Sleep eluded her. She was dead tired and couldn't wind down enough to fall into any sort of solid sleep, so she tossed, turned, watched the remnants of rain that clung to her windows in glassy streaks.

Bored, anxious, and feeling the somber weight of humility press heavily on her chest, Abigail shoved off the comforter and roamed down to her pub, the steady footsteps creaking across the century-old damaged wood floor.

Using the bright red lever on the coffee maker to pour a mug of hot water with one hand, she selected mint tea with the other—multitasking out of habit—and tossed in the bag to brew.

The rain had paused, only that fine spray remaining, but the air was tined with a frosty chill, leaving icy dots on each windowpane like Mother Nature's fingerprints left behind.

Sitting in the dark, empty pub with only the lights of town shining through, wearing her nightly uniform of a lone T-shirt—this time reading "Keep Calm And Go To The Plumber's Pub," a personal favorite, one of her regulars had made for her—she took her tea and tucked cozily into the chair nearest the window.

Thoughts of Declan plagued her attempted comfort—what he'd done for her, what he'd said to her. The roar of his mother and the unexpected news from his father gnawed at her as well.

The full day had scorched her, leaving marks that went well beyond a night of sleepless slumber. Humbled, confused, angry—it had all the scrapes and scratches of a day she wasn't soon to forget.

And love... Love, she could admit in the quiet cool, was what kept her going. She loved Declan with every piece of her heart, every tattered piece of it that was worn thin by the evening's events, by the years of using every scrap of her soul to keep her and her brother's heads above water.

Her heart would be whole again after some time. She would heal just as she had before. But the thought of Declan leaving, going back to the life she knew nothing about, swept loneliness through her.

She didn't want to need anything to feel whole, didn't want to feel broken just because someone or something wasn't there.

Money and family could make a mess of things, sure, but heartache was a different kind of mayhem, she decided as she sipped tea to soothe. It stung in wake and in sleep, and caused sudden pangs to wrench at unpredictable times.

It was okay to know she loved a man who had once loved her back. It was a sad thought maybe, but to her it was a happy one that consoled better than a cup of tea. Somehow it made it easier that he'd be gone before the hurt could cut too deeply.

Settling a bit, she breathed out, wishing for the weather to turn and snow to fall. Winter, the start of it anyway, provided a layer of comfort. She liked the routine of it—shoveling the sidewalk in front of the pub, keeping patrons warm with Irish coffee and hot, hearty food. She wondered, briefly, indulgently, what it was like in Manhattan when it snowed. Or rather, what it was like for Declan in Manhattan when it snowed.

She was wading through wistful little daydreams when she startled, registering a knocking sound that stomped through her quiet.

Moving toward the quick raps, her pulse pounded with the idea that it could be Declan. Then, ordering herself to be logical, she decided that it was probably just Beckett after a night with whatever girl from the party.

She strolled through the kitchen then pushed open the back door to the pub and caught sight of Declan braced to knock again on her personal door, the undone ends of his bow-tie hanging flat around his collar, the crisp white of his shirt unbuttoned at the top.

His hair was still wet from the rain, the dark streaks of it, and his face displayed a wild edge. He was beautiful, she thought, like a dark storm was beautiful.

He moved over to the door she'd opened and only glared at her as he continued through, striding into the pub where she'd been.

Watching for hints of what brewed as he passed her, she closed the door and followed. "Tea?"

"Whiskey."

She poured two fingers neat into a lowball glass then poured the same for herself, deciding she may need it if the rest of the night's discussions were any indication.

He'd sat himself at the table where her tea was perched so she joined him, setting the whiskey in front of him. He drank from it without another word so she did the same, glad for the burn while the silence crept coolly around them.

"I'm sorry for what I said to you." His tone was low, steady. "It was wrong, and I was angry."

"I'm sorry too, Declan. For a lot. I would've found you before I left but..." she trailed off when he gestured her words away. And something about the movement woke her, mixing with the fire she'd done her best to stomp out. She was done being dismissed and cast aside.

"I need to know," she started, her words deliberate, "why you would deposit forty-five grand into my account without telling me?"

"You needed it. Just didn't know you'd trade me for it."

