by Hazel James
“Look at you, being a Boy Scout.” I get dressed in the pool bathroom off the patio, and when I open the door, DH is ready with a blindfold.
“Really? You know with my sense of direction, I won’t need this.”
He lifts his brow and gives me a stern but playful look. “My surprise, my rules, Shawshank.”
“Fine, fine,” I sigh, smiling.
He takes my hand in his and leads me to the truck. I laugh to myself, thinking back to the first time I rode in it. So much has changed since then. If I’ve learned anything this summer, it’s that love doesn’t follow a plan and sometimes it takes a tornado to make you see the things worth chasing.
Like the man in the driver’s seat.
It doesn’t take long—maybe five minutes—before the truck rolls to a stop. “Can I take this thing off now?” I reach for the fabric over my eyes when DH launches himself over the console.
“Not yet. Hang tight.” I hear his door open and shut, and then mine opens. I unbuckle and swing my legs over, and he carries me out of the truck. “It’s easier this way.” There are far worse places to be than blindfolded in DH’s arms, so I don’t complain. I feel him nudge the door shut with his shoulder and then we’re walking up steps.
“Oh, is this an Italian place? God, it smells amazing.” My stomach rumbles with delight as he walks inside. I hum along to the Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeran song they have playing on the radio hoping that we’re not making too much of a spectacle. A hunky guy carrying blindfolded woman with wet hair isn’t exactly a common site in a restaurant. “You can put me down now,” I whisper into his neck.
“I know you get lost easily. Just follow the lights.” He gently deposits me on the floor. I lift the blindfold and gasp.
I’m in Maggie’s foyer.
There are candles everywhere.
I spin back around and look at DH, but he only smiles and wiggles his finger indicating I need to walk down the hall. I step through the house, carefully following my illuminated path, until I reach the living room and see my bookshelf.
The one DH made for me.
Breathless, I approach it. On the top shelf, there’s a picture frame with the word “Me” next to four stacked books:
Hopeless
Manwhore
Walking Disaster
El Diablo
The picture frame on the next shelf says “You.”
Bright Side
Spark
The Game Changer
Sweet Addiction
The frame on the shelf below that says “Us.”
The Goal
Say You’ll Stay
Entwined With You
The Perfect Life
The shelf below that has a tiny black velvet box. With shaky hands, I reach down and pick it up. It’s light in weight and heavy in promises and for moment, I stand there trying my best to memorize this feeling. I’ve found my soulmate. With a deep breath, I open the box.
It’s empty.
I’M ON ONE KNEE WITH the ring when she turns around. I’ve spent weeks trying to figure out how I wanted to do this. The internet has exactly three billion suggestions, and I’ve seen about half of them, thanks to Maggie and Aunt Helen. In the end, it came down to the things Paige loves most.
Family.
Books.
Taylor Swift.
Lasagna.
“I tried writing a speech, but it kept coming out wrong, so I’m going to wing it.” Deep breath. “I’ve spent my entire life chasing after things because I never thought I was worthy of being caught. And then you came along, with your country music and cherry lip gloss and you changed everything. For the first time, I felt like I was worthy of love. Of having a future. Of growing old beside someone. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, and I love you more than I’ll ever be able to put into words. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Will you please be my wife?”
I hold the ring between us and everything in my body stops as I await her response. It’s like watching a supercell in the moments just before the tornado drops. I can’t breathe. I can’t blink. I can’t move.
I don’t know which comes first, her tears or her smile, but they both come out in full force as she bobs her head up and down. “Yes! Yes! Yes!” she chokes out. Air and blood and adrenaline rush through me, making me feel like I’m soaring. In three seconds flat, the ring is on Paige’s finger and she’s in my arms.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” I whisper.
“How did you do this? How did I not know?”
