, had roared on northeast toward Newfoundland. Now, late on Friday afternoon, Rockpool residents including Fen and Seb ventured out to see what it had left behind.

Fen found it difficult to believe what she saw, though. The line of waterfront shops and cottages, once so quaint and colorful, looked like they’d been crushed by a mighty hand, or perhaps kicked in by ten-foot-high boots. Most of the facades were damaged, and pieces of the buildings, along with other litter, lay heaped against them.

The weak sunlight that emerged in the wake of the departing clouds somehow made everything look worse—stark and too horrible to contemplate.

Fen and Seb had walked the length of the beach, only to discover both of their shops had been affected. They stood now before Fen’s Fancy—what had been Fen’s Fancy—the wind tossing Fen’s hair while she gazed at her pride and joy.

The porch—gone. She remembered painting each and every one of those floorboards, and the spindles and rails, with hope bright in her heart. Now what was left of the frontage looked gray, smeared with great gobs of seaweed.

Tears stung her eyes. “Gone. My dreams are—gone, just swept away.”

“Love, don’t cry any more. You can rebuild. We both can. In fact—”

“You don’t understand.” Unable to look at the shop any longer, she turned and faced him. “My dream of having this place was so strong. It was all that got me through the terrible moments in my life.”

Seb’s dark gaze softened and he caressed her face. “Your guiding star.”

“My guiding star, yeah. And I hitched myself to it so firmly, well, it didn’t matter how long it took or how hard I had to work to achieve it. Like I said, I was willing to give up anything, even a chance with you, if it meant I could keep holding to that dream. And now—just swept away.”

“Fenady, it will be okay.”

“How can you say that? Your shop looks even worse than mine—front staved in, even the sign torn off.”

He squeezed her fingers and drew her closer. “Maybe the sign needed to be torn off.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The storm swept everything away, yeah. But what do you do with a clean-swept floor?”

She shrugged helplessly.

“Start anew. Fenady, what happened here last night was fate, and I learned a long time ago you can’t buck fate once she sets her sights on you.”

Fenady latched her gaze to his face, that beautiful face, and the dark eyes, so filled with bottomless magic. She couldn’t bear looking at the wreck of her dream, but, by the goddess, she could still look at him.

“Listen to me,” he urged.

She managed a rueful smile. “Impart to me your wisdom, oh great and learned Wiccan.”

“From the moment we met, the Universe has been at work with us. No—since before we met. It’s no coincidence we both decided to root our new businesses here this summer or had such similar dreams for them. We imagined it all. Why, we even dreamed up the same flavors.”

“I never could have imagined this.” Fen tipped her head. “Or you.” She’d never dare imagine a man who suited her so completely, whose humor chimed off her own to such a degree, whose faith seemed to both match and complete hers.

But the Universe had.

“Ah,” she said softly, and saw the reciprocating light take hold in his dark eyes. “My old dream got swept away for—for something even better.”

Seb squeezed her fingers hard. “We never stood a chance against the intentions of the Universe.”

“And,” Fen acknowledged, “it had to be done violently because I’m such a stubborn little witch.”

“Maybe.”

“But, Seb, what now? What lies ahead?”

“On that clean-swept floor? I have a proposition.”

“Uh-oh.” Fen loved his propositions in bed, feared them a little in the light of day. That wicked light still lingered in his eyes. But if he could live with a stubborn, surly witch, surely she could accept a little wickedness.

Or even revel in it.

“Tell me,” she urged him.

“We rebuild, right? But we give up on bucking fate, and we build one shop—we live our dream together.”

“One shop.” Fen’s entire being leaped toward it. “You think we should?”

“I think we’re meant to, and I can prove it.”

“Go ahead.”

“What flavor did you write on that paper, shut away in the safety deposit box?”

“You want to tell now? I thought we were supposed to meet there tomorrow.”

“Yeah.” Seb freed a hand and waved it at the beach front. “All that’s also swept away.”

“I’ll tell you, if you tell me.”

“Go.”

They recited in chorus, “Devil’s Food Ripple with a Cherry on Top!”

Seb grinned and Fen began to laugh, her grief turning to euphoria. She threw herself into his arms.

Her anchor in the storm, any storm. Her new dream. Suddenly the future looked as bright as the sunshine around them.

“But where?” she asked.

“Where what?”

“Where should we locate the new shop?”

His dark eyes gleamed at her. “I suggest somewhere well above the reach of that ocean.”

“Right. And,” she asked, “what will we call it?”

His lips quirked in the smile she loved to see. “What about ‘Fen’s Wicked Good Fancy’?”

“Good thinking,” Fen said just before she leaned in and kissed him. “Because I tell you, Sebastian Bane, you most certainly are.”