“Keep her busy,” he whispered, “for maybe fifteen minutes.”
Cartier was just minutes away.
He ran through the rain, found the manager waiting for him with ten beautiful rings laid out on a tray in a private room, but it took no time to decide on the right one: a perfect, blue-white diamond, flanked by sapphires and set in white gold.
It was a classic, just like the woman who would wear it.
He put the little red box in his pocket, raced back to Saks and found Sage agonizing over the bowling-ball case, the sack and a lunchbox—at least, that’s what they looked like to him.
“Where were you?” she whispered. “I wanted your opinion—”
“In the men’s room,” he said blithely, and told the clerk they’d take all three.
Caleb Wilde, world-class problem-solver.
“I keep telling you,” Sage said, all bluster but with something indescribably tender in her eyes, “that you’re impossible.”
“I am,” he said somberly …
And then a funny thing happened.
A lightning bolt came straight out of the ceiling.
It might as well have, because all at once and with unerring certainty, he knew he wasn’t impossible at all.
He was simply a man head over heels in love.
CHAPTER TWELVE
CALEB poured himself a brandy, stood at the windows looking out at Central Park, and told himself to calm down.
Sage was in the bedroom.
He could see her whenever he turned around, surrounded by boxes and shopping bags and all the things he’d bought for her.
She was excited and happy.
He was excited and happy … and an absolute wreck.
The little red box was burning a hole in his pocket.
He brought the brandy snifter to his lips, took a slow, warming mouthful of the amber liquid.
Asking her to marry him had been easy. Well, more or less. Proposing had been a logical choice.
Telling a woman you loved her didn’t have anything to do with logic.
It meant putting your heart on the line. And he’d never done anything remotely like it before.
The glass shook in his hand.
Amazing.
He’d faced capture by the enemy, torture, even death. But this—telling Sage he loved her …
What if she didn’t love him? What if she said, “That’s very nice to hear, Caleb, and I like you, I like going to bed with you but …”
Sage must have felt his eyes on her because she spun toward the door and when he saw the joy in her face, his heart lifted.