With Every Heartbeat (Forbidden Men 4)

He was happy, so freaking happy while I was afraid I might vomit. I closed my mouth and forced each breath through my nose. Then I nodded because I was totally unable to write the word yes.

“So...this was unexpected,” I finally found the courage to admit the next day.

I sat in the passenger seat of Quinn’s truck as he drove us to the jewelry store. So he could buy Cora an engagement ring.

He glanced at me. “Hmm?”

“Your, you know...” I flailed out a hand. “The ring. Your engagement. I didn’t... I mean, I didn’t realize you were that serious about her...that you guys were that serious.”

His cheeks reddened as he grinned out the front windshield. “Well...yeah. It was pretty unexpected. I mean, I hadn’t been planning it or anything.”

“But yesterday you just, what...woke up with a wild hair to propose marriage to someone?”

Okay, I might’ve sounded a tad bit bitter there, because he glanced at me in surprise.

“I mean…” I rushed to add, except he was already shaking his head.

“Cora isn’t just someone. She’s my girlfriend. I’ve been dating her for months. We’re in love.” He cocked me a searching glance. “You don’t think I should ask her? You think it’s too soon?”

Face flooding with heat, I waved my hand. “I wasn’t saying you shouldn’t ask.”

He nodded. “Then you think I should?”

Grr. Why was he making me answer this? I just wanted to lean forward and bang my head against the dashboard. I was the last person on earth who should answer that question.

All the no reasons floated through my head first.

Because I want you for myself.

Because she lies.

You’re too young. You haven’t dated her long enough. She doesn’t even like football. She lies. And I want you for myself.

Ugh. I couldn’t tell him any of that.

So I thought up the yes reasons.

She’s sick and she needs support, the kind someone warmhearted like you could give. Any woman would be lucky and honored to receive a question like that from you.

You love her.

And with that reason in my head, I lost my taste for all the yes motives. I stared out the side window of his truck. He loved her, and there was no way to argue my way around that.

“I think you should do what you feel in your heart is the right thing to do.”

Quinn was quiet for a minute. “She woke up so happy on Sunday morning. I mean, she even said Saturday night was the best night of her life.”

No, it had been the best night of my life. And then Cora had stolen it from me by hopping onto that stage and kissing him after he’d sung that song to me.

“And I can’t remember what happened, but something did. Something big. I think it was something amazing.”

I swallowed, sinking lower in my seat, wondering if it had been something amazing with me…or something amazing with Cora. I was tempted to tell him…about us, how we’d talked, flirted, almost kissed, how he’d gazed into my eyes when we’d sung that song together. But what if I was wrong? What if the amazing thing he thought he remembered had really been something afterward that had happened with Cora?

What if I was trying to steal my roommate’s boyfriend while he wanted to buy her an engagement ring? That would make me the lowest of low, especially when she was so sick and…

I drew in a shaky breath. Since moving here, Cora hadn’t been acting as I remembered her from home. But maybe the lies and the secrets would stop after the transplant. She had to be scared; I knew I would be. Maybe fear was just making her lash out. And maybe she’d been so distasteful to me lately because she didn’t like the way I always looked at her boyfriend. I certainly wouldn’t blame her for that. So what if she and Quinn really did belong together and I was hampering it by making him question his reasons?

“She dropped a hint too.” Quinn glanced at me swiftly before returning his attention to the road. “A pretty big one. On Sunday morning, she pretty much told me how she wanted me to propose.”