“You’re not hard to distract,” I tease. “All Maggie had to do was give you a raft and a pool, and you did the rest for us. Allison texted me pictures of all your book titles last week, and I drove there this afternoon to get everything. But that’s not all.” I step back and point toward the kitchen. Paige’s eyes grow wider as she scans the faces staring back at her. Uncle Kurt and Aunt Helen. Maggie, Eric, and Jordan. Ali and Chris. Austin. Evan.
“Mom and Dad!” She runs toward them, sobbing, and they each hug one half of her. “When did you get here?”
“A couple of hours ago,” Caroline says. We’ve known about this since our last trip, though.” Paige’s jaw falls to the floor.
“What? How?”
“That’s when DH asked me for your hand in marriage.” A man only gets one shot with a conversation like that. If Max thought I was nuts for pulling him aside in Mr. Wilson’s garage, he didn’t show it.
I shove my hands in my pocket and shuffle my feet trying to figure out how to say everything. I always had the right line when it came to women, but this is different. This is the rest of my life we’re talking about. She’s the only one I want to spend it with, so the next few minutes will guarantee me a lifetime of happiness or heartbreak. No pressure. “Sir, I know this is the first time we’re meeting, but I need you to know that I’m in love with your daughter. I haven’t been able to get her out of my head since the day I met her.”
Max nods but remains silent. I’m sure he knows what I’m doing, but he doesn’t rush me, and for that, I’m grateful. Paige is worthy of a man who stands before her father and declares his intentions—even if he’s scared shitless when he does it.
“I should have waited to talk to you about this, to give you and Caroline a chance to get to know me better, but I can’t let you leave without asking for your permission to marry Paige. Don’t get me wrong,” I quickly add, “I’m not in a rush to get married or start a family with her. We can do all of that whenever she’s ready. I just need her to know how I feel. I need her to know there’s no one else who will ever compare to her.”
My heart is pounding. I’ve said my piece, and now it’s all in his hands. He looks like a nice guy. Clean cut. Kind eyes. Surely, men like that don’t go around ripping the hearts out of their daughters’ boyfriends. Right?
Max clears his throat. “Paige dated Chad for three years.” Shit, here we go. My stomach lurches. “Not once did she ever look at him the way she looks at you. People may think dads don’t notice stuff like that, but I did. The only thing I’ve ever wanted for Paige is for her to find someone who loves her as much as I love her mother. I can see now that she has.”
He’s smiling. Max is smiling. At me.
“You have my blessing, son.”
We shake hands and hug and go back to talking about Mr. Wilson’s ’68 Charger, but all I can think about is Paige.
I get to marry Paige.
“Thank you for this.” She walks back into my arms. Even with her tear-streaked cheeks, she’s radiant.
“Thank you for this.” I tip her chin and give her a gentle kiss, which Austin promptly interrupts.
“Mom, I kept the big secret. Can I have my ice cream now?” The adults in the room crack up at his well-timed outburst. Including Austin on the proposal wasn’t in the original plan, but he forced our hand when he ran inside as I was setting the candles out. In a prime example of parenting on the fly, I bribed the shit out of h
im if he didn’t say anything. He shook hands with me because he said pinky promises were for girls and swore I had his word that he’d keep a tight lip.
My man didn’t disappoint.
“Not until after dinner,” she laughs. “But before we do that, I want to see the ring!”
Paige laughs and walks back into the kitchen. “You haven’t seen it yet? With all your cahooting, I figured I’d be the last one in on this, too.”
Maggie cuts a playful side-eye at me. “DH was mean. He said he wasn’t showing anyone until after it was on your finger. I offered to help him ring shop, but he said he knew exactly what he wanted.”
And I did. “I’m proud of myself on this one. I wanted something that represented you, but was also functional. I didn’t want you to have to take your ring off at work.”
“Yeah, you didn’t want those rich doctors swooping in on her,” Eric interjects. He talks a lot of shit, but he pulled me aside earlier and told me how glad he was that I was finally happy. I’ve spent almost half of my life looking up to him. Hearing him say that meant the world to me. Smiling, I lift my middle finger in his direction and continue.
