Moriah held her bouquet in her lap and sat very still, trying not to disturb her hairdo, as she sat in the backseat of Nicolas's black Mercedes. She had decided, while her head was being lathered over a bowl, that if she was smart enough to build a cabin, repair a lighthouse, and build a stone wall, she was probably smart enough to figure out this girlie stuff, and she wanted to. It was worth the time and cost to see that look of awe on Ben’s face. And it was much nicer than chopping her own hair off every six months with Katherine’s sewing scissors.
While traveling to the church, she surreptitiously admired her fingernails. Long, lovely nails, and they were all hers. She had paid good money for them. Her fingers had never looked so graceful.
Ben glanced down, focused on her hands, and she eagerly anticipated his reaction. Nothing there to be ashamed of today. No ragged cuticles, no broken nails, just a smooth, unbroken, satiny burgundy nail polish.
“What in the world?” Ben peered at her hands. “What did you do?”
“I had my nails done.”
“Why? They were fine before.”
“Oh, Ben. I didn’t want to look like a man today.”
“Lass,” Ben’s voice was strained, “with that body and that face, you couldn't look like a man if you tried.”
Moriah smiled. Yes, the trouble she and the women at the beauty shop had gone to was worth it.
“You're hands look pretty, sweetheart.” He took one of her hands in his and studied her fingernails. “But then, they always do to me.”
He lifted her hand to his lips, gazing at her with those deep blue eyes of his, and kissed it.
It took her breath away.
He had also taken her breath away when she first glimpsed him as he strolled into the lodge wearing that tux. His latest haircut had grown out, curling slightly over the stiff, white collar. His blue eyes were startling against the tan he had gradually obtained in spite of the sunscreen.
He did not release her hand but continued to hold it as they drove to the church.
She was grateful they had another month ahead of them while they completed the project. There was unspoken hope in her heart that he would decide to stay. There were good signs. He never complained about being on the island, and he was making a lot of friends among the people at church and the crew. She knew he admired and cared about her.
She would never ask him to stay here to be with her, but if he decided on his own to live permanently on the island, instead of going back to live in the Amazon, she would not fight him about it.
If they were to be together, he would have to stay.
She had secretly tried to leave the island this summer. Over and over. In the middle of the night, while everyone else was asleep and she knew the swing bridge wouldn’t be moving to accommodate ships.
She had tried driving across it; she had tried walking across it. Nothing had worked. She told no one, not even Ben. This was her fight, her struggle. The failure she felt each time her fear defeated her was not something she wished to share with anyone.
Her attempts had felt like death each time. The dizziness, the chest pain, the shaking, and the dry mouth. The same feelings that had terrified her as a child washed over her each time she tried.
Except now, she had the desperation of her love for Ben and the horrific flashbacks to her childhood in the Amazon to add to her private bag of misery.
Ben was worth it, she told herself each time she arose in the middle of the night to drive to Little Current to attack the bridge again.
Ben was worth everything.