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Preston is now walking forward, each step bringing him closer to me.
“I promise to give you nothing but complete honesty from here on out.”
I’m not the only one who has noticed Preston’s movement. Chatter quietly begins as attention is now on him as he joins me.
“Mr. King,” someone calls out. “Do you have a comment for Miss Richford’s confession?”
He nods, eyes on me. “I do, but only if she’s finished.”
After a beat, he goes one. “Are you finished?”
I nod, a soft smile on my lips.
He grabs my microphone. “Then in the spirit of complete honesty, I want it on the record that I am madly in love with Grace Richford.”
My heart races and my breath catches.
Everyone in the room starts talking at once. Some are talking to each other, and some are shouting questions.
“Is the wedding still happening tomorrow?”
“Whose idea was this?”
“Are you back because you lost your promotion?”
“Are you here to keep the lie going?”
On any other day, my mind would be racing with the different answers Preston might have for them, and then I’d be panicking about what it all means.
But not today.
Today, I can’t take my eyes off the man who loves me back.
I don’t say anything, and he grabs my hand.
“Did you hear me?” he asks.
I nod.
“Good. Because I’m not saying it for show or for an article or to keep a story going. I’m saying it because it’s true. I love you, Sunny, so much.”
“You do?”
He nods. “Hell yeah. I love everything about you. The way you work, the way you smile, the way you are with your family, with mine. The way you go after your goals, the way you need a plan for everything, and the way your brain overthinks everything.”
I can’t help but smile.
“You love the overthinking?”
He nods. “Yes, but I love it most when you share those thoughts with me and I get to help you calm them or fix them. I want to help fix them for the rest of my life, Sunny. I know that this whole thing started as a lie, but that’s not how it ends, okay?”
I bite my lip.
“How does it end?”
He doesn’t answer right away; instead, he lowers to one knee and pulls out a ring that takes my breath away.
“Preston,” I gasp, and he chuckles.