Page 135 of Our Chaotic Love Affair

“I want you in my life, Cleo. Not as a fake fiancée or a weekend in Rome or whatever we were pretending this was. I want the real thing. All of it.”

I was still speechless.

He kissed me and the world stopped. The other dancers disappeared. There was just him and me and his hands on my body and his mouth on mine. He was right in front of me. The very thing I’d been searching for my whole life.

When he pulled back, I was crying.

“You have me,” I whispered. “You’ve had me since the piazza in Rome. Maybe when you called me in the middle of the night and asked me to go to Rome.”

His eyes were so deep. So open. So full of everything I felt.

“I love you,” he said.

The words hit me like electricity. “Say it again.”

“I love you, Cleo Quinn. I’m completely, irrevocably in love with you.”

“I love you too.” I pulled him down to kiss me again. “I love you so much it’s actually kind of ridiculous.”

“How ridiculous?”

“Like, Disney movie ridiculous. Like, I want to sing about it from rooftops ridiculous.”

He laughed against my mouth. “Please don’t. I have a reputation to maintain.”

“Too late.”

We kissed again, and this time when we broke apart, Melody was standing there grinning like the Cheshire cat.

“I knew it,” she shrieked.

She shoved her bouquet into my hands. I looked at it, confused.

“You’re next,” she said, bouncing on her toes. “Oh my god, you’re actually next. We’re going to be sisters!”

“Uh, I’m still letting Lurch woo me. Let’s not plan the wedding yet.”

“Too late. I’m already designing your dress in my head.” She grabbed my face and kissed both my cheeks. “I’m so happy for you I could die.”

Austin appeared beside his wife, grinning just as widely. “Took you long enough,” he said to Cash.

“I had some things to figure out.”

“Yeah, well. Glad you figured them out.” Austin clapped Cash on the shoulder. “Welcome to the club, brother.”

“What club?”

“The ‘completely whipped by an incredible woman’ club.” He pulled Melody close. “It’s a good club. Excellent benefits.”

“The benefits are amazing,” Melody agreed, looking up at her husband with so much love it made my chest ache.

That was what I wanted. What Cash and I could have. That kind of partnership. That certainty.

The music picked up again and suddenly everyone was dancing. We were shaking it off, doing the whole thing with our waving hands and getting sassy.

Finn appeared and grabbed my hand, spinning me away from Cash with a whoop. Hayes cut in after that. Then Kent. Then some cousin whose name I couldn’t remember. His name was Colt or Cole or something like that. I felt like I was spinning away on the fluffiest cloud.

But through it all, I kept finding Cash. Our eyes would meet across the dance floor and he’d smile. He looked genuinely happy. I liked that look on him.