“One of the first things I learned about you was how much you love The Wizard of Oz. The ring itself is twenty-four karat yellow gold to represent the yellow brick road. You deserve diamonds in your wedding ring, but you need some red in there too. Alternating diamonds and rubies seemed like the perfect fit. And the stones are channel set, so everything is smooth. They won’t catch when you have to put on latex gloves.”
Paige stares at me in disbelief. “My God, you really did think of everything, didn’t you?”
I’ve thought of so much more than just the ring, but I’m not ready to tell her about the rest of it yet. I still have some paperwork to do.
Paige plops down on a gray sectional, then hops up and does the same to a tan sofa. “The sectional,” she declares. “It’s cushier.”
“Cushier?” I smile and shake my head, then check “living room” off the list. She’s come up with some crazy words today, but it’s been fun watching her gallivant around Mathis Brothers. Karl, our salesman, is having fun too. I’m one hundred percent sure his German accent is fake, but he and Paige have become fast friends in the three hours we’ve been here. Or maybe that’s just because he’s getting a hell of a commission.
“Vunderful choice! Zees vill look amazing vis ze coffee table you chose.”
“Thank you, Karl!” She gives him a high five and peeks at my paper. “What’s left?”
“Bedroom.”
“Hmm.” She wrinkles her nose. “Isn’t it weird that we’re picking out bedroom furniture for a couple we don’t even know? That seems so… intimate.”
“Relax, babe. It’s not like we’re digging through their underwear drawer. We’re just shopping for one.” I’m lying to Paige, but I don’t feel the least bit guilty about it. In fact, I feel amazing.
“I’ll just pretend we’re on Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. You can be Ty Pennington. I had such a crush on him when I was a teenager.” She wiggles her eyebrows and starts toward the bedroom section. “Do we know anything about them? What if I pick out something they don’t like?”
“I don’t sink you have anysing to vorry about, Frau Paige. Your taste eez eempeccable. Now eef you vill excuse me, I must see to anozer customer. I vill be right back.” With a smile and a nod, Karl heads to the front of the store.
“Yeah, Frau Paige. Your fiancé is proof of your ‘eempeccable’ taste.” She smacks me in the chest with a throw pillow from a bed, then runs down the aisle, darting in and out of the displays. I don’t even care that we’re getting nasty looks. The fact that I’m having this much fun at a fucking furniture store trumps everything. Paige makes everything fun. Dinner. Laundry. Hell, doing taxes next year is going to be a damn riot.
“Uncle!” she giggles when I come up from behind and trap her in my arms. If we were at my place, I’d toss her on the bed and have my way with her, but that’s bound to earn us some seriously nasty looks here. “Let’s get the rest of this done so we’re not late for dinner.”
Dinner.
That’s another thing I’m lying to her about. Yes, we’re meeting Clay, but he doesn’t care about our report on what we purchased. He’s there because he’s a good friend who’s helping me with a favor. And because I promised him two tickets to a Sooners football game when the season starts. As far as Paige knows, the furniture is going in a newly remodeled house for a veteran. That much is true. What she doesn’t know is that it’s our house. The organization that’s doing this renovation—Bringing Veterans Home—and Clay’s role in it, are all fake. Our ten-thousand-dollar furniture budget is coming from my savings account.
Yes, I’m creating more work in constructing this ruse, but you only get one shot to surprise the woman of your dreams with the house of hers. The look on her face when she walks through the front door will be worth every penny. I just need the next two weeks to fly by.
“What about this one?” She points to a king-sized walnut set. “It looks masculine enough for the guy, and maybe with some softer colors on the bedding, it will have a bit of a feminine touch too.” I smile, imagining my Drive Friendly sign hanging above the headboard.
“Perfect.”
“Be advised, we are landing at POI,” the voice cracks through my headset.
Fuck. Point of injury landings are not my favorite way to start the day. Too much risk for secondary IEDs. I haven’t even had my second cup of coffee.
