I swallowed roughly at the intensity I suddenly felt from him. “What does this all mean?” My voice was soft, like a feather blowing in the wind. Did he even hear me? Had I even said it out loud? He closed his eyes.
He exhaled and opened his eyes a second later, his gaze so turbulent, so full of concentration. I could practically see his mind turning over, wondering what he was about to say right now. All kinds of fear slammed into me, things like he’d say this had all been a one-time thing. Words about how I’d lost my job because we crossed boundaries.
Sure, those things terrified me, but the thing that gripped me the tightest, stole my breath, and squeezed my heart was the fear that he would tell me he didn’t want me, that what he felt for me wasn’t even a fraction of what I felt for him.
Because the truth was… I had fallen for him. I’d fallen in love with him. It was insane and ludicrous, almost unbelievable. But I’d never felt anything realer in my life.
“It means I’m not letting you go, Kitty.”
His words were like this bucket of frigid water over me, causing my spine to straighten, having goose bumps form along my skin. It wasn’t a bad feeling. They were words that woke me up, ones that jumpstarted my heart.
“It means you’re mine, that everything I said last night was the truth. It means so much more than anything I could ever speak in the English language.”
I didn’t know what to say, didn’t know how to accurately describe my feelings.
Telling him I’d fallen in love with him seemed almost rushed, as if he’d think I was crazy for having such strong emotions for someone so quickly. But the way he looked at me, the way he spoke, it all seemed like he felt the same way.
“It means that I want you in my life.” He leaned in slowly, so he was now more eye-level with me. “Do you understand what I’m saying? Do you understand how deeply I mean these words?”
I licked my lips and nodded slowly. What was I agreeing to?
“Tell me what that means to you, Kitty.”
I blew out a slow breath of air, knowing I couldn’t lie, couldn’t hide how I felt. It would just eat away at me. Besides, after what we shared and experienced last night, after hearing what Fin just told me, I wanted to be just as honest with him.
“It means forever.”
The sound that came from him was purely male. “It fucking means forever, baby.” And then he broke into a huge grin, his straight, white teeth flashing right before he leaned in and kissed me, stole the air from me, made me delirious from my passion and my love.
He broke away only long enough to pull me onto his lap, the food now forgotten, the blanket and sheet sliding completely from my body, so I now straddled him naked. But I didn’t care. I’d never felt so light and free in my life. I never felt like I belonged anywhere as much as I did with Fin.
And it looked like we were really doing this. It looked like I was giving myself to this man, and he was giving himself to me.
And I’d never looked more forward to the future than I did right now.Epilogue OneFinFin
Several months laterManual labor. That was what I resorted to in order to make my woman happy. But hell, if my girl wanted a garden in the backyard, a trellis for grapes, even though I told her they probably wouldn’t grow well, given our location, the lack of sun, and a handful of other obstacles, my woman got whatever she wanted.
So here I was, bringing my hammer down over and over again, building the raised beds so she could plant tomatoes and cucumbers, green beans and squash. I was pretty sure she wanted to plant more than just grapes, so I’d build her twenty if that was what it took to see her smile.
It was only when the sun started to set that I put my tools away and looked at my progress. I felt proud, not because I built this shit by hand, but because I knew it would make her happy.
That was my purpose in life… making her happy.
I turned and was about to head back toward the house when the image of Kitty in the sunroom had me stopping. My breath caught at the way she looked with the setting sun coming through the break in the trees, how the light created this halo and glow around her.
Everything I felt for her was genuine. Authentic. My love for her was fierce. It could never be tamed. And the love I had for her was endless.
I watched as she rose on her toes to water one of the hanging baskets, a spider plant she bought a couple months ago in town. Her shirt rose up slightly, and I saw the swatch of creamy skin exposed and looked at that little indentation of her belly button.