Kiss It Better

“SOME WEDDING,” Sabrina Bliss said to her sister. “I nearly lost it when the minister got to the ‘till death do us part’ part.” Mackenzie would understand what she meant.

“That’s why I pinched you!” Mackenzie tried to put on a scolding face, but warm laughter bubbled up instead. “It’s so rude to laugh in the middle of a wedding ceremony.”

Sabrina smiled, feeling oddly light and cheerful despite her doubts about the marriage. “You’ll notice I didn’t object, either.”

Mackenzie blinked. “Do you have objections?”

“Mmm…no, not really.”

“But you’re not optimistic.”

Sabrina tucked her fist beneath her chin, fingers tightening around the small velvet box in her palm. She should give it up, but…she just wasn’t sure about letting go.

“You know I don’t believe in fairy-tale endings,” she said.

Sabrina and Mackenzie had come out onto the balcony of the Fontaine Hotel to catch a quiet moment together, away from the reception. They’d found their newlywed parents, Charlie and Nicole Bliss, dancing beneath the starry sky on one of the brick paths of the hotel’s rose garden. Light and music spilled from the open French doors, dappling the scene with a particularly picturesque version of romance.

Bah, humbug, Sabrina thought, without much conviction. Her emotions were too close to the surface. Luckily she had plenty of experience in not letting them show.

Mackenzie was the opposite. And clearly a goner. She’d welled up throughout the ceremony, and now her gaze was pinned on their parents, her big dark eyes shining with hope.

A couple of months ago, Charlie and Nicole Bliss had confessed to their daughters that they’d never quite managed to fall out of love despite their divorce of long standing. They’d decided to give marriage another try. Sabrina and Mackenzie had been stunned. Aside from the occasional family Christmas dinner or birthday party, they hadn’t known that their parents were seeing each other. Naturally, Mackenzie found it all so touching and romantic. Sabrina wasn’t as ready to forget the perils of the rancorous divorce, even though it had taken place sixteen years ago, when she was thirteen. And she sure didn’t want to be around if the shrapnel started to fly again.

“Maybe it’s not a fairy-tale ending,” Mackenzie said softly. “Maybe it’s real.”

“Ha.” Sabrina raised a champagne glass to her lips. “When reality hits, I give them six months.”

Mackenzie wrapped a hand around her sister’s arm. She squeezed, making Sabrina wish she could take back her words. Mackenzie was a squeezer, a patter, a cheerer-upper. And a very good friend. They’d been apart for too long. Mackenzie was settled in New York City while Sabrina went wherever whim took her.

“You’re so cynical, Breen,” she said, reverting to the family nickname.

Did that mean they were a family again?

Sabrina shrugged. While she might have her doubts about her parents, Mackenzie was as reliable as a rock. The sisters had very different personalities, but they’d turned to each other for comfort after the divorce and had been close ever since, even when separated by thousands of miles.