“Thirty seconds. Left door, left door, left door offload.” Brown dirt and dead grass swirl around the bird as the ground gets closer. I signal to Patch that I’ll take point. We’re here to pick up an alpha, the most critical category of wounded. The MIST report said his left leg was amputated below the knee. If we don’t get him to the hospital in the next sixty minutes, his chance of living goes to shit.
“Landing in three, two, one, brakes.” The helicopter hits the ground, and I disconnect from my harness. With Patch just behind me, we make our way toward the injured Afghan man. When we reach the stretcher, I look down and see Patch staring up at me.
“Wake up, dude.”
What?
I wheel around to check my six, and Patch is there, too. “Get up!”
Patch from the stretcher stands. “You need to wake up.”
Patch from the helicopter grabs my shoulder. “Get the fuck up!”
I awaken to the sound of wood splitting and instantly reach for the Glock in my nightstand, then move to the wall behind my bedroom door for better coverage. The last time I was ambushed was on a convoy in Afghanistan; it’s good to know my training is still buried in there somewhere. Still, my breathing is ragged and my heart is pounding a mile a minute. I love adrenaline as much as the next guy, but not like this. The only good part about this moment is that Paige isn’t here. The front door cracks again, then flies open, and the sound of shuffling feet and muffled voices mixes with the pounding in my chest. Fuck, I should have grabbed my phone, too.
“Which way?”
“Over there.”
Shots sail past the door I’m hiding behind. The bullets that were meant for me hit my empty mattress and headboard instead. I swear to fucking God, if these shitstains put a hole in my Drive Friendly sign, I’m going to be seriously pissed. The footsteps come closer, and then a body appears in my room. Without hesitation or remorse, I step out from the door and fire twice, each round landing in the intruder’s back. He drops to the floor with a groan, and I maneuver to the side of my dresser, crouching down to wait for his accomplice.
Seconds later, he comes in shooting. Bullets zing across the room, piercing my walls and shattering my picture frames. My gut clenches with each explosion. Knowing I only have one chance at a surprise attack, I wait for his first break in fire, then take a deep breath, pop up, and send three shots in his direction. The first two miss, but he wails on the third and collapses beside the first guy. Not knowing if anyon
e else is out there, I retreat beside the dresser and wait for a full count of sixty seconds. Then, with my gun aimed at the bodies on the floor, I flip on the lights, kick their weapons away, and grab my phone off the nightstand.
“911, what is your emergency?”
“Home invasion in the apartment over Rhoads Auto Shop. 1824 Archer Highway.”
“Do you see anyone?”
“Yeah, two guys on the floor. I shot ‘em both.” The blood pooling on my carpet is reassuring, but I still keep a tight grip on my Glock in case either of them still has a pulse.
“Are you alone?”
“Aside from them, yes. My fiancée is at work.” And thank Christ for that. As quickly as my mind starts thinking about what could have happened if she was here, I shut it down. That’s not a rabbit hole I can deal with right now. Clay would be so proud of me.
“Officers are on the way. Stay on the line until they get there.”
“Okay.” Just as I start toward my closet to throw on some clothes, I see another figure pass through the splintered front door into my living room. “Fuck!” I drop my phone and point my gun at the third intruder.
“Why do you always ruin my plans?” Sheila’s cold voice sends shivers down my spine as she weaves an erratic path into my bedroom, stopping just before her accomplices. One look at her wild eyes tells me she’s high on something, and the tiny revolver dangling from her hand clears up any confusion about why she’s here.
“Your plan to kill me? Because I love ruining things for you, Sheila. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside.” I tighten my grip on my gun as a fresh wave of adrenaline surges through my body. None of us have seen or heard from her since the note she gave Paige. I knew she was evil, but even I didn’t expect a face-off with the woman who gave birth to me.
“I came here for the money you owe me!” She screams the words out with no regard for the ten-millimeter gun staring back at her. Cocaine? Meth? Maybe a little of both? It’s good to know she cares about her life about as much as I do.