Finding Mr. Right Next Door

by Sarah Ballance

  Resigned, he followed her back to the house. As they walked in, he said, “No offense, Lexi, but if you’re referring to dessert, this one can’t possibly be worse than the last one.”

  “Funny.” Her happiness was brilliant. Reaching for the stove, not so much. He quickly grabbed her hand. “What are you doing?”

  Pointing to the recipe on the counter, she said, “Preheating the oven.”

  He stared. “Lexi, you can put your hands on anything else, but do not touch my oven.”

  Eyes sparkling, she donned an impish grin and asked, “Anything?”

  “Anything else.” He watched her wash her hands, ready to protect himself if necessary, but—unless she changed her mind and decided to drag him to bed—not prepared to give in.

  She didn’t seem to notice his precaution. Instead, she glanced at the recipe then serenely scooped flour in one of the bowls he’d set out. There were dishes everywhere. He hadn’t intended to get so much out of the cabinets, but he’d yet to find everything after she’d rearranged the kitchen.

  And that was just fine with him. Because she was there, and they were going to be okay, and the enormity of that—of what they’d had and almost lost—was enough to take his breath.

  “I’m glad you burned down your kitchen,” he said suddenly, his voice thick with emotion.

  It was her turn to stare.

  “I have never even thought about spending my life with anyone but you,” he said. The words came out fast. “Every time I thought of my future, you were there. I never saw anyone else. I never saw any of it without you.”

  “I have always been here,” she said softly. “I was just as capable of taking that step as you were, but if it didn’t work out… I couldn’t stand the thought of losing everything else we had.” Somehow, she already had a smudge of flour on her nose. A tear spilled over and tracked down her cheek. He wiped it away.

  “I was afraid, Lexi. Afraid of screwing this up and losing you.” He stifled a laugh. “I guess we were really the last to admit that we belonged together. I’m still afraid, to be honest, but I think we can do this.” The gravity of everything hit him hard and fast. She wasn’t leaving. He’d come so damned close to losing her, to missing out on their forever. How could he have ever thought there was an alternative?

  “We can definitely do this,” she said, and then he knew she’d forgiven him. “We kind of have to do this, because, again, I will not be stepping between you and Elsie’s purse, and for that matter, you’re on your own with my dad, too.”

  Matt pretended to groan, then he smiled. He felt like he’d burst. “A month ago I would have said nothing was worth risking our friendship—”

  “And I would have agreed.”

  “But the sex is—”

  “Phenomenal.”

  “We should still have sex,” she said. “If it doesn’t work out.”

  He laughed. “That is definitely not a line from one of your movies.” He cradled her face, kissed her nose. “I love you. I’m in. All the way, every way. I’d take the risk for one moment with you. Everything else is…more than I deserve.”

  Lexi grinned, wrapped her arms around his neck, and dragged her floured hands through his hair.

  He feigned irritation. Her laughter was the most amazing sound in the world.

  “I love you, Matt,” she said, kissing him, “and that is exactly what you deserve.”

  Okay, maybe that was the most amazing sound in the world. Lexi loved him, and she managed to halfway threaten him with the news.

  Life was damned good.

  Other than the part where they were in the kitchen instead of the bedroom, but she was determined to make that dessert, and if it tasted like bricks it would still be the best he’d ever had.

  It had given him Lexi.

  Twenty minutes later she spilled a pot full of simmering berries all over the stove and the floor, splashing her bare feet.

  She gave him a sheepish look. “Um…”

  He scooped her up, sat her on the counter by the sink, and examined the affected skin. It was pink, but he didn’t see any blisters.

  He glanced up into the stunning eyes of the most beautiful, dangerous woman he’d ever known, and simply said, “You knew this was going to happen, right?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You were going to have to marry a firefighter. We have emergency medical training,” he explained, “and you absolutely need someone to put out fires and fix you after your kitchen disasters.”

  She was so hung up on the jab that she almost missed the gist. Then she froze, and the surprise and wonderment on her face made his heart sing. Eyes sparkling, she asked, “I’m going to marry a firefighter?”

  He caught the waver in her voice and had to swallow a knot of emotion. How could she be surprised?

  It was past time to erase that question from her mind. He’d hoped to do it a little closer to the bedroom, but the kitchen now seemed wildly appropriate, considering how this had all started. He swallowed, hoping he just imagined the sudden thud of his heartbeat echoing off the appliances. After faintly clearing his throat, he said, “Lexi, there is not a moment left in my life that I don’t want to spend with you.”

  She choked back a laugh. “There aren’t many you haven’t spent with me.”

  He smiled. “Despite which, I want the rest. All the rest.” He hesitated, unsure about the knee thing, but then decided Lexi—who wanted the picket fence and the two-point-four-kids—would definitely want the knee thing. So he assumed the position, managing to get the ring out of his pocket and into his unsteady grip without dropping it and having to watch it roll under the refrigerator. “I love you. I’ve always loved you, and while it would probably be safer, since we’re in the kitchen, to hand you a fire extinguisher, I’m hoping you’ll accept this ring and agree to be my wife.” Her eyes had long grown wide, and the exaggerated thudding in his chest came to a dead, momentous stop. “Lexi, will you marry me?”

