When we arrived at Joe's his wife immediately hugged me.

"Hi I'm Martha." She says with a huge smile. "This is Jeremy, Hannah and Jake."

"Hi it's nice to meet you. Thank you for having me."

"No problem dear. Have a seat make yourself at home." Martha says showing me the way to the living room.

"Honey, change of plans. Lucy's boyfriend is on his way here." Joe says.

"Oh ok. He's not ok with you staying with strangers?" Martha asks.

"I think that's part of it but I also need my medicine." I answer.

"Are you sick? I have some medicines we could give you?" Martha states.

"No I'm not that kind of sick. I have cancer and take a chemo pill."

"Oh honey I'm so sorry." Martha says rubbing my arm.

"Thanks. I'll be ok though." I smile.

She smiles at me. "That's a good attitude to have."

"I'm trying. I ended up here because I kind of threw a fit over their pity. I don't want anyone to feel sorry for me."

"I understand honey but you have to understand them too. They probably don't know how to act or treat you. Not only is it scary for you but they are also scared." Martha explains.

"I didn't think about it that way. I do feel bad for storming out on them."

"Sounds like you have a good guy though if he's willing to drive here for you."

I smile  and my phone rings. I excuse myself  and step outside. It's Zane.

Hey Zane.

We are here now.

Oh ok you're 20 minutes away?

I'm sure they will wait for you for dinner.

They are pretty nice.

I promise you Zane.

Alright see you when you get here.

Love you too.

I press end on my phone and slide it back into my pocket. I lean on the pillar of their porch and breath in the fresh air. It's quite here, I hear the crickets and no cars driving by. I could live here.

Martha comes outside and hands me a cold glass of iced tea. It's refreshing and delicious. "Was that your honey?"

"Yeah he will be here soon." I answer.

"Well then we will wait for him."

"You don't mind?" I ask.

"Not at all. The more the merrier. We don't get many visitors around here."

"Thank you." I say and see headlights coming up the driveway and I can only imagine it's Zane. As the car gets closer I see that it's definitely Zane and my heart jumps out of my chest.

Martha turns and walks into the house. "I'll give you two a few minutes." The door shuts and I stand there waiting for Zane to come toward me.

Zane gets out of the car and I don't know if he purposely slammed the door or if it did it on its own. As soon as I see his face clearly come into the light I see that he's angry.

"Don't EVER do this again!" He yells.

"Shhh Zane they can probably hear you." I say.

"I don't care! I was worried sick! Everyone was." He pulls me into his arms and holds me.

"I'm sorry Zane." I reach up and plant a kiss on his cheek and realize there is wetness. Pulling back I see Zane actually has tears rolling down his cheeks. I do my best to wipe them away. "Zane why are you crying?"

"You scared me to death, Lucy."

"I'm sorry. I really am Zane."

He pulls me into him again and leans down kissing my lips with desperation and holding me tightly against his body. His tongue forces my lips to part and it enters my mouth caressing against my tongue. If I don't break this up now, I am going to throw him into the car and take him right then and there. I pull away breathless.

"Ha sorry. I missed you." Zane says.

"No no, don't apologize. I missed you too. But let's go inside."

Zane takes my hand as I lead him inside and introduce him to everyone. Zane seems to like them as much as I do. Joe leads us into the dining room to sit at the table for dinner.

"Thank you for keeping Lucy safe." Zane says to Joe.

"No problem. She's a joy to have around."

I smile and place my hand on Zane's leg giving it a squeeze. He looks over at me and smiles and it's that same damn smile that always makes me melt.

"So you two will stay the night, yeah?" Martha asks us. "It's an awful long drive for you to do tonight."

"If you don't mind us staying, we'd appreciate it." Zane says.

"Absolutely. We have a guest room that you can take." Joe says.

Hannah comes running into the room and grabs my hand saying she has to show me something. Hannah is 6 years old with beautiful blond curly hair and grey eyes like Joes. I smile at Hannah and laugh as she pulls me to her room.

Hannah looks me dead in the eyes and asks me if I would mind if she asked Zane on a date. My heart melted at thought of this precious little girl crushing on Zane. It was so cute, so sweet and so innocent.

"Well I don't know Hannah." I say. "I don't mind but maybe you should ask your parents first." I look up and see Martha standing in the doorway with a big old grin on her face.

"So baby girl you have your first crush huh?" She asks Hannah.

"He's really cute mama." Hannah says blushing.

"Well baby girl ask him for ice cream."

"Oh I love ice cream mama!" Hannah's eyes get real big and she bolts out of the room, running downstairs.

Martha looks at me and giggles. "Now he better not break my baby girl's heart."

"What about me? He's going to break my heart if he goes out with another girl." I wink and link arms with Martha as we walk down the steps.

