How could she forget the soldier she and Ash had first worked together to save? The reason Ash had come up onto that rooftop back at camp, to tell her the lad had been deemed stable enough to fly back to hospital in the UK.
‘Of course I remember.’
‘Well, his brother does this for a living; commercial businesses and local councils commission him to paint the gable walls of buildings, under bridge arches—you name it.’
‘How do you know that?’ She shook her head incredulously.
‘He had an unusual tattoo so I asked him about it during that period where he was slipping in and out and you were trying to keep him awake.’
Fliss nodded slowly. ‘I remember, but I never heard what he said.’
‘He told me it was based on his brother’s first piece of work. When I thought about doing this for you—for us—I thought it would be a nice touch. I had a photo from that rooftop so...’
He shrugged, tailing off, but Fliss was still waiting for her heart to start beating.
‘So there is an us?’ The grin spread through her body like warm honey.
Smiling, Ash led her to the chairs, helping her sit down in one whilst he sat in the other; they leaned into each other, his fingers still laced with hers. She didn’t even bother trying to drag her eyes from his until he answered.
‘There is, without a doubt, an us.’
The heat of the fire was much more apparent here but Fliss suspected it wasn’t what was causing the warmth to seep through her body, through her very bones, right now.
‘You’re strong, Fliss. And you’re driven. You have so many incredible qualities, from your empathy and loyalty to your passion and dedication. And I have to tell you, you’re damn sexy too. You affect me in a way I can’t control.’
‘I’m glad,’ she murmured.
‘And I love that about you.’
The words slid through her. So subtly she wasn’t sure if she was hearing things.
‘You still love me?’
She swallowed. Hard. It seemed almost too perfect. Too unreal.
‘I love everything about you, Fliss. You turn my heart inside out.’
‘I do?’ she breathed, marvelling at the man facing her. The same one she’d challenged in that office, in the supply room, in the hotel room. And yet a completely different, more open person.
But only open to her, which somehow made it all the more incredible.
‘I love the doctor you are, Fliss, I love the Major you are, and the person you are. Most of all I love the woman you are. The way you make me want to be a better soldier, better leader, better person. I love the way you make me feel, the way you get under my skin like no one else, the way you challenge me and don’t let up. And, for the record, I love the sexy way you bite your lip like that.’
‘You love me,’ Fliss repeated, the confusion of emotions that had been jostling in her brain finally settling down enough for her to understand his declaration.
It was more than she had dreamed of. A passionate, heartfelt, amazing declaration of love she had never thought anyone would ever say to her. It made her feel part of something special. It made her feel they were something special. Not practical, logical, or sensible. But unrestrained, emotional, intense.
‘I love you too.’ She stumbled over the words in her haste to say them. To hear what they sounded like when accompanied with all these sensations tumbling around her heart.
They sounded magical. Unparalleled. Perfect.
The feeling started in her curling toes and permeated up through her legs, her body, her chest, fixing an outrageous grin on her mouth as it continued right up to the top of her head. She felt as though together they could face anything.
Together.
She started as Ash slid off his chair in front of her, simultaneously retrieving a neat green leather box from beneath her fold-out chair.
‘Marry me, Major.’ He grinned. ‘It isn’t practical or logical but I don’t want to do the practical thing and wait until we’ve dated for a while, because it won’t change anything. No other woman could match you. No other woman could affect me the way you do. There will never be another one for me. So I don’t want us to wait.’