  She grinned. Wickedly. “Have you seriously had that in your pocket this whole time?”

  “I don’t think you’ve been paying attention to those movies you like so much,” he said, a glimmer of relief kicking his pulse back to life. Clearly, they were still Lexi and Matt. Just better, perhaps less fully clothed. “Because this is the part where you say—”

  “Yes. I say yes.”

  He slipped the ring on her finger and stood and grinned. “Like I said, then. Definitely marrying a firefighter.”

  Epilogue

  Lexi had fully expected her parents to be shocked that she and Matt were together.

  She had not expected Elsie, who had joined the four of them for dinner at Lexi’s parents’ house, to smack the table at the news and yell, “Hot damn, pay up!”

  Matt and Lexi exchanged bewildered glances. They’d expected a reaction, but not quite this one.

  Lexi’s dad sheepishly pulled out his wallet and dropped two hundreds on the table, which Elsie promptly slid to her side.

  “Um, what just happened?” Lexi asked.

  “I just won the bet,” Elsie proclaimed as she stuffed the cash in her bra. “And another hundred from the ladies at the village, plus a pair of dentures. Gladys said they’re hers, but I think she lifted them from Melvin, that old geezer down the hall. Haven’t seen him with his teeth in a good long while.”

  “You bet on us?” Matt asked. The fact that neither he nor anyone else batted an eye at Elsie’s story almost made Lexi laugh.

  “Of course she did,” she said. Honestly, she wasn’t surprised. “But my own parents?”

  Lexi’s dad glanced at her mom, whose eyes shone with unshed tears, then back to Lexi. “You two stretched this out a little long. That two hundred bucks is coming out of your wedding budget.”

  “It is not,” Lexi’s mom said. “We’re so happy, truly. However
long it took, I’m just glad we’re all here now. You can have anything you want. You’ve certainly given us all we could have asked for.”

  “Except grandchildren,” Elsie said, wagging her finger at Matt. Then, in a stage-whisper aside to Lexi’s parents, Elsie added, “Though I’d bet they’ve been at least practicing.”

  “That’s great, Elsie,” Matt said. “Really great. Thanks for bringing that up.”

  “Well, I don’t hear you denying it,” Elsie harrumphed.

  “You do know Lexi burned up your Napoleon pan, right?” Matt asked, nodding toward the half-emptied dish in the center of the table, earning a sharp elbow from Lexi.

  “Hey!” She hadn’t loved Elsie’s implication—in front of her parents, no less—that she and Matt had had copious amounts of sex, but he was supposed to be on her side.

  Elsie frowned and peered. “It looks fine to me. Lexi, this tart is better than mine ever were. Keep this up and you can make your wedding cake yourself!”

  Next to Lexi, Matt choked, coughed, and drained his glass of water before daring to glance at Lexi. “No. No she cannot.”

  “Well, it would help the budget,” Lexi’s mom said, stifling a grin.

  “Thank you, but we don’t need you to pay for the wedding,” Matt said, laughing. “Especially not at the cost of allowing Lexi to bake.”

  Lexi shot him a dirty look—the tart wasn’t terrible, though she’d be the first to admit that Elsie was being uncharacteristically kind—but all the intent behind giving him the evil eye dissolved when she saw his face. Not because he wore any kind of heart-melting expression, but because of his adorable, cocky grin and how warm and familiar and soul-jarringly hers it felt.

  Across the table, Elsie and Lexi’s mom had fallen into a discussion about who should do the cake, which morphed into a conversation about the catering, and Lexi’s dad pointed out that they really needed to decide on a location before they chose a menu.

  Lexi leaned back in her chair and took it all in. Family. Just like it had always been, but it had never felt so complete. Sometimes she wondered how she could have missed it for so long. Others, she couldn’t believe she and Matt had actually risked all of it for sex. Granted, it had been a lot more than just sex, but sex had definitely pushed them over the edge.

  Over the edge was her new favorite place.

  Matt leaned close, his fingertips landing on her thigh. “Do you think we should just elope?” he whispered.

  She sucked in a breath. Her skin pebbled instantly against his touch. The table blocked the view, thank goodness, but nothing kept her mind from fleeing into territory that was decidedly unsuitable for mixed company. “No way,” she said in a low voice. “They’ve waited forever for this.”

  “Me, too.” He grinned, walking his hand farther up her thigh.

  “Matt!” she hissed when he breached the hem of her shorts. She glanced toward her parents and Elsie, who were still in the throes of their discussion. Elsie mentioned something about the retirement village, and how it probably wasn’t suitable for a reception because they no longer allowed nudity in their pool. Lexi groaned, and not just because Elsie had just dived into the indignity of being escorted, naked, from the deep end.

