Page 87 of Final Proposal

So what is it that Ledger thinks Ford might regret? What is it that he isn’t telling me?

Clearly he has the business side handled, so whatever it is, it must pertain to his personal life. Family, then. Because it doesn’t seem like anything else exists for Ford outside of work and family . . . and me.

I sit on that thought for a bit and am more than reminded of all the kind things he has done for me.

Of course, there was Millie’s salon and the condo. But there were also flowers left on the kitchen table after I mentioned how there was nothing alive in this inn. A meal delivered when I was sick of eating the same food we have stored in our makeshift pantry at the inn. A laundry service to come and take my dirty clothes. A walk down the boardwalk when Roddy pissed me off to no end and he knew I needed to cool off. Quiet nights when I read my book and he perused the Internet on his laptop where we found comfort in the silence.

Simple things that at the end of the day, make me smile. Make my day a little better.

It’s high time I do something nice for him. The question is what?

I jump at the sound at my back. So lost in my own thoughts over the man who made the sound, that I didn’t notice him.

“Sorry. I didn’t know you were in here. I didn’t mean to scare you,” he says distractedly.

“You okay?”

“Yes. Yeah. Sure.” He opens the refrigerator then closes it. Does the same to the freezer before sitting and then standing back up and going to the window to look into the darkness outside.

“Can’t sleep?” I ask.

“Kind of. I don’t know. I . . . I just don’t know.”

Something’s wrong. Is it what Ledger was talking about? I wish I knew. Clearly Ford is distracted and unsettled.

Just like that first night we met.

It feels like a lifetime ago, but the expression on his face and the discord in his eyes are so much the same as back then.

I want to help him, but I’m not sure how to.

That doesn’t mean I’m not going to try.

“Ford?”

“Hmm?” He keeps staring straight ahead as I rise from the seat, all thoughts of having a second ice cream gone. Without thinking, I move through the darkened room to him, slide my arms through his, and wrap them around his waist.

The kiss I press to his shoulder blade is so unlike me and yet . . . strangely, it feels so right, like something he would do to help comfort me.

“Tough day?” I whisper against his back. He shrugs in return. “When I was little and had a tough day, my mom would let me sneak into her bed. She’d tell me there’s nothing a good cuddle can’t fix.”

The memory hits me out of nowhere. My mom’s huge bed. My head on her chest with her steady heartbeat beneath my ear as she played with my hair. The soft melody of her voice as she told me silly stories about me as a baby. About her childhood. About my dad. The muted laughter we’d share. The calm I felt as I drifted off to sleep to the quiet lilt of her voice.

He slides his hands over mine where they encircle his waist. I’m jolted back to the here, to the now, but my mom’s warmth is still wrapped around me, still cocooning me when I haven’t felt it in so very long.

“Wanna come cuddle with me?”

Ford’s body tenses momentarily. Almost as if he knows how much that question just cost me. As much as I’ve enjoyed—and, oh, how I’ve enjoyed—the sex with Ford, I’ve yet to stay overnight in his bed with him. Or let him stay in mine. Because that just seems too . . . intimate. That makes things too real. So my offer even surprises myself. “You sure?”

“Mm-hmm.”

We make our way through the inn toward my room. We don’t speak. Not as we brush our teeth. Not as he strips down to his boxer briefs and me to my tank top and panties. Not as we slide into my bed. Not as he rests his head on my stomach, arm heavy on my thighs, and I toy absently with his hair.

This feels . . . dare I say, normal?

Even the silence that settles around us isn’t awkward. I’m not sure why I thought it would when we’ve lived day in, day out, with each other for the past two months, but it clearly doesn’t.

Ford’s breathing slowly evens out to the point that I think he’s fallen asleep.