by Lili Valente
“Don’t worry! You can’t jinx love,” he says with a laugh, waving a hand out the window as the BMW swings into the resort, leaving me alone on the rapidly darkening road. It’s just after six, but the winter sun slid behind the mountains nearly an hour ago, which means I’ll have to hurry to get everything set up before Ed and Mitch send Addie on her scavenger hunt.
Hitching my basket over my arm, I make my way through the trees to where pines stretch toward the pink and grey sky, casting purple shadows on the frozen lake below. It’s as stunning as the pictures on the website, and made even more stunning by the surprise already sitting on the ice near the beach, as promised.
The motorized ice gondola is on loan from Tomahawk Mountain house, delivered this morning because Addie was sad that she didn’t get a chance to ride in one last year after the blizzard shut down activity on the lake. I have a slightly shameful amount of money lying around, and I wanted to do something so special that she’ll never forget the way I proposed.
Besides, I never would have finished the book that sold my horror trilogy at auction—with movie rights—if Addie hadn’t kept pestering me for more pages, giving me the confidence that a love story with a horror garnish was entertaining, if not necessarily marketable. But it turned out that a lot of people thought they could market it, and now Addie and I have the money to move to New Jersey, where I’ll write while she goes to school. Mitch refused to tell me if she was accepted to the architecture program at Rutgers, but I have no doubt that she got in. And if she didn’t get that scholarship she was gunning for, I have enough to pay her tuition.
And I will pay it, no matter how many times she insists she wants to pay her own way. After the basics are covered—food, shelter, and money for books that aren’t carried by the library—money isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Hording gold like a dragon who can only nap on a pile of jewels, or scheming new ways to get more when I already have more than enough isn’t my jam. I’d rather use my money as a tool to spread happiness, and multiplying Addie’s happiness is at the top of my list of things I want to do with my life.
She desperately wants to go back to school, and I desperately want to make all her dreams come true, and so we’re going to make it happen.
Together. No matter what.
“Assuming Eduardo hasn’t jinxed your ass,” I mumble as I spread the blankets I brought out onto the leather seat of the gondola, get the hot chocolate thermos and champagne glasses set up—an engagement calls for something classier than mugs—and hide the big surprise under the driver’s seat.
I check that there’s enough room to kneel between the seat and the front of the boat, double check that I can reach the ring without sticking my face in Addie’s lap—though I will happily bury my face between her sweet thighs as soon as she says “yes”—and then fire up the boat and take it for a test drive.
I’m finishing my first circle around the ice near the shore when I spy a flashlight beam bobbing through the trees between the lake and the resort.
It’s her, and it’s time.
I flick a switch on the steering wheel, illuminating the tiny lights that cover the gondola and the larger lantern that hangs over the seat from a hook at the rear of the boat. Soft gold beams cut through the deepening purple shadows, warm and welcoming, and then Addie steps out onto the pebble beach and beauty becomes magic.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Nate
She’s wearing a dark brown fur coat—Eduardo’s gift, I assume—the same shade as the curls floating around her pretty face, that red lipstick that always drives me crazy, and a delighted expression that makes it clear she’s perfectly happy to be on the receiving end of the surprise.
Our eyes meet across the ice as I close the distance between us, and her smile widens. “You are one sneaky devil, Nathaniel Casey.”
“And you are beautiful, Einstein.” I pull the boat to a stop and hop out onto the ice to offer my hand. “May I have the pleasure of ferrying your lovely self around the lake this evening?”
“You may.” She inclines her head as she gracefully reaches her gloved hand out to take mine. “Thank you, sir.”
“You’re very regal and sexy in this fur,” I say, helping her into the boat. “I’m not sure I’m fancy enough to sit beside you.”
She settles onto the seat, her button nose lifted into the air. “I feel like a Russian princess, I’m not going to lie. We may have to move to Antarctica so I can wear my new precious all year round.”
