Ursula’s muse might be the Paradise instead of a person or critter. Her mind was so full of ideas that she could hardly get them written down or typed into her computer fast enough. She finally realized that she had to take a breath and stretch a bit, or she was going to freeze with her hands on the keyboard. She stood up and raised her arms, then touched her toes. After she repeated that five times, she looked around at all the familiar things in her bedroom. Over there in the rocking chair beside the balcony doors was where she recorded the story of the sad little kittens whose father left them. The desk, now cluttered with her laptop and papers and with sticky notes on the wall in front of it, had been where she wrote book reports and term papers—her favorite part of school. Maybe she just needed to be right there in her bedroom to really get in the writing zone. She opened the doors out onto the balcony and looked across the fence where she and Remy had talked. She could see part of Bernie’s trailer over to the right, and to the left was the lane leading out to the road.
“Rae and Tertia are here!” Bernie’s excited voice floated up the stairs and startled Ursula.
Ursula hurried back into her room, stepped over to the desk, and saved the last three pages of research she’d been working on. She closed her computer and hurried down to the foyer. She hoped the whole time she practically jogged down the stairs that Bernie would turn her attention to Rae and Tertia now that they were home. Endora and Luna were ahead of her, and as soon as they were all on the porch, a hugging fest took place with Mary Jane and Bernie right in the middle of all of it.
“I’m so glad y’all are home. There’s a perfectly good bachelor living not a stone’s throw away over that rail fence.” Bernie pointed out across the yard. “He’s sexier than Scott Eastwood or even Elvis Presley, and your oldest sister is dragging her feet about asking him out on a date. You’d think this was the Dark Ages, the way she’s acting. Y’all need to either give her a talkin’-to, or else one of you latch on to Remy Baxter.”
So much for hoping that Bernie would forget about any kind of romance between me and Remy, Ursula thought with a long sigh.
“Bernie!” Mary Jane scolded.
Bernie tipped up her chin in a defiant gesture and glared at Mary Jane. “I’m just tellin’ it like it is. Seems a shame that one of these girls don’t see what’s right in front of their eyes. Remember that old song Blake Shelton sang called ‘Delilah.’ It was one of the most played songs on the jukebox in my bar. The words talk about not seeing the love that’s right there beside a person.”
“Looks like there’s not going to be a dull moment here this holiday,” Rae said.
Tertia tucked an errant strand of curly light-brown hair up into the messy bun on top of her head. “Five down. Two to go,” she said with a yawn.
“What?” Ursula asked as she gave her sister another hug.
“Five sisters are here. We just need Ophelia and Bo to arrive, and then we’re all home,” Tertia explained as she rolled her suitcase into the house, hung her coat on the hall tree.
Ursula followed her and raised an eyebrow. “Did Mama tell you that Bernie had moved here?”
“She did not!” Tertia groaned. “Has she taken over my room for the week? I hate the idea of sharing a room with Rae. She snores.”
“Oh, no, sweet sister,” Ursula said. “She’s moved a little trailer out in the backyard. She’s here to stay until eternity.”
Tertia’s eyes got so wide that Ursula imagined them popping out of her head and rolling around on the hallway floor like marbles.
“What was Mama thinkin’?” Tertia whispered.
“From what I can understand, Mama is hoping that Bernie would light a fire under us all to get busy with marriage plans and making babies,” Ursula said. “If our aunt had her way, I would already be looking at three-tiered cakes and planning a Christmas wedding.”
“And Remington Baxter would be the groom?” Tertia asked.
“Yep,” Ursula answered just before the rest of the group made their way into the house. “He is a marked man for sure. Bernie is determined that one of us six sisters will be a Baxter before long.”
“Six?” Tertia whispered. “Have you forgotten how to count? There’s seven of us.”
“Seems Luna already has a feller picked out so she’s out of the market,” Ursula said and then whipped around to face Rae, who was headed toward the door to her bedroom. “You look tired. Did you have a lot of traffic on the trip?”
“She wouldn’t know,” Tertia answered. “She slept the whole seven hours, but come Sunday, she’s driving all the way back to the Panhandle and I’m going to sleep.”
Ursula picked up Tertia’s suitcase and then set it back down. “What have you got in there, bricks? It’ll take a forklift to get it up to your room.”
“She thinks she has to bring everything she owns even when she goes on a short trip like this,” Rae said.
“Just because you are on the police force doesn’t give you the right to boss me around,” Tertia fussed at her sister. “Besides, I’m older than you are.”
