"You're sure you don't want me there."
Ethan asked it standing in Bianca's kitchen doorway, jacket already on, clearly torn between respecting her instinct and wanting to be present for something this enormous.
"I'm sure." Bianca crossed to him, straightening his collar the way she'd started doing without quite noticing when it began. "He needs to meet someone who isn't already tangled up in this family's history. I can give him that. You can't."
"I know." Ethan's hands found her waist, holding on a beat longer than the moment strictly required. "I just hate not being there when something matters this much to you."
"You'll be there for the parts that need you." She kissed him, brief and certain. "This part just needs me first."
He nodded, though something reluctant still sat behind hi
