Saving Della Ray

Another waiter in a suit came to take our dinner request.

Gage ordered a large steak, oddly enough, a T-Bone steak.

“Missing being Bone?” I asked, with a happy giggle.

“No. But I’ll always love Bone, he brought me to you.”

As the waiter left, I caught Gage just staring at me. “What?’’ I asked.

“You look so fucking beautiful,” he declared with such intensity. “You can’t imagine how glad I am to be with you tonight, baby.’’ As he said it, I swear he blinked away tears.

The words and the look in his deep blue eyes made my heart skip. “I’m deliriously happy you’re alive and here with me, Gage. I don’t know what I would have done without you.”

He lifted his flute and held it out. “To being alive,’’ he said.

“To being alive,” I echoed as I clinked my glass to his.

I watched him tilt his head as he drank. A few strands of his beautiful hair came loose and floated back. “I love you, but I realize you’re still a stranger,” I told him.

His eyes widened. “A stranger?”

“Well, not to my body, but I don’t really know much about you.”

He looked at me indulgently. “What would you like to know?”

“Everything.”

“I don’t see why that can’t be arranged,” he said softly, as he entwined his fingers with mine. “When we have our whole lives ahead of us.”

Epilogue

One year later

-all of me-

I sat in the bathroom and stared at the blue line. Wow, what a coincidence that I should find out I’m pregnant on Jess’s birthday!

There was a bang on the door and I jumped on the toilet seat, my hand flying to my chest.

“Food is ready! Come out, Mommy,” Jess called.

“I’ll be right there,” I called back, and tucked the white stick into the pocket of my shorts. “It will need a confirmation,” I told myself. “Don’t jump to conclusions yet.”

I walked into the kitchen and stopped at the sight of the table. It was loaded with a growing stack of pancakes, strawberries, syrup, and juice.

Gage turned around. He had Jess glued to his body like a baby, as she worked the sausages that were cooking on the stove.

“Wow! You guys cooked all this while I was in the bathroom?” I asked while taking the nearest seat.

“We started even before you were awake, Mommy,” Jess crowed.

Gage put her down and she made a sad face, so he lowered himself to her eye level and gave her a smile that never failed to melt her or me, for that matter.

He spoke so softly to her that I could barely hear what he was saying. That was exactly the tone he used on me too. To the rest of the world he had a stern tone, but to those that he had in his heart, he was gentle, intimate, and consuming.

Jess ran off to carry out whatever errand he had sent her on.

Then he turned his searing blue gaze on me.

After all this time, I still felt my heartbeat quicken when our eyes met like this.

Strands of his silky hair fell lightly down the sides of his face. He’d gotten rid of the beard, but it always made me happy that he didn’t cut his hair after his undercover assignment came to an end. Instead, he had maintained the dark cascade, but had never allowed it to go past his shoulders.

He was dressed in nothing but the pair of dark slacks that I had peeled off his body last night and the memory jostled me to where all I could think of was having my hands on him again.

He leaned against the sink, and studied me intently. “Why are you upset?”

“I’m not upset,” I responded, taking a strawberry from the platter in front of me.

“Nichole is coming up from Arnault today, isn’t she?” he asked.

“Yeah, she is.”

“How is she?”

A smile spread across my lips. “She’s fine, but she mentioned a secretive, mysterious billionaire who has come to live in Arnault. Apparently, he paid a visit to her gallery. Something about the way she described him made alarm bells ring in my head.”

He frowned. “In what way?”

I grinned. “In a good way.”

I saw him relax then. “Right. Good for her. About time she found someone. Is your sister okay?”

“Yup, she fine too. She said she would call later to speak to Jess.”

He came over to sit by my side. Pulling my chair between his thighs, he stared into my eyes. “Back to you. Are you worried about sending your manuscript to the publishers?”

“Nope, I’ve already decided that if they reject me, I’m just going to self-publish.”

“So what’s wrong?”

He looked at me with such concern in his eyes that I felt as if I must be the luckiest girl alive. Who would have ever thought I would get to keep such a gorgeous man with such a beautiful, protective soul … all for little ole me. Over this last year, my love for him had dug in even deeper than I had ever believed possible. Leaning forward, I threw my arms around his shoulders and kissed him. “You’ve ruined me,” I whispered to his lips. “You pay for everything. You take care of Jess and me. I know how expensive Jess’s medical bills are. I could never pay you back.”