"I love you, too, princess. But are you sure about what you're doing here? I'm a Marine. That's all I've ever wanted to be. I'm no stockbroker."
She actually laughed and, oh, it felt good. "I don't want help with my portfolio." Fisting her hands in his T-shirt, she pulled him closer and kept her gaze locked with his as she said, "I want you to marry me because you need me."
"I do."
"You want me."
"I do."
"And you love me."
He smiled—a slow, wicked smile that curled her toes and made sensuous promises she planned to hold him to.
"Oh, yes, ma'am. I do."
"You keep practicing those two little words, all right?"
"I guess I can do that," he said, dropping his hands to her waist and pulling her flush against him.
Sliding her palms up his chest, she wrapped her arms around his neck, looked up at him and said, "You stole my heart, Travis. Out in that desert you claimed it, whether you meant to or not."
He bent his head, resting his forehead against hers, and released a long breath he hadn't known he'd been holding. For the first time since leaving D.C., he felt … whole again. "You can't have your heart back, princess. But you can have mine. It's belonged to you from almost the first moment I laid eyes on you."
With the stew erupting on the stove and black smoke still curling from the oven, Travis kissed his princess. And the moment their lips met, he knew, deep in his soul, that he was finally the richest man in Texas.
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THE MARINE & THE DEBUTANTE Page 12