Stopping on the landing we peak over the railing and Zane is on one knee so he's looking Hannah in the eyes. Her soft little voice asks him if he would like to go get ice cream with her. He chuckles looks up seeing Martha and I looking over the railing mouthing to him to say yes.

Zane takes her little hand in his and tells her he would be honored to be her date for ice cream. I can't help it but smile at this amazing man in front of me that a few months ago had promises of destructing my heart.

Martha and I come down the rest of the steps and Hannah turns seeing us. Mama, Lucy! He said yes! I giggle, scooping Hannah into my arms and swinging her around. I look over at Zane and mouth thank you to him. He nods his head and grins ear to ear.

Martha goes into the dining room announcing to everyone that Hannah is going on her first date. Joe looks up alarmed.

"Zane has said yes to an ice cream date with Hannah." I say with excitement.

"Well Zane I guess we need to have the talk then." Joe says winking.

"Alright Hannah lets go get you ready for your date!" I say as we run upstairs and she pulls her favorite dress out.

"I wish you all could come too. I'm pretty nervous." Hannah says to me.

"Awe honey. It will all be ok. He's a great guy."

She blushes and hugs me tight. "I like you. I wish you didn't have to leave tomorrow."

"I'll tell you what. I will keep in touch and we can visit and you and your family can come visit us too."

"Really!"

"Yep I cross my heart!" I take her hand. "Come on Zane is waiting for you."

We walk down the stairs and Zane stands there with his hands behind his back in a very gentlemen like stance. We get to the bottom of the steps and I kiss his cheek as he takes Hannah's hand and walks her to the car. He helps her in and gets her buckled into her car seat. He gives a cheery wave and gets into the car.

I turn to Martha smiling. She slinks her arm around my shoulder and tells me I have a good man right there. Joe nods his head agreeing and places his hand on my shoulder.

Jeremy and Jake come running outside saying how unfair it is that she gets to go get ice cream and they didn't.

"Don't worry I have it covered." Joe says.

"Oh yeah?" Martha asks.

"Zane's going to bring us some home too." He lets out a belly laugh.

"I can't believe you allowed him to take Hannah out. You barely know us." I say.

"Oh Lucy we don't need to know you long to know you are good people. He will take care of our little girl I just know it." Martha says.

Joe walks over to the fire pit in their side yard and starts a fire. Martha brings some chairs over and Joe comes with more iced tea.

"I could get used to this." I say leaning back in my chair staring up at the stars.

"You guys are welcome anytime. Too bad you can't stay longer." Joe says.

"Well maybe we can. Let me talk to Zane."

"Really? I can take you all on a horse ride tomorrow!" Martha says.

"I've always wanted to do that. You have me convinced for sure. So are you nervous at all?" I ask.

"Not at all. They should be back soon." Joe says. "Ha they better be. I want my damn ice cream."

We all join in laughing and Jake comes out with marshmallows, chocolate and graham crackers for s'mores.

"If we can't have ice cream we got s'mores." Jake says sticking his tongue out at no one in particular.

I laugh and throw a marshmallow at Jake, which then turned to a full on marshmallow fight. All of sudden a marshmallow hits me square in the cheek.

Joe holds his hands up in the air revealing the marshmallow gun. I pick a marshmallow up and launch it back at him as hard as I can. He just bats it away laughing at me.

"You guys are a lot of fun. Really thank you so much for everything." I say.

"No need to thank us, it's our pleasure having you here." Joe says.

"Have you lived here a long time?" I ask.

"I built this place, right before Martha and I got married."

"How long have you been married?"

"We've been married 15 years." Martha answers.

"Wow that's a pretty long time. I hope to have the kind of love you two have."

"You do sweetheart. Trust me you do. But after today you may have to fight Hannah to get him back." Joe jokes.

"She's a really cute kid. You have 3 beautiful children." I say.

"Thank you dear. Do you plan on having any children of your own?" Martha asks.

"I'd like to one day. Zane and I just have really gotten together a few months ago, but I feel like I could spend the rest of my life with him."

"How did you meet?" Joe asks.

"His brother is my best friend. He had Zane move here to get straightened out."

"Straightened out how?" Asks Joe again.

"He apparently partied hard with drugs, alcohol and women. He got clean and moved to Seattle for Paul to help him stay clean and get on the right track. Then he introduced us and made me promise not to fall for him and well I guess the heart wants what the heart wants. Paul saw him as a project though and that upset him. He took off and obviously came back weeks later."

"He's not a project and I don't think you see him that way." Martha says.

"I don't. He's incredible, makes me laugh, god he can cook and he's been there for me through a lot so far."

"I think you saved him." Joes says.

"Maybe I did and maybe he saved me."

Thinking back to what it was like before Zane, it wasn't as exciting. It was lonely and my nights were cold. I didn't know what it was like to have a constant in my life. Today I get to know that because he took a chance on me and I took a chance on him.