She shook her head as she swirled the liquor in her glass, struggling for control. "I needed you, Declan. But I needed to take care of my brothers more, do you understand that? I'm not playing the victim here, it's part of my life, it's my past and those were the cards I was dealt. Your mother made me an offer and told me to stay away, told me she'd give me money to stay away from you. I thought it was from her."

"And you told her no," he reminded her with fringed fury.

"I told her no. But I thought she ignored me—obviously a habit of hers—and I assumed she deposited it anyway." She paused as Declan stood, walked to the door to look out over the sleeping town. "But you gave me that money. Why would you not tell me you did that?"

"Would you have accepted it if you knew it was from me?"

"No," she said defiantly. "People talked, said that I was with you for your money, and I wasn't. I didn't want your money."

"Exactly."

"No, not exactly." She stood, pushed back her chair and paced through the room. "You should've told me, Declan."

"And you should've told me about the conversation with my mother."

She spread her arms wide in a quick gesture of helplessness, the hem of her shirt rising to the top of her thighs. "It was humiliating, okay? Here's this amazing guy that I'm in love with who has everything. And I'm this girl who had a run-down house, two hungry mouths, and pride. That was all I had."

"You had me," he told her.

Her belly throbbed from whiskey and pangs of hurt. "I did, and it would've lasted maybe a little while longer. But I couldn't need you, Declan. I couldn't lean on someone who was about to leave town. I'd already been abandoned by my own family—first my father, then my mother—and I just couldn't take the thought of being abandoned by you too. It's not that I didn't want your love or your help, it's that I couldn't allow myself to need you or it would've hurt that much more when you left."

Saying words she'd never before said, she crossed to her drink, tossed back a gulp. "I'll pay you back what you gave me. When I can," she added, feeling like a broken record. "I'll pay you back every cent."

"I don't want your money, Abigail. It wasn't a loan."

"I still can't believe you did that. Declan," she said on a whisky-tinged breath.

"While we're at it, I should tell you I also gave a loan to Ben. He came to me just before our graduation ceremony and asked for a loan. He had a plan for paying it all back, he had it outlined on a piece of paper torn out of a notebook."

Her back straightened. "What is it with your family loaning my family money? We're not charity cases." She crossed her arms for the protection. "You gave my brother money without telling me? You gave money to a fourteen-year-old boy?"

"What do you mean my family loaning your family money?"

"Have your father tell you."

"How about you tell me?" He ordered.

"How about you tell me why you went around my back to give a kid in my care money? A kid, Declan."

"You're impossible."

"Not nearly as impossible as you."

"The boy said you guys needed food and gas money and that he was the man of the house and needed a way to get money, but promised to pay it all back. And he did, slowly over the years after he turned eighteen like we agreed."

"He paid you back? I always wondered where his paycheck was going." She sat, deflated, in the wooden chair.

"I would've told him not to but I figured it'd be a good lesson for a young boy to pay back a debt." Declan slid into the chair across from her, threw back the rest of his whiskey. "I put his payments toward your bank loan, by the way. Since we're being honest."

Her mouth dropped open. "I spent days on the phone with the bank trying to figure out where that money came from."

"The bank president is a golf buddy of my father's."

"Oddly, that's one thing I already knew," she said, taking the moment to clear the haze from her head. Nothing was what she thought it was, too many facets of deception, sneaky favors, mysterious silences.

"So if you and Ben had this agreement, what happened between you today? You looked like you'd been fighting this afternoon."

"He was afraid I was going to tell you about the loan. Astute guy, actually. Even I didn't know I was going to tell you."

"He's always been astute, probably more than was good for him. Thank you for telling me. But you should've told me before you gave it to him."

"While we're at it with the honesty," he started, the shadowed blue of his eyes looking into her. "I love you, Abigail. I never stopped loving you. You've been with me every day since I left here, and still I've missed you."

For that one drifting moment, she let his words sink in, feeling them meander through her veins, prick through her pulse, and hum with her heart that beat wildly. And when the moment wafted away, streaks of sad, like the streaks of raindrops on the windows, were what remained.

"I wished for a lot of things over the years, and this was one of them," she told him. "I wished for this, for you to be back here, for you to be near and for us to be close like we used to be. But I don't think I'll like myself much if I tell you I love you too before I process all of this. It's a lot, and my head is spinning, and I need to stand on my own two feet before I..."

