It had been a lazy afternoon. After Jack's nap, the five of them took a walk down to the stream on the property just below the house. Allie had been impatient to get out there and fish.

Allie and Nathan put their lines in the water while Rebecca and Elizabeth sat with Jack on a large quilt. Rebecca taught them how to make whistles by placing a flat blade of grass between their thumbs and blowing on it.

Jack was getting more comfortable with Rebecca, and was starting to take to her in the same way he had with Nathan and Allie. When she asked him if he wanted to learn the Horsey Song and patted her knee, he jumped right up.

Elizabeth had heard the song before:

He always sings, raggy music to the cattle while he swings, back and forward in the saddle on a horse, a pretty good horse, with a syncopated gait, such a funny meter to the roar of his repeater... He's a high-falutin', rootin' tootin' son-of-a-gun from Arizona, he's my Ragtime Cowboy Joe!

While Rebecca sang it faster than Elizabeth thought was possible, she bounced Jack on her knee as if he were on a horse, and he rewarded the whole group with gales of delighted laughter.

Allie turned around and said, "Grandma, you used to sing that song to me!"

"Yes, I did, Alliebeck. And now you need to learn it so you can do it with Jack. I'll write it down for you."

Nathan and Allie each caught a couple of brook trout for dinner and they all walked back to the house relaxed after having their fill of fresh air.

Rebecca asked Elizabeth if she would mind baking some cookies with Allie and Jack for dessert, and she set them up in the kitchen with everything they needed.

"Nathan," Rebecca said, "Can you help me with something in the bedroom?"

"Sure, Mom," he said, and followed her down the long hallway.

Rebecca closed the door and said, "I want to give you something."

She went to her music box and pulled out the small drawer in the base. There was a square of black velvet with something wrapped inside, and she handed it to Nathan.

He looked at her, and sat down on the side of the bed. Rebecca sat next to him. Nathan folded back the corner of the fabric to reveal a gold wedding band and an engagement ring with four small diamonds in a square.

He looked up at her in surprise. "Whose are these?"

Rebecca touched the rings tenderly with her finger. "They were your great-grandmother Penny's, and then they were mine."

He hadn't noticed, but now he looked at her bare finger and said, "And you don't wear them anymore."

She smiled softly at him. "I loved your father very much, and I'll always be grateful that he gave me you and your sister; but I can't be married to him any longer after what he did."

"I understand that, Mom. I'd feel the same way if I were you."

Rebecca continued. "After reading your letters, I didn't need to meet Elizabeth to know that you were completely in love with her." Rebecca took Nathan's hand and held it tightly. "But I needed to meet her to know how she felt about you." Rebecca smiled. "I don't need to see any more, Nathan. She loves you with all her heart, and I couldn't wish better for you."

Folding Nathan's hand around the rings in the velvet, Rebecca said, "I want you to think of these as your great-grandmother's rings. She and your great-grandfather were happily married for over sixty years. That will be you and Elizabeth."

Nathan looked down at his hand. "I... I don't know what to say." He looked up and Rebecca could see tears in his eyes. She hugged him and whispered, "You don't have to say anything."

She sat back and looked him in the eye. "But don't dawdle, Nathan. Things pass you by before you know it. And that girl is something special. Don't you ever forget it."

Nathan laughed softly and met her eyes. "I won't, Mom. I'm ready. I'm not sure she is just yet. But I hope she will be soon."

Rebecca all but pushed Nathan and Elizabeth out for a late afternoon ride and to watch the sunset. They'd had a late lunch and would be having a late dinner, so there was plenty of time for it.

There were six horses in the stable on the Airdrie ranch, and Elizabeth had a hard time choosing which one to ride.

Nathan walked her down the stalls. "Obviously, Sunset is mine, and Allie seems to have chosen Buddy as hers. Mom and Charlie ride them all, but Mom has a soft spot for Sugar, and Charlie's favorite is Nugget. That leaves Toby and Rio."

Elizabeth smiled. She had grown up seeing horses as animals that drew carriages, and on the rare occasion that a woman rode, she would ride sidesaddle in fine dresses with parasols. As she stroked the sleek coats of these beautiful animals, Elizabeth thought it was such a privilege to be allowed to feel their strength and power, to have the wind in her hair, to be breathless and so fully out in nature riding with them.

"Now, if you have Jack in the saddle, you might like Rio. He's older and very calm, though any of them would do for that. But if you want to run, as I know you do at times," Nathan looked sideways at her, smiling, "Toby's the one. He loves nothing better than to get out and put some space between himself and the stables."

