They’d eloped, actually. Once I found out and Gretchen told me how she saw Tony buying the wedding rings on the first day of the cruise, I’d been ...insistent that I attend the wedding I held Gretchen’s hand and watched them repeat their vows to each other in front of the Captain. Their eyes were naked with emotion. They obviously loved each other as deeply as Gretchen and I loved one another. They promised to love one another and the Captain pronounced them man and wife. ‘Ladies and Gentlemen,. I know Marianna was aware of my change in mood and she did her best to try and cheer me up, but those temporary sessions didn’t seem to last. I really wanted to know what her future held. I also was waging a war with myself on whether I should declare my love for her and ask her to marry me. Would that be fair to her? No ... of course not. I was just going to have to wait and see which way the cards would fall.They did not fall in my favor. Marianna returned from her meeting with Botelli and. Who hadn't? But she'd never heard it uttered before. She sat silent in shock as the woman left the premises, taking her male friend with her. Tizzy was quite puzzled. Was this woman one of those women of ill repute that she'd read about? One of those people she'd been warned so many times not to associate with?As if in answer, three men approached her from across the bar where they had previously been engaged in conversation with the woman who had just left. They strode right over to the table. Erin’s soft pubic hair pressed into Lynn’s leg and Erin’s hand closed with a gentle handful of strawberry patch. Her movement woke her wife.“Did you dream?”“Did you?”“I asked first.”“I did.”“What did they say?”“They said that they loved us and that they always would. That they would be gone when the last baby came but would be back with the first pregnancy of our child.”“That is not what they said to me.”“What did they say to you?”“The babies said that they can’t help me with my guilt over.