Connell (Carolina Reapers 3)

Sarcasm and anger colored Connell’s tone.

And then…

“…ye can fuck right off.”

Tears filled my eyes as I continued to listen, my lips parting as I stared at Connell.

“…I happen to be madly in love with the woman I have waiting for me at home.”

I gasped into my hands.

“And now,” Connell said as the taped recording silenced. “This is what love looks like for me.” He pointed to the jumbotron, and I tore my gaze from him to look up.

A new video replaced the earlier advertisements and game footage. This one was recorded by Echo at the 5k when we opened the reserve. Connell, rushing up to me after the race, his ostrich costume bobbing with his movements as he scooped me up in a flurry, kissing me before racing off with me in his arms, a wide smile on his face, me laughing the whole way.

I chuckled, tears rolling down my cheeks as another clip rolled.

This one was a shot of Connell, sitting unknowingly on a bench in the locker room smiling up at my picture taped just underneath his last name. “Connell’s got a girlfriend,” Logan’s voice taunted from the other side of the camera. Connell leaped off the bench, laughter in his eyes as he tackled Logan to the ground, the camera cutting off in a shaky haste.

I dropped my hands as another clip played.

Connell filled the frame as he filmed himself in the basement of city hall. “Clearly, this chaos has needed my help for years,” he said, rolling his eyes. “This is my before shot—” my voice in the background, shouting at him from the top of the stairs to get his Scottish butt back upstairs to mop. His eyes lit up at the sound, gazing up the stairs in a look I could only describe as…adoring.

Another clip.

“And this is my after shot,” he said into the camera before panning it around the basement. Organized, sparkling, the exact dream for any city clerk. He’d revolutionized the area. “This will definitely make her life easier,” he said, grinning into the camera. “But I’ll do my best to shake her up every now and again.”

A laugh ripped from my chest as he winked at the camera and the jumbotron filled with pictures of him and me…ones I’d never seen. The pictures he or his friends had taken when I wasn’t looking, but Connell was.

Looking at me.

Those blue eyes alight with nothing but love, adoration, and perhaps lust.

Happiness.

“And,” Connell said into the microphone, the collective awes from the crowd echoing behind him. “If you’ve ever doubted how I spend my time during away games…” he shifted, shaking his head at the screen.

Video after video rolled, some filmed by him, some by Logan or Cannon or Sawyer.

A succession of silly pranks—buckets of water over the Vikings on the team, Lukas and Axel laughing but livid as they chased him down arena hallways. Shaving cream on the face of those players stupid enough to fall asleep in hotel lobbies. Cannon, furiously trying to open his book, which Connell had apparently glued shut.

I actually feared for him in that clip, not exactly sure how Connell was still alive.

Nathan Noble chasing Connell—who carried a massive gear bag—through a hotel lobby, Nathan in nothing but a tight pair of athletic underwear, Logan’s laugh sounding from the behind the camera as Noble screamed at Connell.

Laughter erupted from the crowd as the clips rolled on, but Connell returned his focus to me.

“I don’t have time for anything else in my life, Annabelle,” he said. “Just this, and you.”

My knees wobbled.

“As I hope you can clearly see,” he said. “I love you. And I’ll always love you.”

Another wave of awes soared through the crowd.

“Will ye have me?” He asked, hand outstretched toward me over the partition, his eyes vulnerable and raw.

My heart soared, love pooling within every inch of my soul, knitting together all the shattered, jagged pieces that had plagued me since that stupid article had hit.

I could not deny the proof he’d collected.

Or the simple fact that he’d just laid our relationship bare in front of a sold-out arena...and I didn’t care. No mortification. No worry of what the audience thought. I only wanted him. Nothing else mattered.

And I suddenly felt like the biggest ass in the world for being the last person to see it, to realize how he felt about me.

The same way I felt about him.

I choked back a sob, my feet propelling me toward him.

He dropped the mic on the ice, the crowd hissing from the quick assault on their ears, but soon they were cheering. Because Connell hauled me over the waist-high partition separating us, our lips a frantic and hungry meeting.

“I’m sorry,” I said between kisses. “I’m so sorry, Connell. I’m an idiot. I can be so blind—”

“Don’t,” he said, kissing me again. “Never again,” he said.