I smile down at her. “So I assume you have no issues with vintage fur?”
“Heck no. It is my precious, and I will call it precious, and it shall be the most precious, for always and forever.” She snuggles deeper into the coat with a grin so cute I can’t resist leaning down to steal a kiss.
Our lips meet, and I taste sweet and sour and a hint of something that burns my skin. I deepen the kiss, stroking my tongue against hers, amazed that even a year into this constant togetherness thing, a kiss or two is still enough to get me rock-hard and ready.
By the time I take the seat beside her, murmuring “spiked cider,” against her lips, I’m already desperate to be inside her.
But my cock has learned the value of delayed satisfaction, and there won’t be any naughtiness in the gondola until I have Addie’s answer. I want her mind clear when she agrees to marry me, which is why I deliberately chose not to spike the hot chocolate. Her tolerance is a little higher than when we first moved in together, when she would get giggly over the first celebratory glass of champagne and fall fast asleep about halfway through the second, but she’s still the lightest of lightweights.
And she’s apparently already had something to drink…
“Just a sip,” she says, putting my mind at ease. “Eduardo had a thermos and insisted we toast our first friend-i-versary. Isn’t that the sweetest thing?”
“It is,” I agree, settling beside her and shifting the boat back into drive.
“Not to mention the precious, which I told him was way too much and made the poetry book I bought him seem sad. But he insisted I had to take it, and it’s rude to refuse a gift. And you know I hate to be rude.”
“I do know this about you.” I wrap my arm around her as we cruise away from the Lover’s Leap beach, into the deepening shadows beneath the trees and the isolated side of the lake where I intend to make my move. “And I know that I love you a ridiculous amount.”
She snuggles closer, making me melt despite the chill in the air. “Me, too. Completely ridiculous, even though you shoplifted my surprise.”
“I didn’t shoplift it, I added to it.” I kiss her forehead, continuing in a softer voice, “So, are you going to keep me in suspense or what?”
“About my surprise?” She nods. “Yes. You don’t get a single hint until after your surprise is over. I want to draw out the surprise fun for as long as possible.”
“Sounds good.” I turn the wheel, sending our iceboat cruising closer to the center of the lake to avoid a few low hanging tree limbs. “But I meant about Rutgers. We don’t have to talk about it tonight if you’d rather not, but I want you to know that I crunched numbers yesterday. We can afford this, Einstein, even if you didn’t get the scholarship. It’s entirely doable, and I’m not going to stop pestering you about it until you let me help out if you need it.”
“That’s sweet,” she says softly. “But you’re assuming that I got accepted.”
“What?” I ask, my blood heating. “What the hell is wrong with those people? They should be down on their knees begging you to go to their fucking, piece of shit school. Fuck them! You’ll apply somewhere else, somewhere better, where they’ll have the sense to—”
“Relax.” She laughs as she pats my leg with her gloved hand. “I was just messing with you. I was accepted, I got the scholarship, and I can enter the program in the summer semester, as long as you think we can get moved by then.”
Relief floods in to calm my spiking heartbeat. “Of course we can.
And shit, that’s amazing news! I knew you could do it.”
“Thanks.” She grins against my lips as she accepts my congratulatory kiss. “And thanks for crunching the numbers, just in case. You are the sweetest and the best.”
“And you’re a little jerk. You almost gave me a rage-stroke.”
She smiles, unrepentantly. “That was revenge for sneaking around and figuring out my surprise. Now we’re even.” She shakes her head, her brow furrowing. “How did you do it, anyway? I was so careful.”
“The lodge called a couple of weeks ago to offer to upgrade us to a hot tub room for free if we added Valentine’s Day breakfast reservations,” I say, laughing as she curses. “I accepted, of course. Is the hot tub nice?”
“It’s very nice, dammit.” She wrinkles her nose. “I knew I shouldn’t have given them both phone numbers, but I told them to call the cell. Twice! I told them twice, just to be sure they heard me the first time.”
