“Marshall!” Hope rushes me so fast I don’t even see her coming. One minute I’m on the sidewalk all by myself, the next I’m tackled into a snowbank and her lips are on mine. I nearly forget I’m on the ground until the seat of jeans starts to dampen.
“Hey,” I say, combing the hair back from her face. “I’m so sorry about?—”
“I didn’t get your message until this morning. Actually, it was Hillary who found it since I thought it was spam and deleted the voicemail without listening to it. But now I know it was you and—and Marshall?”
“Yeah?” I ask, chuckling.
“I love you.”
“You do?”
“I think that’s why I’ve been so afraid to go out with you this whole time. I knew I’d fall in love with you so fast, and I was afraid you were just trying to sleep with me. That you’d move on as soon as something better came along?—”
“Hope, there is nothing better than you. I loveyou, and that’s not going to change.”
“You mean that?”
“I mean it enough to promise I’ll never miss another New Year’s Eve kiss as long as live.”
A slow smile spreads across her lips, illuminating her entire face. “Good answer.”
“I love that you’re here,” I say. “But can we please get out of the snow? My jeans are getting pretty soaked.”
“Good.”
“Good?”
“Because it gives me an excuse to get you out of them sooner.”
EPILOGUE
ONE YEAR LATER…
HOPE
“How doyou expect me to get to the party on time when you put on a dress like that?” Marshall asks when he first lays eyes on me in the same sparkling black dress I wore last year. One he unfortunately didn’t get to see before he was hauled off to jail for defending my honor.
“You like it?”
“Like it?” He comes up to me, caging me against the living room wall next to the Christmas tree we won’t take down until tomorrow. “I want to fuck you into next year while you’re wearing it.”
“I like the sound of that.”
His hand finds the slit in my dress, his fingers teasing my inner thigh. “Maybe even right now.”
“Now?”
“You have a problem with being late?”
“I didn’t plan the party this year,” I say, biting my bottom lip. My core tingles at the thought of being fucked by my husband up against the wall.
“You still okay with that?”
“Yep,” I say, working at the button of his black pants. “Running an event like that is not my thing.”
Adrianna Carter approached me this year to ask if I wanted to help her plan the town’s New Year’s Eve party, but I turned down her offer. I don’t need a fancy title to feel good about my life. I have my small business—which has doubled in size since this time last year. I have a good relationship with my sister that continues to strengthen from a distance—she ended up in a little town called Caribou Creek and insists Marshall and I need to visit her soon. We have the best dog in the world. And I have a man who loves me more than life itself.
The same man who currently has his finger dug beneath my panties.
