“Promise me that if you ever start to get scared about us, you won’t run,” I tell her.
“I promise, but same for you, okay?”
She kisses me again, and I slip my tongue in her mouth and then pull her bottom lip between my teeth.
“If I’ve learned anything over the last ten years, it’s this: you and me.” I kiss her one more time because I want all her kisses, day and night. “You and me, Tobias and Natalie. We’ve always been right.”
EPILOGUE
TOBIAS
Seven-ish Months Later
“Who was the first person you told outside of your family and close friends circle that you were a romance writer?”
Natalie reads out loud a question from the interview I did at the end of last summer.
She’s leaning back in her chair, the sun shining down on her barely covered body as we soak up the sun on a beach in the Maldives.
The same trip I planned and gave to the girls for her bachelorette party. One way or the other, I was sending her on her dream trip.
Little did I know that it would be the trip where I propose to her.
But shhh, she doesn’t know that fun fact quite yet.
“Are you listening?” she asks, turning to me.
I grin, waiting for her to go on.
“Yep. You’ve got my full attention.”
As she should and always does.
“Do you remember your answer?”
“I do.”
“Hmm, well, let's see what it is.”
Her voice turns deep as she imitates me. “The first person I told I was a romance writer outside of my friends and family was a girl I’d met at a party.” She stops talking, and when she goes on, her voice is normal again. “I’d known her for maybe thirty minutes but knew she was different. She was the kind of girl you meet and then work your ass off to keep in your life.”
“Does this girl have a name?” she reads the next question. “Nat—” She pauses to take a breath. “Natalie Miller.”
“And is this woman still in your life?” she keeps reading. “She is, and I’ll make it my goal to see that she’s there for the rest of my life.”
She has tears in her eyes. “I was still with Griffin when you did this interview, wasn’t I?”
“Yeah.”
“But you knew. Even if you didn’tknowknow, you knew.”
“You’re starting to sound like Beck.”
She laughs. “He’s starting to sound a lot smarter than I gave him credit for.”
“Shhh, we might be thousands of miles away, but he will hear you.”
“This is amazing, Tobias, and perfect timing since we just announced the release date of our book.”