“People rarely follow directions.”
“Don’t I know it,” she says with a sigh. “Oh well, that works out well sometimes. If people weren’t so bad at following directions, I would still be washing hair instead of managing the Chelsea salon.” She glances up at me, worry in her eyes. “I think Eduardo is sad that I’m going to have to quit, even though he promised he was thrilled that I got into the program. I feel terrible for abandoning him.”
“He is thrilled for you, don’t doubt it for a second. And you’ll train a wonderful replacement between now and May, and everything will be fine.”
She grins. “Those are some of my favorite words. Everything will be fine.”
“Good. Because it will.”
Her grin softens as she gazes out across the frozen water. “I believe that now. It really feels like everything is going to be fine. So much better than fine.” She threads her fingers through mine. “I love you, P.D. Thank you for this beautiful surprise and this perfect night and for loving me the way you do. You are very good at it—the way that you are very good at all the other things you put your heart into.”
We’re not to the far side of the lake yet—we’re closer to the middle, still in sight of the hotel beach if anyone decides to take an after-dinner walk—but I’m not going to get a better opening than this.
“You’re so welcome. It’s truly my pleasure.” My pulse spikes all over again as I shut off the engine, leaving the lights on because I need to see her face. “But my heart isn’t in as deep as I would like for it to be just yet.”
Her brow furrows. “It’s not?”
I shake my head as I ease off my seat to kneel next to her feet. “No, it’s not.”
“Oh my God,” she murmurs softly, shock and understanding warring in her expression as I reach for the ring hidden beneath the seat. “Oh my God. You’re not doing what I think you’re doing, are you?”
“That depends.” I open the box, revealing the ring my mother brought up last weekend. It’s my grandmother’s ring, a pink diamond the same color as Addie’s cheeks when she blushes. “Are you thinking I’m going to ask you to marry me?”
Her hands fly to cover her mouth, but she nods fast enough to make me think she’s eager for me to continue.
“Then yes, I am.” I swallow hard, fucking nervous as hell even though I’m pretty sure she’s going to say yes. But that doesn’t mean I want to half-ass this. I want it to be perfect, as perfect as this woman who has made my life something so much deeper and better and fuller than it was before.
“Adeline Klein,” I continue, holding the ring between us, “I knew the moment I laid eyes on you that you were no ordinary girl. And by the time we found our way out of that hellmouth, I was pretty certain kissing you was going to be my goal for the summer. What I didn’t know back then was that you were the smartest, sweetest, sexiest, most beautiful and perfectly crazy person I would ever meet, or that I would fall so hard for you that no one else ever would, ever could take your place. No one could even come close.”
She blinks faster, tears filling her eyes as she tucks her chin to her chest, her mouth still covered by her gloved hands.
“A year ago, fate worked some pretty big miracles to bring you back to me.” I pull the ring free and tuck the box into my coat pocket. “But I still need one more. Because I’m greedy for miracles when it comes to you.”
Addie huffs softly with laughter, and sniffs as she pulls her hands from her face, revealing lips pressed into a thin line.
“I need you to say that you’ll be my wife, Ad,” I say, throat tight. “And promise that we’ll spend the rest of our lives making love and making memories and making up for lost time because you are the only person in the world I want to keep growing up with. I want to wake up with you every morning and plan adventures with you every night and be your family, because loving you is the best job on earth, and I don’t ever want to quit.”
Her eyes close, sending tears down her cheeks. “Oh, man.” She sniffs hard again, and dabs gloved fingers beneath her eyes. “The one night I wear mascara, and I can’t remember if it’s waterproof.”
“It doesn’t matter. You’re beautiful even with black all over your face.” I squeeze her knee through the fur of her coat. “But I would love to know your answer. Unless you need time to think…?” She nods, and a piece of my heart breaks off and plummets into my stomach. “Oh. Okay. Yeah, time to think is good. Time to think is probably—”
“No!” She shakes her head just as emphatically. “No.”
