“After we’re home. I won’t be able to drive if you touch me. Just being in the same car is making it difficult for me to concentrate on the road.”
Nicholas violates more traffic rules than I can keep count of. I’m shocked, since he’s generally a safe driver. But I’m also too impatient to care as long as we make it home safely.
The car finally screeches to a stop, and we hop out. I wrap my arms and legs around him as he grabs me and devours my mouth like a man who’s been denied sustenance for far too long. He tastes like love and the beautiful future I dared not dream of, and my heart swells with longing.
The door crashes open behind me, and he carries me inside the cool foyer. Carla lets out a small yelp from the kitchen, and I pull back in surprise. But her footsteps fade away as she leaves.
Nicholas rests his forehead on mine and whispers something. It takes me a moment to realize in my dazed state that I can’t process what he just said.
“What was that?” I whisper.
“That’s what’s on the first note I gave you,” he explains with a smile. “I told you I’d tell you what they meant on the hundredth day we’d been together. And today’s the day.”
He’s been counting all this time, even when we were apart. His love never wavered. Every time I think I can’t love him more than I do, he does something to prove that oh yes, Ican.
“What does it mean?” I ask shakily.
“I love you.” He holds my gaze in his, adoration in his eyes. “The notes said, ‘I love you,’ in a hundred different languages.”
Tears of joy and elation spring to my eyes. I can’t believe he’s been telling me every day already. I should’ve trusted the intent behind his gestures from the very beginning—to ensure I understood that I matter to him. Then we wouldn’t have had to go through this pain, separated from each other for the last several days.
He brushes his lips against the corners of my teary eyes, my forehead, my cheeks, and between each pressing of lips, he whispers, “I love you,” in yet another language. And I realize he has all the “I love you”smemorized, just for me.
Love and hope fill my fluttering heart. I cradle his gorgeous face and kiss him.
He was right when he saidfuck realistic. I was holding my happily ever after back then, and I’m lucky to be holding him now.
“Make love to me,” I say softly.
“Anything you want. It’s yours.” Then he carries me to our bedroom for our happy ending.
Chapter Forty-Nine
Molly
I pace through the kitchen, then into the living room. I should probably sit down or check on the food like a good hostess, but I can’t concentrate. Calm is the last thing I’m feeling.
“Oh myGod, I’m so nervous.” I wipe my clammy hands on my dress, then cringe and look down. No wet spots on my thighs. Yay.
“Relax. It’s fine.” Nicholas comes over and puts his hands on my shoulders, stopping me from pacing some more. “It’s just a causal dinner with some people. No big deal.”
He tries to kiss me, but I put a hand over his mouth. “No. You’re going to mess up my lipstick.”
His eyes twinkling, he kisses the side of my neck.
I laugh breathlessly. “Stop distracting me.”
“It’s working, though. Now you aren’t worrying yourself sick.”
“I want your family tolikeme.” I’m meeting Nicholas’s brothers and sisters-in-law for the first time. Well, I’ve already met Lucie, who is absolutely charming in a slightly dominating way. You can’t ignore the force of her personality or sheer physical presence. She towers over many men and make them shrink before her. The encounter with Noah was less than ideal, but I decide I’m not going to count that. He was angry and disapproving. Hopefully he won’t be today.
“It’s just a lousy dinner. If they do anything to upset you, we’ll kick them out and enjoy all the roast beef. Yum yum. Mmm. Roast beef. Just the two of us.” Nicholas runs his mouth along my neck.
I reach back and thread my fingers through his hair, appreciating his attempt to get me to stop thinking about all the things that can go wrong. Intellectually, I understand there’s nothing wrong with the food—Carla took care of that—and that Nicholas’s family is probably going to be polite, if for no other reason than because they like him. But I also want them to likeme. I want to be able to fit in.
The door opens, and I pull back from Nicholas so I can say hello to the first of his family to arrive. It’s a tall, handsome man with a warm smile that puts me at ease. He’s holding a tiny girl, who looks like a little doll, in one arm, and has the other one around a pretty blonde.
“Emmett! And you brought Monique!”