Ursula laughed out loud as she followed them upstairs. Some things never changed. Sisters argued, but Lord help anyone who tried to get between the two of them.
“What’s so funny?” Tertia asked.
“Y’all are, and I’m happy to have you here,” Ursula said and headed back down the stairs.
When she was on the bottom step, Joe Clay slung open the door. “I see that more of you girls made it in time for supper. Bo just texted that she’s about an hour away, and Ophelia’s plane has landed in Dallas.”
“Happy times,” Bernie said and threw one of her famous winks toward Ursula, “but they’ll be even happier in another year. I can feel it in my bones.”
All you can feel in your bones is whiskey and cigar smoke that’s settled into the marrow, Ursula thought. If you are waiting for me to lead the parade to the altar, then you had better order up an extra dose of patience.
Ursula could feel Remy’s presence a full minute before she realized that he was standing right behind Joe Clay. Her gaze shifted from her sisters, who were all talking at once, to Remy, and one of those delicious little shivers tiptoed down her spine.
Lord, girl! Just make the first move already, the voice in her head said.
“Ursula, darlin’,” Mary Jane said and motioned with her hand. “Come on into the kitchen and help me get the rest of supper ready.”
Ursula headed toward the kitchen with Bernie right behind her.
“I could actually see the sparks between y’all,” Bernie whispered. “Just imagine those delicious muscled-up arms holding you. If I was thirty years younger, I’d give you a run for your money. I bet he’s…”
“Shh.” Ursula gave Bernie a dirty look.
“Don’t shush me,” Bernie growled. “I’ve been around men my whole life. I know them, and that one likes you. If he was sitting at my bar, he would be shooting you all kinds of pickup lines.”
“You’d have to be more like fifty years younger to date Remy,” Ursula scolded.
Bernie’s forefinger snapped up like a pistol, and for a split second, Ursula thought the finger was going right up her nose. “Girl, I know more about how to please a man than you’ll know in a lifetime.”
Ursula grabbed her finger. “Then after supper, we’ll go to your trailer, and you can give me detailed instructions on what you know.”
“With that smart-ass attitude, you can learn for yourself,” Bernie said and marched into the kitchen with her head held high.
Mary Jane looked up from the counter where she was cutting up a salad. “Looks to me she’s right about Remy. That crush that I figured he had on you in high school is still there.”
“How did you know that… Are you…” Ursula stammered. “Who told you that?”
“Honey, we all knew,” Mary Jane said. “Only a girl that he was interested in could make him sit on that fence and stare over this way. I used that scene in my last book about the girls of the Paradise, only that guy finally got the girl to leave the Paradise and marry him.”
“Remy was staring at the Christmas decorations,” Ursula said.
“Yeah, right,” Bernie said.
Remy’s deep drawl floated from the foyer into the kitchen. “Joe Clay, I’ll unload the sleigh from the flatbed and then go load the trailer up with more boxes. You can visit with your daughters.”
Ursula was tired of the spotlight being on her, so she marched out of the kitchen and heard the door close before she made it to the foyer. “Daddy, I’ll go outside and help Remy. Tertia and Rae will be downstairs in a little bit, and they can help Mama and tell y’all about their trip.”
Joe Clay handed Ursula a jacket from the hall tree. “Honey, I overheard a little of what’s been said, and Remy wasn’t looking at the lights in March or in the middle of summer. I didn’t know then which girl he was pining after, but it’s pretty evident now.”
“Why didn’t you say something?”
“He was a nerd, and you never would have gone out with him, even if he had asked,” Joe Clay answered.
“I had a big crush on him too,” Ursula admitted. “Mama says he’s my muse now for the book I’m planning to write. I think maybe the Paradise is my muse, not a person or a critter of any kind, but evidently she was right about me needing to be back here for my creative juices to start flowing again. I’ve already got this wonderful idea for a historical novel.”
“Just like that!” Joe Clay chuckled. “You come home, and suddenly your writer’s block disappears?”
“Seems that way,” Ursula answered.
“I heard that last part, and that’s great news.” Remy poked his head in the door. “What are you going to write? Oh, and I just wanted to ask… Is there an order to the way I need to bring the boxes up to the house, Joe Clay?”
“Nope, just haul ’em up here anyway you can stack ’em,” Joe Clay said.
