Page 47 of Cabin Fever

All I can hear are sniffs, and then Dahlia starts.

“Theo. When we were kids, I thought you were too serious. I made it my personal mission to annoy the hell out of you until you finally jumped off the tire swing or walked through the creek in your bare feet.”

Finn and I find our way back to each other. His eyes glisten.

“There was just something about you that got under my skin. I couldn’t figure you out, and I wanted to. Though we spent some time apart, you were always there in the back of my mind. The string I couldn’t ever let go of.”

Holy crap. It’s like Dahlia’s narrating my inner thoughts. Was this just what happened when you grew up with two cute boys on your block? You fall in love as seven-year-olds, and they are forever imprinted on your hearts? They should advertise that in the show home pamphlets.

“But that’s not why I’m standing here today. We could’ve met up those years ago and discovered that we’d become totally different people. That you were still living in one of your parent’s basement or something.”

That draws a collective chuckle.

Dahlia draws a deep breath and reaches for Theo’s hands, her handkerchief pinned between them. “I’m here because you already are a man who deserves my love, Theo. You make me laugh. You make me better. You keep me grounded when I want to get lost in the clouds, and I like to think you enjoy flying with me up there sometimes.”

She sniffs and shakes her hair from her face. “I love you, Theo, and I promise to work toward the best version of myself. To always make our home a place you want to come home to. And on your birthday, to make that peanut butter chocolate cheesecake you’re obsessed. Except when we’re traveling, because sometimes we end up being out of town on your birthday.”

They’re both laughing so hard, I barely decipher that last line. Finn’s grinning so wide, his dimples are caverns. And then his mouth forms a shape. A word.

My brows pinch as I try to decipher it. You?

“And everything else you said,” Dahlia finishes. “I love you. No takebacks. Ever.” She motions to Finn, shaking us out of our trance.

Father Aldo waits for Finn to produce the rings. He pulls Dahlia’s from his breast pocket and hands it to Theo, then grips his shoulder before stepping back into place.

Finn's eyes come to me one more time, and then they drop.

“By the power vested in me, and by the authority of a house rule older than any of us . . .”

Theo cups my sister's face as the sun bathes them in light. Dahlia rises on her bare toes, and this is it. The moment eleven months of my spreadsheets, tabs, and contingencies were always for. My sister. Kissed, married, laughing against her husband's mouth while the people we love come to their feet roaring.

Half of me is entirely there, joy rushing through me like a current. And the other half is watching the best man six feet away. Applauding, smiling, and refusing to look at me.

The recessional is a blur of music and thrown petals, and then I’m swept into my maid of honor duties. I'm handed the bouquet, the veil, somebody's phone, and Aunt Bev. I'm fluffing the train for the photographer, wrangling family units into the photo order Dahlia and I planned in the airport. It’s almost an hour before I surface long enough to scan the beach for Finn.

He's not with the groomsmen, who finished their photos and have their trousers rolled, ferrying chairs. He's not at the arch or at the waterline where Theo’s dipping Dahlia in the golden surf while the photographer loses her mind. I do a casual full three-sixty, pretending to hunt for my water bottle, but he’s nowhere to be found.

“. . . should’ve gone in the car with Finn,” Marisol says behind me.

“Hm?” I turn, pretending I thought she was talking to me.

She looks over. “Oh, nothing, I was just saying we should’ve caught a ride back to the ship. You know, when the pictures were over.”

Sadie nods. “I’m sweating like a pig. I need a full shower before the reception tonight.”

I smile and say something about wanting to jump into the ocean but not wanting to wreck the dress. And then regret it because Marisol and Sadie jump into a discussion about whether we’ll ever wear the dresses again or if dry cleaning could get seawater out of the fabric.

When we load back onto the transports with the Winstons, Finn’s seat is empty. I sit with the garment bag and the leftover programs and my sister's second-best lip gloss in my lap, watching the beach disappear. Wondering what happened during Dahlia’s vows that made Finn want to vanish with it.

Chapter Seventeen

The reception is in the aft lounge, the room flipped by Pam's people in six hours into something out of a dream. The two-story windows full of open ocean and a rising moon, the same hurricane lanterns from the beach down the center of long tables, the parquet cleared for dancing. The ship pulled out of Grand Cayman at seven, and the whole island is a string of lights sliding backward off the edge of the world.

My sister is married.

And Finn is still missing.

I started to panic about an hour ago when he wasn’t in our room. Then when Garrett and Rhys both asked if I’d seen him, I went straight to Theo and Dahlia. They said he had to take care of something, but they weren’t sure what.