Marrying Daisy Bellamy Read Online Free PDF

Daisy, she thought. Figure out your own heart. How hard could it be?
    Torn and restless, she set down the invitation and walked away, her chest already squeezing tight with emotion. Julian had always had that effect on her, from the first moment they’d met as teenagers.
    Yet in spite of the diverging paths their lives took, their connection persisted. During their college years—she at SUNY New Paltz, he at Cornell—they managed to see each other on rare occasions. Whenever their school holidays synched up and didn’t bump up against his ROTC training and duties, they stole time together. And on each occasion, the yearning that had begun all those summers ago flared, more intense than ever. It seemed to grow despite all the life events that intervened. They continued to seek each other out, but it was never enough. She didn’t understand it, tried to rationalize it away, because being with a guy like Julian seemed so impossible. Their lives kept leading them away from each other. He had the ROTC and Cornell, and she had Charlie, work and…Charlie’s dad. No wonder things had never worked out for her and Julian.
    Sometimes when Daisy fantasized about being with Julian, she tried to imagine him and Charlie together, like father and son.
    But the painful fact was, Julian seemed adamant about not taking on that role. He was nice enough to Charlie, yet she could see Julian keeping his distance. She recalled a time when Charlie had slipped and called Julian “Daddy.” Julian had winced visibly and said, “I’m not your daddy, boy.”
    Little had he known the remark would give rise to a nickname. From that day onward, Charlie had dubbed Julian “Daddy-boy.”
    When you were a single mom, Daisy reminded herself, your life was dictated by the needs of your child. Charlie needed a dad , not a daddy-boy.
    Against all expectations, Logan was a pretty great dad. Like Daisy, he’d earned his degree from SUNY New Paltz and settled in Avalon. He had bought an insurance agency from a guy who was retiring. Business was brisk. Despite hard economic times, people still needed to cover their asses in case something happened. Daisy didn’t know whether or not he felt passionate about his career, but he was totally devoted to Charlie. So far, their unconventional arrangement was working out.
    Sometimes she caught herself wondering if this was really supposed to be her life.
    She sighed, picked up the invitation once more, and turned the reply card over and over in her hands. The commissioning ceremony sounded important. It was important. Everything Julian had done since high school was important. With no money, nothing but brains and ambition, he had done exactly as she’d suggested that summer. He had qualified for ROTC to finance college. It was the only time she’d given advice and it had actually worked out. In exchange for his Ivy League education, he owed the next four years of his life to the air force, longer if he later qualified for pilot training.
    This service incursion meant he might be sent anywhere in the world.
    Anywhere but here, she thought, thinking about the place she called home—impossibly small, impossibly quaint Avalon, of absolute zero strategic value to the military.
    She double-checked the date of the event.
    Yes, she was free that day. Wendela’s Wedding Wonders employed several photographers and technicians, and Daisy wasn’t scheduled for anything that weekend. She could ask Logan to watch Charlie, and she could go to the event in Ithaca, camera in hand, to document this most auspicious moment.
    She wanted to go. She needed to go. She needed to find some serious private time with Julian. After years of yearning for him, years of stumbling toward each other, only to be pulled apart by circumstances, she finally saw her chance.
    Once and for all, she would do what she should have done long ago.
    It was time to get real with Julian, with