"Of course." I smiled again. "But a few words of advice. If you feel the way you look to me, then don't waste time."
"How do we look?" Gage asked.
"Like a couple in love," she affirmed quite bluntly. "I'm sorry, but I know more than most that there's no point in trying to deny something that's perfectly obvious. If I'm right, please..." she looked at us both. "Don't waste time. Don't beat about the bush. And please, take care of each other. I'll leave you with that thought."
She gave us a soft smile as she backed away. I watched her until she went back in the house and closed the door behind her.
Gage was already looking at me when I looked back to him. I held his gaze for a few moments before he reached for me and pulled me onto his lap.
I slipped my arms around his neck while he held my waist and stroked the skin there.
He looked up at me and smiled. "You should probably know that taking care of me involves a lot of baking. I love pumpkin pie."
I laughed and reached out to touch his face. It was just like him to say something like that.
"I like baking. While we're on the subject of care, to take care of me, you'll have to put up with me playing my violin for hours."
"Newsflash princess, in case you didn't notice I love listening to you play. You can play forever if you want."
I leaned forward and kissed him.
"So, um..." He sighed and smiled. "I have a wild plan brewing in my mind." The wildness flickered within the depths of his eyes.
"How wild?"
"Very."
"Let's hear it." I caressed the firm line of his jaw.
"Okay. So in the spirit of not beating about the bush, my plan is, first of all, to try to get you to stay in Italy for an extra week and take you back to Rome. We can start our adventure from there."
"In the spirit of not beating about the bush I'm totally saying yes, but that's not a wild idea."
He grimaced at my and tweaked my nose playfully. "I'm not finished yet. It's quite a big plan."
"Okay, still listening." I played along.
He gazed deep into my eyes and held my hand at his heart. "I love you, Evie. In the spirit of not beating about the bush, my plan is to make you fall in love with me, and then in the extremely near future I plan to ask you to marry me."
My heart sang with delight, overflowing with love as I looked at him. He couldn't have surprised me more, and I didn't even have to think about what my answer would be.
My smile couldn't have been brighter as I said, "I love you too Gage. So you don't have to try to make me fall in love with you, I already am. I'll definitely be saying yes when you ask me to marry you, in the extremely near future." I laughed.
He brought my hand up to his lips, kissed it and held it to his cheek.
"Thank you, Miss Evie." He beamed, exhaling a long sigh of contentment. "Looks like I just found Mrs. Gage."
"Yes, Mr. Evie you certainly have."
I smiled back at him feeling blissfully happy and fully alive as I met his lips for the sweetest kiss.
Epilogue
Gage
* * *
3 years later…
It was the first week of May. Evie and I were preparing to go to Italy.
Going to Italy had been our number one vacation spot and a place we cherished.
We got married there, bought a summer home there, and visited Grams and Angelo as often as we could.
We loved going. This year was special though. This year we’d been taking Mason with us, our eight month old son.
I couldn’t believe it was me. Me, Gage Montgomery.
I had a wife and a son.
I was so happy with the way my life had turned out.
We were scheduled to leave next week to spend two weeks before the start of the new season’s training camp.
I kept my apartment here in LA for when I was here. Evie would come and stay with me for a few weeks while I was working, but we lived in New York and loved it.
While I was here I took every chance to see my friends. Josh, Scott and Corey.
Those guys were all as crazy as me. It helped too that our wives were all friends too. I would probably say that Evie and Amy, Josh’s wife, were best friends because they were always off doing something together.
Like today, but today they’d taken Abi, Scott’s wife, to whatever madness they had cooked up for the day.
The guys and I met up today too at the stadium. It wasn’t officially training but we had a few things to go over. Stuff we wanted ironed out before I left for Italy.
That was what we were like.
True Gladiators. Strict in our training.
We’d been doing that for the last few days and we were wiped out.
We were just finishing up now with a plan for the week when I came back from Italy. That was the week when we planned to run our free summer camp for the inner city youths.
“Hey old man,” I said to Josh as we entered the locker room.
