It took Ian a moment to find the words. He wanted 371.

just the right ones, but in the end, he couldn't find them. So he simply said, "Stay."

Selena gasped, smiled up at Ian-so painfully beautiful, it took all his willpower not to crush her against him.

Back on the porch, Maeve let out a scream and came running down the steps.

Elliot looked from face to face in obvious confusion. "You're just being polite."

"No," Ian said.

Selena squeezed his hand, then let go, moving toward Elliot. "I told you once that you were my family, Elliot. I believe this is what families do. They grow. One person at a time, one day at a time, they grow and change and stay wondrously the same."

Elliot touched her face, a fleeting, emotional gesture. "There's no Agnes anymore," he said quietly. Tears filled his eyes again, and he seemed unashamed of them. His mouth curved in a tender smile. "You're offering me a family."

Family. Ian heard the reverence in the word, and it moved him. This big, scarred man had wanted what they all wanted, what they'd all found when only they'd opened their hearts.

Elliot could nod right now and it would be done. He could release Selena, release himself from their past.

Together, they could all create the future.

It was so simple, so incredibly simple. Selena had been right from the very beginning. The world came down to choices, simple, straightforward choices.

"Elliot," she said in that soft, throaty voice, the one that always mesmerized Ian. "You belong here with us."

Maeve moved up beside Elliot, placed a small hand on his huge shoulder. "Stay, Elliot."

Elliot looked up. Above the women's heads, he stared at Ian, flashed him a last, silent question.

Very slowly, Ian nodded.

A grin broke across Elliot's big face. "I'd like to stay."

A whooping holler rose from the crowd and they surged forward, shaking Elliot's hand, patting his back.

Welcoming him.

Selena turned to Ian then, and he knew that if he lived to be a hundred, he'd never forget that moment.

That look of shining, brilliant love in her eyes.

She moved into the circle of his arms. He held her, felt her melt against him, and knew that this time it was forever. He closed his eyes, heard the distant rumble of the sea, the ebb and flow of the horse's breath, the murmuring of voices in the background. Somewhere a gull cawed, and it sounded like the cry of a newborn babe. G.o.d's exquisite symphony.

Slowly he opened his eyes and gazed down at her, loving her so much, it hurt. "Ah, G.o.ddess," he said in a thick voice. "I can hear the music at last."

Epilogue.

They say that the old mansion on the isolated coast of Maine still stands, waiting for a loving, restorative hand to bring it back to its former glory. Trees and underbrush have crept across the once-shorn lawn, winding slick, green tentacles around the peeling porch rails. A thousand white wildflowers grow stubbornly amidst the weeds, their fragrance a sweet reminder of days gone by.

No one visits the old asylum anymore, no one has in years. The many children of Ian and Selena flew from the nest long ago, scattering like dust in the wind, raising their children and their grandchildren in other, more modern places.

But every now and then, the locals creep through the weeds to gaze at the old place, and even now, more than a century later, the house of the broken windows welcomes them. Over the years, more than one person has claimed to hear laughter. Some say it is the wind, others the restless spirits of the lunatics who once lived here.

The children know, though, and the grandchildren, too. This wild, lonely house by the sea is like no other, haunted not by demons or sorcerers or evil, but by the memory of a pa.s.sionate, undeniable love.

For when the night is dark and the tide is low and the wildflowers glow like scattered diamonds across the

blackened yard, the sound of laughter lingers in the air. And the lovers hear it as they stand along the desolate sh.o.r.e, waiting for the moon.

end.