  Matt was killing her.

  “If memory serves,” he whispered, “You considered this behavior perfectly acceptable for the dining table. Or was that acceptable for the workplace? Your call.” His lips grazed her ear.

  Lexi glanced across the table. As close as Matt was, there was no way they hadn’t noticed. Maybe they were politely ignoring them. “You are going to pay for this later,” she muttered, shifting in her seat. He, like she had before, took full advantage…and with it, her breath.

  “Oh, I’m counting on that,” he said. He lightly stroked her through her clothes, giving her serious thoughts about dragging him upstairs to her old bedroom.

  “So what do you think, Lexi?” Her mom’s voice.

  Lexi blinked her into focus. “About what?”

  “The venue,” she said, with an arch of her eyebrow and a pointed look at where Lexi and Matt sat glued at the seam.

  The wedding. Lexi somehow kept forgetting that part. She already had so much. Matt and Waffles had moved into her house with its newly remodeled kitchen, and his would be on the market as soon as they put a fence between the backyards. Everything was the way it always had been, only better.

  She had Matt and a picket fence and…Elsie asking if they’d get married at the retirement village if she got them to raise the ban on nude swimming.

  “I would marry her literally anywhere but there,” Matt told Elsie, much to Elsie’s consternation and to the amusement—and probably relief—of Lexi’s parents.

  Lexi barely heard him. She was too distracted by the ring glittering on her left hand. She’d never been big on jewelry, but that ring was glorious.

  She had the rest of her life to admire it, but nothing in the world compared to knowing that Matt would be part of every moment.

  She couldn’t wait.

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  Acknowledgments

  Matt and Lexi were clearly meant to be together. If you read Her Sexy Challenge, the story of Shane and Caitlin, you likely already knew this, along with absolutely everyone in Dry Rock. Everyone, that is, but Matt and Lexi. And just in case you thought they were being silly with their denial, I’m here to assure you that the resistance was real, because this book took several years and many rewrites to get to the words you see today. And YOU GUYS. It was worth it. I hope you’ll think so, too.

  On that note, I have to thank—like, grovel-thank—my editor, the amazing Heather Howland, who has put up with way, way more than any one editor should. She has the patience of a saint and extraordinary vision, and she did as much to make this book what it became as I did. That part of the book you really loved? Blame her. She rocked it.

  I also NEED to thank Ankle Bracelet (I’m not allowed to tell you why I call her that), who, with my editor, is the only other person on earth to have read multiple versions of this story. We met because she was a fan, but in time, I’ve become a bigger fan of hers than she could ever be of mine. She believed in Matt and Lexi and *actually* threatened me for not writing quickly enough, generally making me relieved for the eight hundred miles separating us, but she’s also the best person in New England, except maybe for her family and everyone else who must put up with her. Without her faith and encouragement and flat out demands that Matt and Lexi get it together, I’d probably still be somewhere in the fetal position and the world would be short one happily ever after. (And probably a second, because my husband can only take so much of me sobbing into my keyboard.)

  As always, many thanks to Michelle, my spider-loving #creepytwin. I’ve lost track of how many years we’ve been friends, but when it comes to all things writing-related, you are my ROCK. We all need that one person who gets it, and you are that for me. I don’t know what I’d have done without you, other than alienate my husband with my tales of writerly angst. And since he doesn’t scream when I send him pictures of spiders, it REALLY wouldn’t be the same.

  My gratitude extends, as always, to my family, who are seriously the most tolerant beings on earth. I think they secretly like when I stare at my computer because doing so usually means I’m not finding chores and things for them to do, but on the flip side, there’s only so much frozen pizza and chicken nuggets a person can take. You guys are the best, and I appreciate it eternally.

  And finally, my readers, this is for you. It’s been years since you all met Matt and Lexi, and still you care about them. You’ve asked about them, month after month. It’s humbling and crazy and such an honor that these characters who appeared on a whim from my fingertips have people that care so much, but you have, you do, and that astounds me. I thank you all so very much and I hope they
were worth every bit of the wait.

  About the Author

  Sarah and her husband of what he calls “many long, long years” live on the mid-Atlantic coast with their six young children, all of whom are perfectly adorable when they’re asleep. She never dreamed of becoming an author, but as a homeschooling mom, she often jokes she writes fiction because if she wants anyone to listen to her, she has to make them up. (As it turns out, her characters aren’t much better than the kids.) When not buried under piles of laundry, she may be found adrift in the Atlantic (preferably on a boat) or seeking that ever-elusive perfect writing spot where not even the kids can find her.

  She loves creating unforgettable stories while putting her characters through an unkind amount of torture—a hobby that has nothing to do with living with six children. (Really.) Though she adores sexy contemporary romance, Sarah writes in many genres including historical and ghostly supernatural romance and romantic suspense. Her ever-growing roster of releases may be found on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, iBooks, Google Books, and Entangled Publishing.

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