He threw the ball he’d been carrying at me, intending for it to hit me hard but I caught it and laughed. We had a running joke with each other about our ages.
Scott and Corey started to laugh.
“Don’t you old man me, you bitch.” Josh joked. “What do you want?”
“I have an idea guys.” I got a cool idea the other day.
“What?” Corey asked.
“That summer camp, why don’t we make it an official thing. We all plan to coach one day right?” I did, and I knew they did too. We just never said when, and we probably never would.
“Official?” Scott asked with a wide smile. “I like that.”
“Me too.” Josh agreed, and Corey nodded. “Not that we’re saying we’ll be coaching anytime soon. Officially.”
“Nope, we’ll just be teaching the kids.” I smiled at Josh. I thought the two of us would most like die playing football. I certainly knew that we would play for as long as we could.
However…
There was one thing that was more important to us than the sport, and that was the women we loved.
I knew I could speak for all of us when I said that.
I liked how we’d shaped up. All of us. We weren’t just crazy boy’s running with all the fame imaginable that came with playing pro-ball. We’d become men.
Though I guess I was probably more inclined to speak in reference to myself, Josh and Scott.
Corey was always the one with his head screwed on. The rest of us though needed to change.
I certainly wished it hadn’t taken me more than twenty five years of my life to see that my girl next door was the one and only for me.
There was a small tap at the door of the locker room. Evie stuck her dark head in. One of her eyes were closed.
“Are you all dressed?” She asked tentatively.
“Nope, come right in. Mrs. Gage.” Josh beamed with a wicked smile. He started to laugh and purposely whipped off his shirt.
I scowled at him, knowing instantly what this was. It was an attempt to get me back for a stunt I pulled awhile back with his Amy.
I wouldn’t have minded if the man didn’t look better than me. And, he’d gotten a new tattoo. A Celtic swirl on his shoulder.
I was forbidden to get another one, because of the promise I made Grams years ago.
“Hey.” I threw the ball back at him, smacking him in his chest.
Scott and Corey laughed at us. Evie was looking at Josh too, but she was laughing.
“It serves you right.” Josh teased, kissing the solid muscle on his biceps as he flexed. “Feast your eyes on the sexiest man alive.”
“Say’s who?” I scowled.
“Amy Mancini and FHM for three years running.”
“Asshole.”
Best to leave him. I picked my bag up and left them all, going over to Evie.
“You guys are so silly,” Evie giggled.
“Exactly, not me though right?” I took her hand and led her away from my silly friends.
>
“No, not you Mr. Evie.” She slipped her arm around me and gazed up at me with her beautiful, beautiful eyes. “Never you.”
“I have an idea.” Another idea. This one was for us. “How about we re-live our first trip to Italy? We could leave here tomorrow and spend some time to ourselves.”
We hadn’t really done anything since Mason arrived.
“I love it. But to re-live the whole trip? Could we possibly forget the first week?”
That first week might have been crazy, but I would never forget the image of my Evie in all her naked perfection flying at me as she fled to save herself from those lizards.
“There are parts of that first week I never want to forget. Ever.” I nodded giving her a wink.
She smacked my chest playfully, knowing exactly what I was referring to. “Gage you are devil. I asked you to forget that.” She pretended to be annoyed.
I knew she wasn’t.
“I said I didn’t want to.”
The cool night air lifted the ends of her beautiful hair.
“That’s not fair. You’ve never done anything embarrassing.”
“You have it all wrong princess, that wasn’t embarrassing. That was history. Memories forged in my mind of the perfect woman. How about we relive some of that tonight? This time we can both be naked.”
She shook her head at me and laughed.
“You are too much. But I like that idea Mr. Evie.”
“Guess what?” I pulled her to me and kissed her.
“What?” she asked against my lips.
“I just fell in love with you all over again Mrs. Gage.”
“I love you too.”
That was something I would never get tired of hearing from the girl who stole my heart, and my world, and filled it with everything that was beautiful.
What more could a guy want?
Play of Love: The Gladiator Players Box Set Page 46