“No?”
She laughed. “We’ve never fought more in our lives, but she’s in the right. It’s time for me to accept her help, give her the wheel, and stop trying to act like I got this.” That’s when I saw the tears. I swallowed, stunned. I’d never seen Emory cry before. What was happening? What should I do?
“It’s okay,” I said automatically, just in case she was embarrassed. I felt an uncomfortable lump in my throat, too.
“No, no. That’s just it. I’m just fine letting you see this.” She laughed, grabbed a napkin, and wiped her tears. “I never would have allowed this to happen just a few months ago. The new me. It feels…really nice.”
Sarah arrived back and slid into the chair next to Emory. She looked at me and then Emory and nodded. “It got serious in here, huh?”
I smiled at Emory when I said, “We were talking about Emory’s journey.”
A similar smile slowly took shape on Sarah’s face. “I’m so proud of her, Skyler.” She reached over and squeezed Em’s hand. “And her doctor thinks things are going really well.”
I exhaled. “I’m relieved to hear that.”
“Moral of the story,” Emory said. “I’ve learned to take nothing for granted because no one is guaranteed a tomorrow. Put all your cards on the table. We don’t have the luxury of holding back from the people we love.”
I absorbed the advice, the words carrying that much more power after seeing the two of them battling something bigger. I’d been honest with Carrie about my growing feelings, but I had held back the one word that felt ridiculously scary. But I loved her, plain and simple. Things were going really well between us, and that should give me the encouragement I needed to put myself out there on that lonely platform and take the ultimate leap. She was everything I wanted, and I shouldn’t leave it unsaid.
I’d never told anyone I was in love with them before.
But Carrie was the one. I knew that as plainly as I knew my shirt was blue. I wanted to be with her forever and wondered what she’d think about that.
“Sorry about that, everyone,” Carrie said, giving her head a shake. But there was a new energy about her now. She seemed charged up, wired.
“What was that about?” I asked.
“Long story. But everything is fine.” She placed her hand on top of mine. “Can I update you later? It’s boring work stuff.”
“Of course.” But she was distracted, and it showed. She partially checked out of the group conversation after that, her gaze roaming the room as if her thoughts had hold of her. We’d had a great night, but things had shifted noticeably after that call.
Once we were alone together in the car, I turned to her as she drove. “So, what’s going on? Something has you preoccupied.”
“You think so?” She watched the road. “No. No. Nothing major. Just Corey with some interesting gossip.”
Her agent. “What was it?”
“WBAA in Seattle is looking for an anchor, and he wondered if I’d be interested.”
I frowned. “What happened to theirs?”
“Pregnant and choosing to not come back.”
“Oh. Well, good for her, then.” A pause. A cold shiver moved through me. “Are you considering it?” No. Surely not. But I could hear my own heartbeat as I waited for the answer.
“Not actively, no. But you know what? It is an interesting turn of events. Isn’t it?” She tapped the beat of the music on her steering wheel. “It’s an excellent market. Seattle.”
She wasn’t wrong. San Diego was a top-thirty market. But Seattle was a top-twenty, a step up. I didn’t like the way this felt. My throat constricted. Uncomfortable, I rolled down the window. The newly autumnal air was chilly, and the burst of it across my face helped me breathe easier. I gulped it in. “You just seem, I don’t know, happy to hear about it.”
She looked over at me and seemed to understand that I was upset, on high alert. She turned down the radio. “I’m not trying to leave you, Skyler. In fact, that’s the last thing I want to do. God, I can’t imagine that.”
“Yeah?” I exhaled in more ways than one. “It’s really good to hear that because for a moment I was worried you had one foot on the road to Seattle, and we’d be battling it out on the nightly news each night.” I added a laugh I didn’t really feel.
“No. I’m simply enjoying that my name came up during a time when it feels like the industry has put me out to pasture. A top-notch station has expressed interest. In me. It’s…nice. I guess I’m reveling for a few minutes.”
“Well, of course they have. You’re amazing and at the top of the list of badass anchors.” I could easily celebrate with her now, knowing that I wouldn’t be losing her to this opportunity. “I would seek you out if I had an opening. They’d be idiots not to.”
She reached over and touched my cheek. “Thank you for saying that. There are moments where I sit confidently, happy as I look back over my career, and others when I’m terrified about moving on from it.”
“You don’t have anything to be terrified about. Really cool things are happening for you. For us.”
“They are, aren’t they?” She smiled big.
We drove on, enjoying the chilly ocean breeze and the stars twinkling over us like a blessing. Doing my best to make out the darkened waves as we drove along the shoreline, I ruminated on Emory’s words about making myself vulnerable to the people that mattered because nothing was ever guaranteed. I looked over at Carrie, her beautiful profile, as she studied the road, and my heart swelled and squeezed with love for her.
It was time to say the words. Three little utterances, but they seemed so terrifying. I just had to summon the courage and manifest the perfect moment. Carrie was my future, and every last part of me knew it.
“Carrie, I have to say something.” Everything in me hummed with anticipation, the fear-laced kind. But there was excitement there, too. I focused on that.
Her brows dropped and she glanced over at me. “Okay, what would you like to say?”
“This isn’t the perfect moment. I know that much. But I feel like I can’t wait another second to tell you that I love you. I really, really do. I’m in love with you. There. Said.”
She didn’t speak, and I wondered briefly if I’d just gone and freaked her the hell out, ruining that perfectly wonderful thing we had going by saying the words too soon. No. Uh-uh. I didn’t believe that. I didn’t ruin anything because my feelings were real and present already. Announced or unannounced, they’d informed every moment we spent together, and it was time to acknowledge that, once and for all.