Maybe I’d always had doubts about where we could go as a couple, but now that I knew he loved me, too, I felt like I could fly. “Yes,” I answered simply.
“Yes, you will?” Marcus probed. “Will you marry me? I don’t have a ring yet, but—”
I put a gentle hand in his hair and cut off his words as I leaned forward to kiss him. I didn’t give a damn about a ring, or the formalities. All I needed to know was that he loved me.
Everything else was nothing more than inconsequential details.
He wrapped an arm around my waist and then pushed me onto my back, his mouth demanding as he took control of the embrace.
It was the sweetest, hottest kiss I’d ever experienced.
He lingered, nipping at my bottom lip, and then soothing it with his tongue.
The kiss wasn’t carnal, and I wasn’t about to let it get out of control. It wasn’t going anywhere. Marcus was fresh out of the hospital. The last thing he needed right now was bedroom Olympics.
But we could savor the moment, and all of the emotions that went along with deciding that we loved each other so much that we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together.
When he finally lifted his head, I looked into his eyes and simply said, “Yes. I’ll marry you. I’ll stay with you. I’ll continue to let you steal my chocolate for as long as we both shall live,” I joked. “Now you need to get some rest.”
“I’d rather get you naked,” he answered.
“No sex. We both just admitted this isn’t all about sex. And you just got out of the hospital. No strenuous activities for you.”
His expression was disappointed. “I know it’s not all sexual, but that doesn’t mean I still don’t desperately want you naked.”
I wanted him, too, but I was content to wait. “Your health is my biggest priority.”
“Mine, too,” he said in a grim voice. “My balls are blue right now.”
I laughed out loud. I couldn’t believe he actually wanted to have sex when he was still recovering from his injuries. “Go to sleep,” I insisted, pushing him onto his back. “The last thing you need to think about right now is getting laid.”
“It’s the first thing I’m thinking about,” he answered glumly.
“You can go a few days without,” I told him as I settled beside him and put my head on his chest.
“Yeah, I can,” he admitted. “Hell, I used to go without for months, or even a year. But since the first time I touched you in Florida, I can’t fucking think about anything else.”
I smiled against the smooth skin of his chest. Honestly, I pretty much felt the same way, but I wasn’t going to admit it right now. “I love you, Marcus,” I murmured instead.
“Christ! I love you, too, baby,” he said in a husky voice as he wrapped his arms tightly around me. “You can check one more thing off your bucket list because you’re never going to find a guy who loves you as much as I do.”
I sighed, happy as I heard Marcus’s breathing even out, a definite sign that he was exhausted and needed to rest.
He wants to spend the rest of our lives together. He wants to marry me.
I decided it was finally time for me to close the window of my past and throw open the door to my future with Marcus.
A tear trickled down my cheek, but it wasn’t from sadness or fear. It was created from the intense joy that was in my heart, and the knowledge that Marcus loved me as much as I loved him.
All of the pain I’d gone through was over, and I was finally ready to move on.
Knowing that I was sprinting forward with a man I loved more than life itself made my new mindset that much sweeter than it ever had been before.
He was the important piece of the puzzle of my life that had always been missing, even though I’d never known it until he had been fit snugly into that empty space.
I fell into an exhausted sleep, held safely in his arms, knowing that no matter how irritated I made him, and vice versa, there would always be love.
Dani
“I love how close all of your family is with each other,” I told Marcus a few days later as we drove home from dinner at his mother’s house in Rocky Springs.
It was a beautifully clear summer’s evening. Because we were riding in one of Marcus’s many sports cars, I could see the stars. The convertible gave me a perfect view of the Colorado sky.
I relished the feel of being in the open air. My hair would probably end up looking like a bird’s nest, but to feel this way, so free and buoyant, it was completely worth it.
“Your family is close,” he replied.
I shrugged. “When we’re all able to get together. I think so much fell apart when my parents died so suddenly. We all sort of went our own way to deal with our grief. Your mom seems to hold everything together in your family.”
“I agree,” he answered. “She’s been the glue that’s fused our family together since my father died. But traveling the world doesn’t help. We both have some time to try to make up with our families.”
Marcus and I had talked a lot about what we wanted to do in the future.
I would see a lot more of Harper since we were in the same town, and my sister and I had vowed to try to get together more with our brothers. Harper would still be traveling with her senator husband, Blake, back and forth to Washington, DC, and I wanted to travel with Marcus internationally so I could find my own stories to write. But Harper and I would both be home and in one place a lot more often, so we were determined to force ourselves into our brothers’ lives if necessary.
I loved every one of my siblings. None of us had ever wanted to grow apart.
It had just…happened.
Marcus reached out for my hand, and I entwined my fingers with his as I finally promised, “We’ll make time in the future.”
I already adored Tate, and his wife, Lara. Zane and his wife, Ellie, were both extremely kind. I’d met Gabe and Chloe for the first time earlier in the evening. And of course, Harper and Blake had been at the family supper, too.
Honestly, I already knew that I was going to come to love Marcus’s family as much as he did. The Colter women were already trying to pull me into their circle by planning various activities together. It was going to be nice to have family again, but having Marcus’s family wouldn’t lessen my efforts with Harper to pull my brothers Jett, Carter, and Mason back into the fold.
I smiled as we pulled into Marcus’s driveway and he took the small paved road that drove around the massive house and to the back where he had a ten-car garage where he stored his summer cars. There was a three-car garage attached to the house where he kept his luxury vehicles that were appropriate for all-weather driving.
As serious and sensible as Marcus was, I was delighted to see that he was still a boy who loved his toys. All ten spaces were full of luxury or classic sports cars. It seemed to be Marcus’s one big indulgence, and I wasn’t about to complain. He could afford them, and I got the benefit of riding in the powerhouse vehicles.