She drops her purse as I sweep her into a giant hug. “Fuck, I missed you,” I mutter into her hair, kissing her.
“I missed you, too,” she says softly.
“You got some sun.”
“A little too much. We were at the pool all day yesterday. And today, the girls insisted on a full morning of beauty treatments. Hair. Nails. Facials. You name it. Daisy even gave us dresses from her new collection.” She twirls as ice-blue fabric floats around her. “She insisted I wear it on the plane. She said it would be comfortable, and, surprisingly, she was right.”
“You’re perfect,” I say, taking her hand and leading her farther into the room.
“What is—?” She stops short when she sees the open doorway that leads to another room.
She turns to me, eyes wide. “This wasn’t here when I left three days ago. This was a wall.”
“Yup.”
“There was no door. No other room.”
“Nope.”
She takes a step forward. “Sebastian, what have you done?”
“Go and find out,” I grin encouragingly, following as she steps forward.
She gasps. “It’s a closet.”
My smile widens because her eyes are wide with wonder.
“A really, really beautiful closet.”
“It is.”
“The floating shelves. And this storage island. And the glass display with lighting. The floor-to-ceiling racks. This is my dream closet.” She shakes her head, but her smile is wide. “Matt hacked my Pinterest again, didn’t he?”
“He did. You might as well stop changing your password. It’s useless.”
“But I thought we couldn’t tear down walls because of the historical status of the house.”
“I made some calls.”About ten million calls. And double that in favors.
She looks around, still a little dazed. “It’s empty. You haven’t moved any of my clothes in.” It’s an observation, not a complaint.
I lean against the island, my lips quirked. “I know my girl. For you, that’s the fun part.”
She laughs in exuberance. “I love that you know me so well. I love my surprise. And I love, love, love this closet,” she says before kissing me so thoroughly that I almost forget why we’re here.Almost.
We’re both breathing heavily when I pull away.
She looks around with sparkling eyes. “I’m going to have to buy new everything to fill all this space.”
I clear my throat because it’s suddenly parched. “I got you started.” I indicate the glass jewelry display.
She approaches the shelf in curiosity before turning back to me. “What did you do, Sebastian?”
I know the moment she spots the deep-blue jewelry box because she gasps. I walk up behind her as she pulls out the velvet box.
I take it from her shaking hand and kneel. Then open it. She gasps again as she stares at the rare, old mine-cut diamond.
My ADHD hyper-focus locked in as I spent this past year obsessively searching for the perfect gem and setting for Emma. But even with all that research, I’m a mess of nerves, praying she loves it, praying she wants this.
