“What were you doing when GG knocked the apple out of the pillar?”
“I was in a minor fender-bender with a woman who hit a dog. She slammed on her brakes, I tapped her bumper. Total accident, but the dog—his name’s Boo—was pretty smashed up. I was googling nearby emergency vets so we could get him help and I got distracted. He’s fine now, by the way.”
She leaned in and kissed him on a sigh, his good heart never failing to make her swoon. “Hey, did I tell you how beautiful all this is? I know you’re not a huge fan of my girlie food, but you blended game-day food with it like a boss.” Quinn waved her hand at the plates of cheese and fruit, the wine crisp and cold, the blanket he’d spread out on soft grass he’d created with a snap of his fingers.
“I don’t believe you did.”
“Well, then let me be the first to tell you, it’s beautiful. Thank you for organizing this amazing celebration to annihilate our people.”
Khristos laughed, his eyes warm. “Is it like you imagined?”
She pulled her hat from her head, one very similar to the one she’d worn to the Parthenon just a few months ago, and set it aside. “The annihilation of your people?”
He poured her a glass of her favorite wine and held it out to her. “Not so long ago, you were here, dreaming of your engagement to a man who was totally wrong for you. But is this what the setting looked like in that pretty head of yours?”
She leaned in and kissed him, letting her lips linger on his. Knowing he was hers was still as amazing now as it had been when he’d first told her he loved her. “It’s a much better setting with you in it.”
“Answer the question, Love Guru,” he teased, skimming her lips with his tongue.
“You know, now that you mention it, it does.”
He winked a gorgeous eye at her. “Perfect. So, I have something I’d like to read to you. You in?”
She mocked a pouty face. When Khristos read to her, it was usually a funny meme on Facebook or a snarky tweet from some guy who’d taken out an account on Twitter and called himself God.
“Is it going to be another tweet from God? Because telling everyone he hears their prayers and he thinks they’re very funny is only funny after the first reading, Khristos with a K.”
“Hey, he has one-point-nine million followers. He’s damn funny.”
She rolled her eyes at him and his reading material. No, it wasn’t Keats or Shelley, but in the end, when they were together, it didn’t matter as long as they were together. “Swear it’s not from God and I’ll give you the green light.”
Khristos grinned. “I assure you, it is not.”
“Then carry on.” She rolled her hand with a chuckle.
He pulled out his phone and scrolled the screen, flipping it open and clearing his throat. “A poem, by Khristos with a K…”
“Dear Aphrodite,
“You are mighty
“Cute,
“And I’m pretty crazy
“About ute.”
She spit her wine out when she laughed out loud. “Ute?”
“Shhh. It rhymes with cute.”
“Oh, sorry. Please continue,” she said on a grin.
He rolled his shoulders and looked back at his phone. “You also have nice hair.
“I like that it hangs down to there.” He pointed to her breasts and wiggled his eyebrows. “I don’t want to ever consider
“Not being able to read you God’s tweets on Twitter,
“So it’d be pretty badass
“If you’d marry me
“Like really fast.”
Quinn’s shoulders began to shake with laughter. She fell back on the blanket, covering her mouth, trying to stamp out her squeals of hyena-like laughter until tears rolled down her face.
“Hey, now. I wrote you a gushy poem. You’re not supposed to laugh.”
That only made her laugh harder. So hard, Khristos peered down at her and mocked a frown. “If you don’t knock it off right now, there’ll be no shiny for you, Love Maker.”
She grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and pulled him down to her, trying not to snarf. “I don’t care about your shiny baubles. I love you. Not your riches. Right now, I care more about getting you into an emergency poetry-writing class so we can rectify that disaster of words immediately.” And then she began to laugh all over again.
And it was perfect—and nothing like her dreamed-up proposal in her head, but still more incredible than anything she could have ever imagined.
Khristos rolled his tongue in his cheek and feigned insult. “Are we done making a mockery of my heartfelt profession of love?”
She snorted. “I’m done. No wait. Not quite.” She barked another laugh, pressing her hand to her mouth once again to stifle it and clearing her throat. “Okay. Good to go.” Quinn shot him a smile of encouragement and put on her serious face.