“Querida?”
“I’m going to kill my sister. She’s spying on us!”
“Beth?” Skull asks, still confused.
I gently disengage the hair bow from Gabby’s dark hair to show Skull.
“When we wanted to know what you guys had found out about Colin and Matthew, Katie put this little pinpoint camera in Gabby’s hair bow. It’s a little better than a voice recorder, so when you took her into the meeting, we would know what you were discussing.”
“You what?” he growls.
“We had to know what you were talking about and you wouldn’t tell me otherwise. You left us with no choice.”
“Except to not listen into private conversations and wait for me to tell you what’s going on.”
“If I had done that, would you have told me where Matthew was so I could help kill him?”
“Probably not, but he still would have wound up dead.”
“Then I rest my case.” I shrug his complaint off. “Anyways, back to the camera.”
“I should spank your ass,” he grumbles.
“Feel free, later,” I tell him. “I remember she clearly told me she took the camera out after you gave it back to me. Which means she put it back in on purpose, just for today.”
Skull sighs, taking the hair bow and putting it in his pocket. “Soon, mi cielo, we will discuss your tendencies to think you are a detective, but not today. Today, I think I’m the reason she’s spying on us.”
“You are?” I ask, confused.
Skull stands up and reaches his hand out to me. “Walk with me, Beth.”
“Gabby…” I remind him, but I stand and take his hand, wondering what’s going on.
“We’ll just walk a few steps. She’ll never be out of our sight,” he answers.
We go about ten feet. He smiles at me, and it’s the type of smile that makes my heart flutter in my chest.
“Skull…”
“Just a little over three years ago, my world was rocked to its core. I saw this girl with sparkling spun-gold hair blowing in the wind, in this pure white dress looking like an angel. Mi ángel. She was a picture of something in my mind that I dreamed of when I was a child, and then her eyes… As a child, I wanted a woman with sky blue eyes that reminded me of a happy memory. But this woman’s was a combination, a gray that look like the sky just before the rains open up. Much more interesting… more captivating.”
“Skull, sweetheart…”
“Te amo, mi cielo.”
“That’s why you call me your sky?”
“I love you, my sky,” he repeats in English. “You are it for me,” he says, his voice thick with emotion, and I can feel each vibration inside of me.
He reaches into his other pocket. I watch him and, almost as if everything is in slow motion, he goes down on one knee. I can’t stop the tears that fill my eyes. I don’t even try. When he looks up at me and shows me the most beautiful princess-cut diamond I’ve ever seen, I think my heart stops beating.
“Will you marry me, Beth?” he asks. “Will you have more children with me? Will you give yourself to me forever? I swear that if you do, I promise I will bust my ass to make sure you never regret it.”
All my dreams coming true in one moment… everything I’ve ever wanted, here within my grasp. When he holds my hand and slips the ring on my finger, I’m shaking my head up and down over and over.
“Yes! Yes! Oh, God, yes! Of course I’ll marry you!” I drop down to my knees and fall willingly into his arms.
“I can’t believe you got on your knees for me,” Beth says as we’re loading stuff back into the truck.
She’s got this silly grin on her face and her eyes are full of happiness. Mission one accomplished. From this moment on, I will bust my ass to make sure all Beth ever has are smiles. That’s my goal and my promise not only to her, but to myself. She has no idea the lengths I will go to just to make sure that all she feels is happiness from here on out, but she will.
“You can return the favor later,” I tell her, and I’m rewarded with a deep blush on her face.
“I’ll see what I can do.”
Is this what normal feels like? Me, the woman I love, and my daughter. This right here is all I need. Fuck the rest of it. I’m buckling a sleeping Gabby in the car when I hear the squealing tires of another vehicle getting close. I secure Gabby quickly and look up just in time to see an old black truck come barreling up the road from the small picnic area we’re in. This is a private road and the only cars on it would be the ones the guards would allow in the club. When the driver spots us, they throw on their brakes. The car heaves at the abrupt change, the tail-end sliding a little in the gravel.