“You gave me the idea when you told me about Daisy,” Ursula told Remy as she followed him outside. “I want to write a story about what living next door to the Paradise was like for a new mail-order bride. Can we talk more about it later?”
“Sure thing,” Remy said with a grin.
What if he’s not one of my muses, or if he’s a one-trick pony, and I fall back into writer’s block when I finish this book? she wondered as she guided the full-sized sleigh off the back of the trailer.
Girl, that feller looks like he’s got more than one trick up his sleeve, Bernie’s voice came through loud and clear in her head. I can practically feel the heat between you two. Methinks the crush is alive and well twenty years later.
“Oh, hush!” Ursula muttered.
Remy set a load of boxes on the porch and turned around. “Did you say something?”
“Just fussin’ with the voices in my head again,” she said, but she couldn’t help but wonder why it took her so long to realize that Spanish Fort was where she belonged and to ask herself why she didn’t open her eyes years ago.
The house buzzed with the energy of all the sisters being home for the holiday the rest of the day, especially when Ophelia and Bo arrived. Dark clouds rolled in from the southwest, and a cold wind whipped down from the north, making it entirely too chilly that evening to sit out on the screened porch Joe Clay had built onto the back of the house. So they all gathered up in the living room.
“I’m going to build a fire, and we can visit until the rooster crows at dawn,” Joe Clay told the girls.
Ursula figured that sneaking out of the house for a walk to think about all the research she had done or simply going up to her room to work would be rude. But she was antsy to either get back to her story or get away from everyone talking at once so that she could have some peace and quiet and plot out the rest of the synopsis for her Daisy book. The woman was so real in her mind that Ursula could actually feel Daisy’s heart beating, but she still had to learn more about the culture of that day, more about the cattle drives, and more about the women’s rights movements.
Mary Jane had handed over the notebooks she had filled with what she had gleaned from the Paradise madam Miz Raven’s journals. Thank goodness they covered the days when the brothel was first in business, back when Daisy first came to Texas.
Ophelia, the only red-haired sister in the group, was telling a story about something that had happened the last week on her military base in Atlanta when the house phone rang. Ursula grabbed the receiver and answered it without even looking at the caller ID.
“Paradise,” she answered just like she’d been taught to do as a child.
“Is this Ursula?” Remy asked.
His deep Texas drawl left no doubt in Ursula’s mind as to who she was talking to. “That all depends on which one of the Simmons sisters you want to talk to.”
“I’d like to ask Ursula if she would like to ride down to Nocona with me for an ice cream cone,” he said. “I’ll bring Daisy’s diary if she will.”
She held her hand over the speaker and said, “Mama, Remy wants to know if I can go to Nocona for ice cream.”
“Your sisters…” Mary Jane started.
“He’s going to let me look at Daisy’s diary.” Ursula felt like she was a teenager begging to go on a date. Her heart pounded, and her pulse jacked up several notches. She wasn’t sure if it was because she would be spending time with Remy or if it was because she was going to peek inside that diary.
Rae interrupted before she could finish. “All in favor of our oldest sister going on a date, raise your hand.” Her hand shot up immediately, and all the others but Endora’s followed.
“I vote no because that’s being rude,” Endora protested. “We don’t get many days to be all together so you shouldn’t go running off with Remy—or with any other man, for that matter.”
“Don’t go judging all men by the one bad apple that you picked out of the barrel,” Bernie scolded.
Endora shot an ugly look across the room at her. “Men, other than Daddy, aren’t trustworthy.”
“Well, thank you, darlin’,” Joe Clay said and then grinned.
“Of course you can go with Remy,” Mary Jane said. “You need to spend time with your muse if you’re going to get your next book written, and I remember how excited I was when I found Madam Raven’s journals.” She turned to face Endora. “This isn’t a relationship as in a real date. It’s just a business meeting. Endora, you have nothing to worry about.”
Ursula took her hand away from the phone receiver. “Sorry it took so long, but the sisters had to vote on the issue.”
“You are thirty-three years old, aren’t you?” Remy asked with a chuckle.
“Yep, but when I come home, I’m only sixteen,” she answered. “Shall I drive to your house?”
“No, I’m in my truck now. I’ll be in your front yard in five minutes. Will I get shot if I just honk?” he teased.
Ursula stood up. “No need to test that idea. Mama says this is a business meeting, not a date. I’ll be waiting on the porch.” She ended the call and then turned back toward the living room. “Just so you all know…” She looked right into Bernie’s eyes. “This is not a date. Like Mama said, it’s a business meeting. He’s bringing an old diary written by the woman whose story I’m excited about telling.”
