AllFreeNovel
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‘What are we doing here?’ Maxie demanded. ‘The store is closing, Diego.’
‘Not for you,’ he said, steering her towards the elevator.
Not for Diego Acosta, Maxie amended wryly as a uniformed security guard personally escorted them in the opposite direction to the crowds heading home. She was touched to find Diego was taking her to the floor that specialised in nursery equipment.
‘This is where you get to pick what you want and I get to pick what I want,’ he explained.
‘So, what do you want?’ she said, frowning as she gazed down the aisles packed with baby equipment. ‘I don’t even know where to start—there’s so much to choose from!’
‘True,’ Diego agreed. ‘But I’ve already made my choice. If you’ll have me, Maxie …?’
‘Are you serious?’
‘I’m down on one knee in front of witnesses. Will you marry me, Señorita Parrish? I should warn you before you answer there is one condition.’
‘Which is?’
‘You find another wedding planner to arrange our big day.’
After choosing the equipment for their first child’s nursery, he took Maxie to a fairground. He wanted her to have something frivolous and fun to remember the day by, and he locked that memory in with a rather serious diamond ring. Maxie could run a business for as long as she wanted, but when they were together he wanted both of them to make time to have fun together—fun was something that had been conspicuous by its absence in Maxie’s life before they met, as far as he could gather. ‘I love you, Señora Acosta-to-be,’ he told her as the big wheel soared into the sky.
‘And I love you too, señor,’ she told him, snuggling close. ‘More than you will ever know.’
‘Show me that ring,’ he teased her.
She held up her hand to admire it.
It would take many years of persuasion before Maxie would believe that he hadn’t arranged fireworks to choose that precise moment to light up the sky.
EPILOGUE
MAXIE’S wedding dress was the most feminine thing she had ever worn. A simple column of ivory silk, overlaid with the most exquisite cobweb-fine Swiss lace, skimmed her body to her hips before flaring into a fuller skirt with a filmy lace train. She held a modest trailing bouquet of blush pink peonies and fragrant white freesia, interspersed with the palest green feathery foliage. Lucia and Holly were her attendants, and there was one very special page boy—a six-month-old baby boy. Though Jaime Acosta slept peacefully throughout the ceremony in Señora Fernandez’s arms.
Needless to say Jaime already had his first pony. Diego had picked out a small grey for his son within an hour of his birth. Diego might be a little crazy, and Maxie was definitely the person people came to when they wanted something sorted out, but Maxie thought that was why it worked so well between them: they were like two pieces of a jigsaw that fitted perfectly together.
‘Ready?’ Lucia demanded in a voice full of suppressed excitement as she carefully handed Maxie down from the horse-drawn carriage outside the tiny chapel at the estancia.
‘For anything,’ Maxie agreed, squeezing Lucia’s hand. ‘That’s just as well,’ Holly agreed wryly.
‘You look beautiful,’ Señora Fernandez exclaimed—sentiments that were echoed by the housekeepers, Maria and Adriana.
‘Thank you,’ Maxie whispered, kissing each of the older women on the cheek in turn, before dropping a kiss on her son’s downy brow.
‘I’m so happy for you,’ Holly exclaimed, tweaking Maxie’s veil. ‘Wait until Diego sees you!’
Maxie had to admit it was quite a transformation from the bedraggled girl who had arrived on a tiny island in the middle of a storm with only business on her mind.
Had she really thought she was ready for this?
When Diego turned to look at her as she entered the chapel the breath left Maxie’s chest in a rush. She hardly remembered the ceremony, but when they came out to the cheers of their guests as man and wife she did remember the look she had shared with Diego throughout, the silent pledge that bound them for life. And with the blessings and goodwill of everyone around them there was only one duty left for the bride …
‘Oh, no!’ Lucia exclaimed as she caught Maxie’s bouquet.
As if Lucia hadn’t batted every other woman out of the way in order to leap up and snatch it for herself, Maxie thought, laughing as she turned around. ‘You can always give it back to me and I’ll throw it again,’ she suggested.
‘No way,’ Lucia replied, to groans of complaint from the other women. ‘These flowers need water,’ she explained briskly, as a certain American polo player hoved into view.
Then Diego was at Maxie’s side, with their son in his arms. ‘The jet is waiting,’ he murmured discreetly. ‘Can we leave now? I can’t wait to have you on my own.’
‘I love you,’ Maxie whispered, staring deep into her husband’s eyes. ‘I love you both so much.’
‘You’ve given me more than you know,’ Diego said, putting a protective arm around her shoulders, ‘and my love for you grows stronger every day.’
