She attended a school concert when I was delayed.

She remembered that Hannah disliked frosting but loved strawberry filling.

And in the hard moments, she assured me, again and again, that she never expected to replace Rebecca.

“I only want Hannah to understand that loving me does not mean loving her mother any less,” she told me one evening as we washed dishes together.

That single sentence did more than anything else to convince me to propose.

We planned a small wedding at Pine Crest Manor outside Colorado Springs, a garden terrace overlooking pine-covered hills near Fort Carson.