“If he kisses you good night, it’s a date,” Bernie called out.
Ursula had blushed more since coming back to the Paradise than she had in at least five years. Imagining Remy’s lips on hers and her body pressed up against his… Well, there was no way that wouldn’t make any woman’s face turn scarlet.
“Even a holy woman would get a little heated at that idea,” she whispered as she slipped into a jacket and picked up her purse. When she stepped out onto the porch, the headlights of Remy’s truck were already lighting up the limbs on the bare pecan trees. He hopped out of his vehicle, rounded the front end, and had the door open for her by the time she was off the porch. Maybe this was a date after all.
“Thank you,” she said as she slid into the passenger seat.
“You are very welcome,” he answered, closed the door, and then whistled “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” all the way around the truck.
The cab, right along with the seat, was toasty warm, and the aroma of his aftershave—something woodsy with a hint of vanilla—filled the whole truck. He got inside, put the vehicle in gear, and turned around in the driveway.
“It’s not Christmas until Thanksgiving is over,” she reminded him.
Remy made a right turn from the lane to the highway leading south to Nocona. “I’m only a day early, and I love the holidays.”
“It’s my favorite time of the year too,” she admitted. “The family is all together. There’s the fun of decorating and all the wonderful food. You’ll have to try Tertia’s brown-sugar fudge. She’ll have to go back to her job, but she’ll be back home for Christmas, and she gets to stay until right after the New Year, and she always makes at least one batch while she’s here.”
“When do the rest of the sisters come home for Christmas?” he asked.
“They all manage to get here on Christmas Eve at the latest, and they stay as long as they can,” she answered. “Daddy picks them up at the Dallas airport because Mama doesn’t like for them to drive at that time of year. I can see by your expression you’ve got another question.”
“I guess my poker face isn’t working so well,” he grinned. “Why do you call Joe Clay ‘daddy’? Have you always done that?”
“Nope,” she replied. “Endora started it, and we kind of fell in behind her, but he is our daddy. He’s the one who took care of us. Helped us with homework, dried our tears when we scraped our knees. He even helped us have a funeral for our cat when she died. Her name was Raven like the first madam at the Paradise. Those are things that daddies do for their kids.”
“What about your real dad?” Remy asked.
“That would be Martin Simmons, and we call him ‘Father,’” she answered. “His wife insisted on that from the time they got married. We used to see him for a day or two at Christmas, but these days, he might manage to arrange a dinner date with us once a year.”
Remy’s jaw visibly tightened. “If I ever have children, I will always be a part of their lives.”
“That’s because you are a good man,” Ursula told him. “Mama and Father grew apart instead of together. He wanted a son and instead he got seven daughters. That had to be a big disappointment. The two sets of twins are just over a year apart, so Mama had her hands full for many years, before and after the divorce. Looking back, I don’t know how she managed to write novels and raise all of us girls at the same time. Then add the time when she bought the Paradise and had it remodeled into the chaos. In my eyes, she’s even better than a superhero. Speaking of that, I’ve started researching”—she paused—“and…” She sighed.
“You want more information about Daisy and all that?” he finished for her.
“Yes, but I also need your permission to write a fictional story about Daisy and the man who sent for her,” she answered.
“I asked my mother if you could use Daisy’s writings,” Remy said. “She said you could have it as long as you need it, but you have to give her a signed copy of the novel when it is published, and maybe if it’s ever made into a movie, she’ll expect tickets to the premiere.”
“She will have both for sure.” Ursula couldn’t believe her good luck in having an actual day-by-day journal to read about the woman’s life. “Daisy has already taken up a spot in my heart and mind.”
“I can’t wait to read the book,” Remy said. “I’ve got the diary in the back seat, and you can take it home with you.”
“It’s going to be a historical romance,” she told him.
“There’s our old alma mater over there on the right. It hasn’t changed much in fifteen years.” He pointed to the school as they passed by it. “And, honey, for your information, or FYI, I’ve read all your books and your mother’s. I’m interested in seeing all of Daisy’s story and how she felt about the twists and turns that life handed her.”
Ursula liked the endearment honey and the way it made her feel all warm and cozy, but she wondered if it was just a slip of the tongue. “How do you feel about what life has handed you?”
Remy turned toward her and raised a dark brow. “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”
“You go first,” she said.