Elizabeth smiled at Nathan. More and more she was seeing how at home he was with horses, how expert he was in their care, and how intuitive he was about their thoughts and feelings. Nathan could be out of his element sometimes in the company of people, but here with horses there was no awkwardness. He stood tall and walked confidently, trailing his hands on their long necks and flanks, speaking to them in hushed tones – and they all trusted him completely. Elizabeth always thought Nathan was attractive, but here, in the stables, he sometimes took her breath away.

Elizabeth stood between the two stalls that held Toby and Rio, looking back and forth. She put her hands on the gates and Toby immediately nuzzled her. "Hey, boy," she said, laughing.

Nathan smiled. "Toby it is."

While they brushed the horses in preparation for saddling them, they talked easily about Nathan's childhood and how much a part of it the stables were. "I wasn't much on chores, but Mom and Charlie learned pretty fast that anything to do with the horses would get done faster."

"Did Sarah ride?" Elizabeth asked.

Nathan grinned. "She loved it." He raised an eyebrow. "She loved to race. When you and I were in that field and you challenged me to a race? It took me right back."

Elizabeth smiled playfully, "Rebecca told me that Sarah was a little older than you?"

Nathan looked indignant. "Three minutes!" he said. "She would never let me forget that." He laughed and leaned his chest against Sunset, looking over her at Elizabeth.

"Does it ever get any easier?" he asked, softly.

Elizabeth knew that she and Nathan had a bond in those they'd lost too early to death. She knew he was asking about Jack.

Walking around Sunset, Elizabeth took Nathan's hand.

"I think once I got past the unfairness of it all, once I moved past being angry with God and with every man still walking around, alive, in the uniform, I was able to get some perspective."

She leaned against Nathan, feeling his warmth and solid presence, and was so grateful for him. "Women have been losing their husbands, and men have been losing their sisters, since the beginning of time. It's personal to us – so personal, but it's a part of life. We all die, the question is when, and how we use the time until we do."

Elizabeth looked up at him. "I wanted to stop living, but how would that honor Jack? So I embraced life." She put her hand gently on Nathan's cheek. "And life gave me you."

Nathan smiled tenderly and nodded. "And life gave me you," he said softly.

He pulled her to him and breathed in the scent of her hair, felt the softness of her skin. She was a wonder to him. How could he be ungrateful with her in his arms?

They stood holding each other for a time, listening to the soft sounds of the stable. Then Nathan took a deep breath and said, "Come on, let's get saddled up. I have a place I want to show you."

They rode out into one of the most beautiful spring evenings in Elizabeth's memory. The ranch was only ten acres, not large for a ranch in the area, so it wasn't far to ride to just about anywhere on the property.

The sun was low in the sky and the few scattered clouds served to make the approaching sunset even more beautiful as it tinged their outlines with pink and orange.

After about fifteen minutes, Nathan slowed and ducked down between the branches of two large oaks. Elizabeth followed him. When she sat back up in the saddle, she looked around in wonder.

They were in a round clearing, about forty or fifty feet in diameter. It was completely surrounded by tall trees; oaks, pines, and hemlocks. Around the perimeter, wildflowers were growing in a profusion of colors; white, pink, lavender and yellow.

At the very center was a rustic pergola built from four straight, sturdy pine posts and topped with open beams. Vines of honeysuckle and clematis had been trained up the posts and along the beams to form a latticed roof that dappled the stone floor with the last of the day's sunlight.

"Oh, Nathan," Elizabeth said, looking around her in amazement. "How did this get here? It's so... magical!"

She looked at Nathan and he was smiling that inscrutable smile of his.

Elizabeth laughed. "Of course, you built this. Is there anything you can't do?"

He raised his eyebrows. "It wouldn't be very impressive if I showed you all the things I couldn't do, Elizabeth, though there are plenty that fall in that category. If it helps, Ned Yost said I was hopeless at learning Italian."

Jumping happily down from Toby, Elizabeth went to Sunset's side to help Nathan down. He could ride easily with the cast, but getting up and down was a challenge. He balanced lightly on her shoulder, swung his leg around and then hopped down on his good foot.

"You like it?" Nathan asked, walking Elizabeth over to a plank bench under the pergola.

She sighed. "I'm a little speechless," she said. "And yes, I love it."

And then, in his surprising Nathan way, he simply said, "I always thought this would be a nice place to get married."

He watched her wide-eyed reaction closely, and he got his answer. Too soon. It didn't surprise or upset him. He understood.

"Look, Elizabeth. I'm not asking now, and I'm not meaning to hurry you. But," He smiled at her, "I think you know that spending anything less than the rest of our lives together would be an enormous disappointment to me."

