Chapter 22: Edie's Ring

He took me out onto the cannery pier, where the noise from the clubhouse came through the wall as a low happy roar.

The tide was in.

The water slapped at the pilings, and the harbor lights shook on it.

Cade stood with the white envelope in both hands and did not hand it over.

"I had a speech again," he said.

"Do you still?"

"It left when you stood up in there."

I leaned on the rail beside him and waited.

He took a breath and tore the end of the envelope.

First he took out a small velvet bag, and out of that he tipped a ring into his palm.

It was a plain gold band, narrow, with nothing on it.

"I bought it the winter after Reno," he said. "I had no right to."

"Then why?"

"I carried it in my glove box for three years, in case I ever worked up the nerve to knock on your door."

"You never did."

"I got as far as the clinic parking lot twice."

I held out my left hand.

It was not steady.

He slid the band onto my finger, and it fit.

I never asked how he knew my size.

I looked at it for a long time, and then I looked at my right hand, where Edie's garnet sat in the lamplight.

"They'll go on opposite hands," I said. "Edie's stays on the right. Yours goes on the left, because I'm choosing it."

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