He shifted his gaze back to the deserted road. “Some of the paths I’ve traveled have been rough and full of potholes, but looking back, I can see that every experience taught me a lesson, so I’m okay with the choices I’ve made. They’ve all brought me to this evening, and I can’t complain.”
Was he flirting with her? Ursula wondered. Did he still have feelings for her like he had had in high school—like she had had for him back then?
“I haven’t had too many rough places in my path,” she said. “The ride was a little mundane. Life after we moved here was more of an adjustment for me than my sisters. At least I feel like it was since I was the oldest. Don’t get me wrong. There were good times when we were growing up, especially after Joe Clay came into our family as a daddy. Did you know that he didn’t like kids when Mama hired him to fix up the house for us?”
“Had no idea.” Remy sounded surprised. “He talks about you girls all the time.”
“We kind of hoodwinked him into changing his mind about kids,” she said with a grin as she remembered the plans that she and her sisters had made the first week Joe Clay was in the house. They’d had a secret meeting in one of the bedrooms—she couldn’t remember which one at the time—and decided that Joe Clay was a nice guy and that Mary Jane should go out with him. Would there be something like that in Daisy’s story if her betrothed already had children?
“I don’t imagine he had much of a chance with seven of you working on him,” Remy said with a chuckle.
“Nope, he sure didn’t,” she said.
“And after you graduated from high school?” he asked.
“University in Tyler. I was a small-town… No, that’s not right. I was a ghost town girl tossed into a city the size of Tyler, and I was more than a little intimidated,” she answered. “I didn’t do the sorority thing, and I didn’t have enough confidence to go to parties, so I studied. That served me well after I got my master’s, because the administration hired me to teach English, Comp 101, and creative writing, but nothing much changed other than that I worked on my novels when I had time.”
“‘Two roads diverged…’” Remy said as he drove into Nocona.
“And which one should we take, but that could mean a lot of things,” Ursula said.
“Yes, it could,” he agreed with a nod. “I’ve got a question that has nothing to do with where we’ve been or where we’re going. Why do all you girls have such unusual names?”
“Mama named each of us after a character in the book that she was writing at the time,” Ursula answered. “Their names kind of marked Bo and Rae. Rae grew up to be a policewoman, just like the character in Mama’s book, and Bo has been in Nashville for years, trying to get a toe in the country-music door, just like the character in the book with her name.”
Remy made a left-hand turn into the Dairy Queen parking lot. “And you? Did you turn out like your character?”
“No, I’m not a thing like her. She was a superhero kind of woman,” Ursula answered. From what she could see in the windows, the Dairy Queen was crowded that evening. “Looks like we better hustle if we’re going to get a booth, and I do believe that a Peanut Buster parfait is calling my name, right along with that journal you promised me a peek into.”
“Like I said, you are welcome to take the journal and keep it as long as you want,” Remy offered as he got out of his truck and jogged around the front end to open the door for her.
She slid off the seat and took a couple of steps to the right so he could close the door. “I’ve been calling the man in the story ‘Fred.’ Do you know what his name was?”
“Yep,” Remy said. “Daisy was my mother’s great-great-grandmother. Her husband’s name was Jack Dulaney.” He stopped talking long enough to hold the door into the Dairy Queen open for her. “The story has it that she was a spitfire Irish woman with a temper to match her fiery-red hair.”
“Which fits right in with my idea of what she would look like,” Ursula said with a smile. Jack seemed to go with Daisy so much better than Fred. “I can’t believe that you are trusting me with something as precious as the journal. It belongs in a museum.”
“Probably,” Remy agreed, “but Mama loves romance books, and she can’t wait to see what you do with the story.”
“No pressure there,” Ursula said with a sigh. “You said that your mother read the journal?”
“My grandmother did. My mother read the first couple of pages, and a lot of that was about what she cooked that day or how many shirts she hung on the line. Mama said Daisy had tight handwriting, and she wrote very small. Probably to keep from using so much paper. I just hope you aren’t disappointed in what she wrote and that you get some ideas from it.”
“I’m sure I will.” Ursula thought of the journals that Joe Clay found when they were remodeling the Paradise about the seven ladies who worked there. Her mother’s books based on them were instant bestsellers, and then a television series based on the series was made and went through six seasons.
“Hello, Mr. Baxter.” A young lady behind the counter smiled at him. “What can I get y’all this evening?”
“Two Peanut Buster parfaits and a couple of cups of coffee,” he said as he pulled out his wallet and put a bill on the counter. “Keep the change.”
