She stared at him for a long couple of minutes while everyone in the room seemed to hold their breaths. “Yes, I absolutely want to marry this idiot,” she said.
The women squealed with delight. The vicar sighed heavily and Matt winked at her. “Good decision. Well done. But how about less of the idiot stuff?”
Before she could answer, the vicar cleared his throat. “Dearly beloved,” he started, and Jena didn’t hear anything else.
All she could see, all she was aware of, was Matt’s smiling face and his eyes full of love.
Love for her.
Jena Morgan had found a home at last.
Epilogue—six months later
The frame for their new house was going up, and Jena couldn’t wait to see it happen.
“Get up.” She bounced on the bed beside Matt.
He groaned and shoved his head under the pillow. “Go away. This is my first day off in months.”
“Liar. You were off last weekend.”
“I was on call last weekend. There’s a difference.”
She grabbed the pillow and lobbed it over the room. “You need to get dressed. We have to get to the building site. I want to see the house go up.”
Matt rolled onto his back, momentarily distracting her with his pecs. Yum. She shook her head. No. Not yum. There was no time for yum. His eyes sparkled as he guessed what she was thinking.
“Why don’t we stay here for a while instead?” He reached for her, but she jumped out of his way.
“I don’t want to miss this. Get up and get dressed right now.”
He groaned. “Explain to me why I have to be there so you can see it. You can see it perfectly well without me.”
“Matthew Donaldson, this is our first home. Probably our last home. We’ve been planning it for months. This is important. It’s something we need to share together.”
“Fine, I’ll get up, but you owe me.”
She clapped her hands and bounced some more as he hauled himself out of bed. “You shower, I’ll get your clothes. Hurry.” She shooed him in the direction of the bathroom.
Apart from the fact it was exciting to see their house being built, she was also excited that there was an end in sight to living in Matt’s horrible police-issue house. No matter how much colour and mess she threw at it, it still seemed sterile. Not to mention the orange glass windows made her want to vomit. She did a little twirl as she waited for Matt to finish in the bathroom. Normally she would have climbed into the shower with him, but she actually wanted to leave the house sometime before lunch.
She could never have guessed how fabulously things had turned out. Her old house had building insurance. It wasn’t enough to cover building a new home, but it had been damn close. Then the government had gotten in touch. It turned out they planned to pay damages for the fact her property sat on an unsafe mine. It meant Jena and Matt had more than enough to build the house of their dreams. Not that Matt was bothered. He kept telling her that his savings were now her savings. Which was great, kind, generous, all of those things. She still felt better sharing his savings when she had something for them to share too.
An arm wrapped around her waist and Mat
t buried his face in the crook of her neck.
“Delicious,” he rumbled against her skin. He kissed her shoulder before nuzzling the spot behind her ear that made her go weak at the knees.
She stepped away, thrusting his clothes at him. “No distracting me.”
He laughed, the devil. “Are Gordon and Brenda coming?”
Jena nodded. “They’re meeting us there.”
“I hope they’re bringing food.”
Jena ignored him. Everything revolved around food for Matt. She was pleased Gordon would be there for the start of their house. He’d really taken her under his wing at the hardware store. She’d learned so much the past few months, and after her house had blown up, Gordon started paying her in money rather than materials. She loved it. She loved everything DIY, and Gordon was talking about her becoming a partner in the business. He said he wanted to change the sign above the door to “Stewart and Daughter”. It made her cry—much to Matt’s amusement.