“Take my advice, Mel. Ask. The. Man.”
Her bossy tone made me smile as I admitted, “I mean, he’s made some random comments. Like how he’s lucky I know how to use his top-of-the-line espresso machine because now he doesn’t need to worry about figuring it out.”
“See, Devon probably hasn’t even thought about you leaving yet if he hasn’t brought it up. Promise me you’ll talk to him before doing something silly, like arranging for a rideshare to take you to a cheap motel and then locking yourself in a crappy room to cry your eyes out over something you could’ve fixed with a simple conversation.”
“Okay, drama queen.” I crawled off the mattress to walk into the bathroom. “I’m going to hop in the shower now so I’m not a smelly mess when Devon gets back, and we have that talk.”
“Good call. Make sure to shave all the good parts in case you need to remind him why you should stay.”
My call to my sister had accomplished both of my goals. She was all caught up on what had been going on in my life, and I was laughing as I stepped into the shower. Devon must have returned while I was in there because shortly after I was finished getting ready, he walked into the bathroom. “What’re you doing?”
I met his gaze in the reflection of the mirror as I zipped my makeup bag closed. “Just packing up my stuff so I’ll be ready when it’s time to head back to my apartment.”
Instead of taking Ana’s advice to heart, I chickened out during my shower and decided I should mentally prepare in case Devon wanted me to go home. Judging by the way he was glaring at me, it wasn’t the right call. I got flustered when he stalked toward me without saying anything and blurted, “Staying at your place has been awesome, but I wasn’t sure how long you wanted me to stay. You brought me here to keep me safe from my stalker, but he’s dead now.”
Devon started to put everything back where it’d been. Then he flung open the cabinet door under the sink and tossed my makeup bag inside. Once that was done, he tugged on my hand to lead me into the bedroom. When he pointed at the edge of the mattress, I sat down. Then I gasped when he dropped down next to me and pulled me onto his lap. “Need you close for this conversation.”
Now that I had a better idea of his reaction, the knots in my belly loosened. “I’m guessing it’s safe to assume that you don’t want me to leave today?”
“Definitely a safe assumption.” His breath was hot against my neck as he chuckled softly. “I don’t want you to leave today, tomorrow, or any other day unless we’re both moving out together.”
I gasped and twisted around to straddle him. “You don’t think it’s too fast? We haven’t even known each other for two weeks yet.”
“Nope, I’m behind the curve again, sweetheart.” I caught the reference to when I’d teased him about all the time we’d spent together before hopping into bed with each other, but I didn’t understand what he meant. “Brecken proposed to Hadley two days after they met.”
“Proposed?” I echoed, feeling as though my heart might jump out of my chest.
“Yeah, sweetheart.” He rubbed his thumb over my left ring finger. “I’m not asking you to marry me right now because you deserve a fuck of a lot more than a spur-of-the-moment proposal. But now that your stalker is in the morgue and I’ve answered all the questions the cops had for me, I’ll make finding the perfect ring my top priority. Then I’ll come up with a grand gesture you can share with our kids.”
I fisted his shirt in my hands and shook my head. “I don’t need all that.”
“What do you need?” He gripped my butt cheeks to pull me even closer.
I trusted Devon with my life and my heart, so it wasn’t too difficult to take a leap of faith and confess, “To know that you love me.”
His lips were barely an inch from mine when he whispered, “I’ll love you until the day I die, sweetheart.”
“That better not be anytime soon since I love you, too,” I murmured.
“You can count on us having many, many years together,” he promised. “It’s my job to guard your heart for the rest of our lives, and I’ll do as good of a job at it as I’ve done keeping you safe since we met.”
EPILOGUE
DEVON
“Tell me the story about how you asked Mommy to marry you after you saved her life,” our six-year-old begged as she stared up at me with pale green eyes that were a perfect match for her mom’s.
Whenever Nina was acting up, my gorgeous wife loved to remind me that our daughter got her stubbornness from me. And that I’d been the one who’d knocked her up before I’d proposed because of how much I hated the idea of having anything between us. Not that we’d known she was pregnant at the time. That was a happy surprise that pushed our wedding up when we discovered it two weeks later. Her sister pulled together a small ceremony and reception in Portland for fifty of our closest family and friends in less than a month. Then my bride and I flew to Hawaii for our honeymoon, where we spent two weeks at a rental house on the beach.
Nina wasn’t much of a sleeper. She hadn’t slept through the night until she was nine months old. Then she’d fought naptime when she was a toddler. And once she’d outgrown that stage, she started to use every excuse in the book to stay up past her bedtime. But even with all of her grumbling, putting her to bedat night was one of my favorite things. “You know the rule—only one book before bedtime.”
She widened her eyes and blinked up at me. “But I’m not asking for another book, Daddy. Just a story.”
“Always looking for the loophole so you can bend the rules your way.” I tapped the tip of her nose and smiled.
She grinned back at me. “Did it work?”
I nodded before setting the book I’d just read to her on the bedside table. “Sure, I’ll tell you the story about how I proposed to your mommy.”