“Thanks a lot,” she said.
“Are you still working toward an English degree?” he asked.
“Just got one more year, and then I’ll be looking for a teaching job,” the young lady answered as she rang up the sale and put the tip in her pocket. “You want to give me a recommendation?”
“Any time,” he nodded and then guided Ursula through an archway to the left.
“Hey, Ursula! Is that really you? I haven’t seen you since we graduated.” Derrick Marlow waved from the first booth they passed. “What are you doing back in town?”
“I live here now,” she answered without stopping. A vision popped into her head of the cocky expression on his face when he told her that she was lucky to be at the prom with him, so she could get in the back seat of his car and show him how much she appreciated him for asking her. Even after all the years that had passed, she had no intention of even carrying on a polite conversation with the man. She could be forgiving—some of the time—but not today.
With his hand on her back, Remy guided her to an empty booth at the very back of the room and waited for her to slide in before he took a seat across from her. She missed the sheer warmth of his touch and wished he had chosen to sit right beside her.
“How often have you run into Derrick since prom night?” Remy asked.
“This is the first,” Ursula answered. “I hope it won’t happen very often. That will be one of the benefits of being a hermit, living in Spanish Fort and writing full-time this next year. I get to spend more time with characters and less time with people like him.”
“You don’t think you’ll miss mingling with people?” Remy asked.
“Not one bit,” she answered without hesitation. “How about you? If you could be a full-time rancher, would you want to teach?”
“Yes, I would.” He smiled. “I love teaching. I do like the hours and the calendar too. I have time off in the summer and during holidays and breaks. It’s like having the best of two jobs.”
“I counted holidays as an opportunity to buckle down and meet a novel deadline, and I loved being able to work in my pajamas,” Ursula told him.
A different waitress than the one who had taken the order brought their ice cream. “Here you go. Enjoy! Are you one of the Simmons girls, maybe Ursula? My daughter, Cynthia, went to school with you. She’s married now and has three kids.”
“Yes, ma’am, I’m Ursula,” she answered. “I remember Cynthia. Tell her hello for me.”
She was so glad that her aunt Bernie didn’t hear that comment about someone her age already having three children.
“I will,” the lady said. “Both of us have read your books and all your mother’s as well and really enjoyed them.”
“Thank you so much,” Ursula said. “I love hearing that a reader likes my stories.”
“Hope to see you around. I’ll tell Cynthia that I got to see you,” the lady said and hurried away when a bell rang to announce that another order was ready.
Remy picked up his spoon and dug deep into the parfait. “I feel pretty special.”
“Why’s that?” Ursula followed his lead and took a bite of her ice cream.
“I’m out with a celebrity,” he answered. “Maybe that’s why Derrick hasn’t taken his eyes off you since we walked past. He might be trying to wrangle a date so he can get at your bank account.”
“Knowing that he’s staring at the back of my head gives me the creeps, and he might get a surprise if he saw my bank account,” she replied without even a hint of a smile. “What I have might last through this next year since I have free room and board at the Paradise.”
“If it doesn’t, you can always hop over the fence and help feed cattle and wash dishes. I’ll pay you well,” Remy teased.
“Then I could really walk around in Daisy’s shoes,” she joked right back at him.
“Maybe we could borrow two or three young’uns just so you could get the right feel.” His dark eyes twinkled.
“Did Jack have children for Daisy to take care of?” Ursula asked.
“Mama said there were two, and rumor had it that they were hellions. Seems his wife had run away with another man and left them behind for him to raise. She divorced him too, which was uncommon in those days. I guess that’s the main reason he needed to get married again,” Remy answered.
“I’m pretty sure I can fake it,” Ursula bantered.
“Oh, really?” He raised an eyebrow.
“I have managed to write a few works of fiction,” Ursula said. “They are contemporaries and set in a large city and not a ghost town, but hey, love is love and happy-ever-after happens all the time. It’ll be interesting to see if Daisy tamed those kids and if she fell in love with Jack for real.”
“Do you really believe that?” Remy asked.
“Believe what?”
“That happy-ever-after happens all the time?” He looked straight at her without blinking.
“No, I don’t,” she answered honestly, “but when it does, it has to be wonderful.”
“I can agree with that for sure,” he said. “I’m really enjoying this evening, Ursula.”
“Me too,” she whispered.
Sometimes miracles happen in the real world, not just in romance novels, her inner voice said.