“No, you don’t want to marry me?” I ask, wondering how this could have gone so differently than I thought it would.
She laughs and shakes her head again. “No, I mean, I don’t need time to think. Yes. Yes, I’ll marry you. Yes!”
My breath rushes out, and my bones feel less solid than they did a second ago. “Thank God. Shit, you scared me.”
“I’m sorry.” She leans in, kissing my cheek and then my other cheek and then my lips, long and soft and deep until she’s made it abundantly clear how much she meant that “yes.”
“You just surprised me is all,” she continues, pulling away with a smile. “A proposal wasn’t anywhere on my radar. We’ve only been dating a year, and you’ve got so much going on with work right now.”
“Work schmerk. It’ll all get done,” I say, but then I start to worry, “But is it soon for you? Would you rather put it off until after you start school? Or finish school? Or—”
“No! Not at all! I can’t wait to be your wife.” She shakes her head hard enough to send her curls swirling around her face. “I want to keep growing up with you, too. You are my very best friend and the only man I’ve ever loved and I can’t imagine a future without you in it.”
“Then do I get to put this on?” I hold up the ring, letting the diamond catch the light of the lantern overhead.
Addie’s fingers come to circle my wrist. “Yes, but I do have one serious question. Something important that we should discuss first.”
“Shoot.” My tongue sweeps out to dampen my lips. I’m starting to wish I’d had a shot before starting this proposal. I seriously underestimated how stressful this would be.
But then Addie has never been the easiest woman to figure out, just the best.
“What about kids?” she asks, proving there’s a topic aside from vintage fur that we haven’t touched base on. “Do you know if you want kids someday?”
“I want whatever you want,” I say, because it’s the truth. “I like the idea of babies with you, because I think you’d be a wonderful mom and kids are fun. But after what you went through the first time we got pregnant, I understand if that’s not part of your dream for the future. As long as I have you, I’m never going to feel like I’m missing out.”
Her eyes start to shine again. “Me, either. As long as I have you. But I would love to have your babies someday, if I can. But before we make any big promises, you should know that I might not be able to.” Her brows furrow. “I talked to my doctor after my check-up last fall. Sh
e said there’s a chance my first pregnancy ended badly because I was so young. But there’s a chance that the next time will be hard, too. Maybe even impossible.”
“Then we’ll adopt.”
“Are you sure?” Her frown deepens. “Totally sure?”
“Yes, Addie. I don’t need to have my DNA passed down to the next generation.”
“But you have very smart, handsome, creative DNA. Wouldn’t you be sad not to have a shot at a boy with your cheekbones and way with words, and my really bad hair?”
“I love your hair.” I reach out, tugging a curl that bounces immediately back into the halo around her face. “A kid would be lucky to get any part of you, inside or out.”
“The hair is better than it used to be, before Eduardo got his hands on it.” She smiles, but it doesn’t stick around for long. “All joking aside, is that something you’re going to regret? If a baby that’s a mix of me and you isn’t in the cards?”
“Not even a little bit. That’s never been what I’ve thought about when I think about kids.”
“Then what do you think about?” she asks, looking intrigued.
I chew on my bottom lip. “Um, well, just…loving them, I guess. Loving them with you, because everything’s better with you. And making them happy, and making sure they always know that Mom and Dad are there for them, no matter what. No matter who they want to be, or what they want to dream, or how many mistakes they make on the way to where they’re going.”
“Yes.” She cups my face in her hands. “That’s one of the most beautiful things you’ve ever said. And you say a lot of beautiful things. I feel the same way. I just want a house where love wins. Where it always wins, even when things get hard.”
“It will, I promise,” I say, my breath rushing out as I smile. “Now, do I get to put this ring on your finger, Einstein?”
“Yes, pretty devil.” Her eyes dance as she holds out her hand. “Please.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