She looked back at him with a depth of love in her eyes that made him take a breath. "And it would be to me, too. I love you, completely and without reservation." She paused, looking down. "I don't want you to mistake the way I just reacted, Nathan."

Elizabeth looked up at the vines above them and the flowers and trees around the clearing. "My heart is so full right now that I would stand here with you this minute and pledge the rest of my life to you. Just us, and Allie and Jack and Rebecca and Charlie. That I could handle."

Nathan said, "That's a perfect picture you just painted." He grinned. "Let's do that."

Elizabeth laughed softly. "Believe me, I'm tempted. But what about my parents and my sisters?"

Nathan exhaled. "Yes, your parents. Hamilton society." He shook his head. "You might as well take me to the moon, Elizabeth. I'm beyond being nervous about meeting them and your sisters. I wouldn't know the first thing about which fork to use, and what are they going to think about you marrying another Mountie? What if your father doesn't offer me a job, will I feel slighted?" He laughed softly and took her hand. "And none of this really matters, I know. What matters is that I love you and want to share the rest of my life with you. So I'll go to Hamilton and try not to stutter and trip over my own feet."

She laughed and moved closer, putting her head on his shoulder. "I don't care in the slightest if you trip, and I love your stutters. Honestly, you know what I'm thinking? We invite them all to Hope Valley and let it be up to them. When I married Jack, my mother and Viola were in Europe. Only my father and Julie came. There's no reason to subject you to Hamilton, Nathan. The more I think about it, I don't want to."

Nathan took a deep breath. "I won't fight you on this, if you really mean it."

Elizabeth held him close. "I need to tell you this, and it's hard for me to say. My family, with the exception of Julie, were not kind to Jack. They didn't think he was an appropriate choice for a Thatcher. And the truth is, they probably won't be kind to you."

"I would walk through fire for you, Elizabeth," he said softly.

"But I don't want you to. I know Julie will come out if I ask her. If my parents and Viola can't rise to the occasion, then they shouldn't be there anyway."

Nathan frowned. "Wait. I'm a little confused. Are we planning a wedding? I'm still trying to figure out how to get down on one knee with this cast on."

Elizabeth turned and looked at him, her face turning crimson in the early twilight. "Oh, this is embarrassing. You haven't even asked me yet, have you?"

"Not properly, no," Nathan said. "But when have we ever been proper?"

With that, Nathan stood. And with the help of a post, the bench, and a small tree, began to bend himself so that his leg with the cast was straight out to the side and he was effectively on the other knee. Elizabeth, laughing, tried to help him and he said, "No, it's required that I do this myself. Be patient, please."

Finally, somewhat out of breath, and more than a little out of balance, Nathan reached in his pocket and pulled out a small square of black velvet.

To Elizabeth's quizzical look, he said, "My mother told me today that I shouldn't dawdle, that I might lose you if I waited too long."

"That sounds like your mother," Elizabeth said. "But you won't lose me, Nathan, dawdling or not."

"No, I won't, because I'm taking her advice. She'll tell you that doesn't happen very often," Nathan said, starting to laugh himself.

Before he began, he said, softly, "I know this will surprise you, but I haven't really thought through what I'm going to say. I'm doing the best I can on short notice, but I probably won't be quoting Emerson. I was so sure you were going to say we had to wait."

Elizabeth said, her eyes sparkling, "Well, get on with it."

Nathan took a deep breath. His eyes went very soft and Elizabeth's heart expanded.

"Elizabeth Thatcher Thornton, you are the kindest, wisest, most beautiful woman I have ever known. I love you more than my own life, more than the Mounties, more than Bear, and more than Sunset. You've made me believe that love is real, that signs exist and that dreams really do come true. I want to help you raise Jack, and I want you to be a mother to Allie, and I hope you'll say yes so we can do that for the rest of our lives."

Elizabeth was caught between crying and laughing, so she just gave in and did both.

Opening the square of black velvet, Nathan took out the ring with the four diamonds in it. "This was my mother's and her grandmother's." Nathan looked closely at it and smiled. "It has four diamonds. One for you, one for me, one for Allie and one for Jack. I would like for us to be a family."

Now Elizabeth was crying. This proposal was so... Nathan. And she loved him so dearly.

"Will you marry me?"

Because it wasn't going to be easy for Nathan to stand up, Elizabeth got down on her knees in front of him.

She held his face in both of her hands and kissed him tenderly.

"Yes."

On cue, the sun slipped down below the horizon and the sky burst into colors that rivalled the wildflowers.

Elizabeth threw her arms around Nathan and he held her as close as was humanly possible. What they were feeling was immeasurable, so they didn't speak.

They didn't have everything worked out, but that didn't trouble them. Whatever they did, they would do together. And that made all the difference.