Initiate Me(79)

“Goddamn right you are. I’m not here with you because you’re a Brunetti. I’m with you because it feels right. When I’m with you, I feel like I’m where I’m meant to be.”

“Are you sure that's not all that scotch talking you had at dinner tonight?”

“It’s me talking.” I inhaled slowly, trying to calm the mad beat of my heart. “Mia. I love you.”

A beat passed, and she smiled cheekily. “I figured since you weren't the type to wear your heart on your goddamn sleeve that I’d have to say ‘I love you’ first.”

I laughed at her perfect imitation of my way of speaking. This woman rarely reacted how I expected her to, which was just another reason I was so crazy in love with her.

“That first day I met you when I was sixteen and you hit me with the football was the best thing that’s ever happened to me.” She started undoing the buttons on my shirt. "I’m not here with you because you’re a famous ex-private investigator or a wealthy businessman or because of your slamming, hot body...okay, that might be part of it.” She kissed every inch of my skin as she exposed it. “I love everything about you. We fit together in so many ways. I never thought...I’d find someone like you.”

Was she really choked up, telling me how she felt? “Sweetheart, you undo me.”

“So, are we going to christen this pool table or what? I’m dying for you.”

Yep. I was definitely in love with her. But first I had to make an honest woman out of her, which I planned on doing. That night. The ring my mother had given me during her last visit had been burning a hole in my pocket for weeks, but it was finally the night.

“Before I kiss you, before I touch you, let me say this: I love you. Sweet baby Jesus, I love you so damn much.” I kissed her so tenderly and passionately that by the end, she had tears springing to her eyes.

When she broke away, she whispered back to me, “I love you, too.”

“Then marry me, Mia. Not because we’re compatible or because you are hot, sexy and sassy...well, that's a huge part of it, too." I laughed, mimicking her earlier joke. "Marry me for me. Marry me because I’m a selfish bastard and I want you to be mine forever. Marry me because I don’t know if I’ll survive the rest of my life without having you by my side every damn day. Please say yes, angel. Make me the luckiest man in the world.”

“Yes.”

I kissed her again. All the need and hunger which had been dormant inside her for the previous few days ignited like a bushfire. She tugged me toward her, but I gently pulled back.

“Nuh-uh. You've agreed to marry me, so no hanky-panky until you’re wearing my ring and you’re my wife.”

“But—”

I lifted an eyebrow. “Don't argue, Mia, or there will be consequences, remember?"

“Oh, I remember, but maybe you can spank me all the same. I am naked, after all."

“Damn, angel, stop trying to tempt me. You know I'll give in,” I laughed. “I never envisioned proposing to you on a pool table. But first we need to talk. I went to see your dad."

“Oh, crap. What did he say?"

“I talked to him about us. I wanted to set things straight. He wasn't happy."

“Really? You did that for me?”

“There is nothing I wouldn’t do for you,” I whispered against the smooth column of her throat.

“And...what was the outcome of your conversation?"

"I asked him if I could have permission to marry you, seeing as I've been in love with you since you were sixteen. I also told him I've got a lot of catching up to do and that you will be moving in with me, here at the pub. That's when he wasn't so happy. But I'm not budging."

Mia squealed with delight and squeezed me tightly.

"I told him I wanted to get married right away. He obviously assumed you were pregnant and lost it." I grimaced, remembering how Max had to hold back his dad from slugging me one in the face.

She stared at me, stunned. "Oh, shit! I'm not! You know, pregnant that is."

"I know, angel. But I love you. You love me. I don’t want to wait."

She continued to stare at me.

“Ah, hell. Are you mad?”

“No. I'm just trying to wrap my head around it all."

A feeling of rightness and inevitability flowed over me like it had that first day when I met her playing football with her brothers. But unlike then, I knew that moment it was real. “What do you say, angel?" I asked her again. I grinned at the woman I would love for the rest of my life.

"I say it’s about damn time, stud.”





Chapter Twenty-Seven