Gun Shy
Page 22
∙•∙
Still on his knees by her side, Jack rubbed his chest to ease the ache deep inside, and as he did, another smaller box he’d carried bumped against his fingers. He retrieved the item, turned it over, and flipped open the lid.
If he was going to do it, then he might as well go all the way and humble himself. She loved him.
He just had to set the record straight.
The woman in front of him wasn’t going to settle for anything less than wholehearted commitment. She deserved nothing less.
He took her hand again, stared up into her stunning face, and enjoyed the way she goggled at him. She’d been quiet since the whole pasty incident, and he was about to take advantage of her silence.
He had to make it right.
“I came here for you, Kate. I had no idea you were having our baby when I arrived. I didn’t wrench an antique diamond solitaire from my grandmother’s hand and fly halfway across the world to take no for an answer.” It wasn’t quite the proposal he’d imagined, but she’d made him desperate. “I love you, Kate.”
“You could have just said.”
“Said what? I’ve been saying it all the goddamn time since I got here.” He lurched to his feet without letting go of her hand and yanked her up into his arms while panic skittered through his veins.
“No, you haven’t.” She pressed her face against his chest and made his heart reel. “You could have just said you loved me. That it was nothing to do with the baby.”
“Well, hell, I thought it was obvious.” And just like that, it was obvious. He’d come for her. He’d risked life and limb to cross the Atlantic divide for the one woman he’d ever love.
As she raised her head, he crushed his mouth to hers desperate for the taste of her. Like a sip of water after days in a parched desert, he drank from her, the spark of hope igniting to fire through his veins.
“I love you.” Hungry, he plundered her mouth.
“Yes.”
He knew he barely gave her the chance to answer, but a desperate man resorted to desperate measures.
“Marry me?”
He chanced a look as he raised his head. Her kiss-swollen lips curved in a wide smile, and she waved her left hand for him to slip the ring onto her finger.
“I’d love too.”
»»•««
With quiet laughter, Kate turned from her mother’s dressing room mirror and stepped outside the door where her father waited to escort her downstairs. He tucked her hand in his arm, and her heart swelled with pride at the sight of him in his morning suit.
“You cut a fine figure, Dad.”
His broad smile shot creases into his face. “You make a beautiful bride, Kate. Your mother’s going to cry.”
“She may not be the only one.”
The small gathering of people turned as one, but Kate only had eyes for the handsome cowboy as she made her way to where he waited at the end of the short aisle. He should have looked out of place. She thought he’d fidget, but instead he stood tall and proud in a pale gray morning suit to match her father’s and Michael’s.
She reached out her left hand and placed it in Jack’s firm palm. Her eyes met the chocolate warmth of his gaze as it turned molten.
With a cheeky little jiggle of her head, she flicked her hair back, and pink feathers fluttered in the sprightly breeze to tickle her neck and send goosebumps over her skin. It hadn’t taken much to convert the pretty little pasties to earrings.
Jack’s eyes shot wide, and Kate almost choked on her own laughter as she smoothed her hair back into place.
“Let’s get married, Sheriff.”
About the Author
Diane Saxon lives in the Shropshire countryside in England with her tall, dark, handsome husband, two gorgeous daughters, a Dalmatian, a one-eyed kitten, a ginger cat, six chickens, and a gorgeous black Labrador puppy called Beau—a name she’s borrowed for her hero in For Heaven’s Cakes.
After working for years in a demanding job, on-call and travelling great distances, Diane gave it all up to write when her husband said, “Follow that dream.”
Having been hidden all too long, her characters have burst forth demanding plot lines of their own, and she’s found the more she lets them, the more they’re inclined to run wild.
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