He pulled out the same envelope he'd given her before, set it on the table between them.

She studied him before slowly reaching for what had caught her eye. And tears pooled in her eyes when she pulled out her necklace. "Thank you, Declan."

Her fingers shook as she fiddled with the clasp and set it around her neck once again.

"The payment for tonight's party is in there too."

"Declan I—"

"You earned that. Don't be stubborn. It's yours."

She nodded, a stray tear escaping down her face. "Dammit. Declan, I love you with all that I am. And that's pretty much all I have to give, it's all I've ever really had to give." She held up a hand, signaling she wasn't finished. "And while that sounds completely pitiful, I don't want your pity. And I think that's what I'm trying to tell you. You fixed things for me when they were broken, when I needed your help, and I didn't know that you had and that makes me feel stupid. I don't like feeling stupid." Tears that'd been suspended for years pried loose and streamed down her cheeks.

"I don't like feeling small and I don't like feeling stupid. I've worked really hard to build a life for myself, for Ben and Beckett, and I've built a great one. Granted it's sort of falling apart at the seams—and I mean that literally—but I love it, just as I love you.

"What you did for me, what you did for Ben, is incredible. More than that, it's something I don't even know how to express to you with words, I don't know how to tell you thank you without it sounding flippant. Please know that when I say thank you, when I say I love you, it means more to me than I'm able to express to you. My pride is bruised, badly." She paused, sniffed, skimmed a hand over her forehead. "But know that I love you. I'm mad at you and I love you and I thank you."

He stood, taking her hand, tugging her into his arms and holding tight. "I'll take it."

In that scent of him, that familiar scent of man and storm, she curled in, laying her head on his shoulder, feeling his strength, his heat.

"I have one more thing I should tell you," he told her.

She leaned her head back, peering at him. "I don't think I can handle one more thing tonight. Can it wait until tomorrow?"

"I think you'll want to hear it now."

She didn't have the energy to brace herself so she simply retreated backwards a step, looked at him through wet eyes, and waited. "What is it?"

"I've been in talks with the partners at my firm about branching out and starting a law office here in Stonebridge. Decided I've had enough of the corporate side of things, I'd rather help at the small business and community levels. It's more interesting. Got the green light tonight—I was in meetings most of the party—and next week I'll start mapping it all out then get going."

Her heartbeat drummed madly. "You're moving home? You're coming back here?"

"Well I'm not moving home. It's not my place anymore. I was thinking maybe we could start by living together above a certain pub I've been hearing about. I understand they have excellent food."

The thought brightened her whole face with humor. "You want to move in here? The place is falling apart." Her laugh rolled out, a gentle ripple, as he pulled her close once again.

"Why are you laughing?"

"The idea of you living above my little pub is amusing to me." She laughed again. "Millionaire moves into a shack."

"Billionaire."

Her head tilted back as she studied him. "What?"

"Your headline was off a bit. Plus, this isn't a shack. It's a home. It's your home. And I want to share a home with you, Abigail Roberts."

"Then I hope you like runny faucets, loud cheers late at night in the bar, rugby matches on the television early in the morning, scents of food seeping through the walls, and stairs you sometimes, accidentally step through when the person you've never stopped loving wakes you up before the sun does." Her smile filled her face, reflecting lights and shadows as she looked at him.

"Just as long as there aren't men giving women lap dances downstairs, I think that sounds perfect."

"There aren't. But it's possible I'll talk you into giving me one."

"Anything. I love you, Abigail."

His grinning lips met hers, matching breaths, movements, minds, and hearts, melding them together. The past and the future swirled with the cool autumn breeze, cocooning them together in the present moment.

Home was what she thought of. Being whole, complete, and home with the man that had made her heart smile. 

~The End~

SPECIAL NOTE TO READERS: Thank you so much for reading One Autumn Night! As a reminder, each book in the One Night Collection is a standalone novella, featuring new characters with a story all their own, that takes place over the course of one night. The exception to this is One Summer Night which features a fun roundup of all the main characters in the collection as they come together for a fabulous Fourth of July celebration.

One Night Collection

ONE AUTUMN NIGHT

ONE WINTER NIGHT

ONE SPRING NIGHT

ONE SUMMER NIGHT