Page 127 of Trick or Tease

“I love you,” I said again, softer this time. “I love your passion, your stubbornness, the way you fight for what matters. I love that you see the potential in everything including me, apparently. I don’t deserve another chance, but I’m asking for one anyway. I’m a selfish bastard. I want you. Period. I know that makes me an asshole but I’m being honest.”

She smirked. “Asshole. Dick. Prick.”

“All accurate,” I said, unable to keep from grinning despite the seriousness of the moment. “But I’m your asshole. Your dick. Your prick. If you’ll have me.”

She rolled her eyes, but I caught the way her lips twitched like she was fighting a smile. “You’re really going to stand there and claim ownership of me after everything you’ve done?”

“No,” I said quickly, stepping closer. “I’m asking you to claim ownership of me. I’m asking you to take a chance on a reformed corporate lawyer who finally figured out what actually matters in life.”

“Reformed?” She raised an eyebrow. “That’s a pretty strong word for someone who was planning to sell your family’s home out from under me less than twenty-four hours ago.”

I winced. She wasn’t going to make this easy, but then again, I didn’t deserve easy. “You’re right. Reformed might be premature. How about actively reforming? Under new management? Still working out the kinks?”

“The kinks,” she repeated flatly.

“Poor choice of words,” I admitted, my face heating up as I remembered exactly what kind of kinks we’d explored together in the old house. “What I meant was⁠—”

“I know what you meant,” she said, and this time she definitely smiled. Just a small one, but it was there. “Keep groveling. It might be working.”

Relief flooded through me. She was listening. She was engaging. She hadn’t walked away or told me to fuck off again.

“I quit my job,” I said. “Well, technically I got fired after telling my boss to go fuck himself and watching him fall face-first into horse crap, but the point stands. My corporate lawyer days are over.”

“And what are you planning to do now? Become a gentleman farmer?” There was skepticism in her voice, but also something that might have been genuine curiosity.

“I was thinking more along the lines of small-town lawyer,” I said. “Help people fight the kind of corporate bullshit I used to dish out. Set up a practice here in Greenleaf, maybe help other family farms protect themselves from vultures like Ron.”

She studied my face. “You’d really do that? Give up everything you worked for in the city?”

“Sabrina, I didn’t give up anything,” I said, and I meant it completely. “I found something better. I found home. I found family. I found you.” I held out the flowers again. “I found the woman I want to spend the rest of my life making happy, if she’ll let me.”

She looked down at the bouquet, then back up at my face. “Those are beautiful flowers, Garrett. But flowers die.”

My heart sank. “Sabrina⁠—”

“I’m not finished,” she said firmly. “Flowers die, but partnerships don’t. If you’re serious about this, about us, about staying here and building something real, then prove it.

She finally stepped forward and took the flowers from me. The moment her fingers brushed mine, I felt like I could breathe again for the first time in days.

Her touch was magical. Healing. It made me want so much more.

Everything. I wanted all of it.

“You’re an idiot,” she said, but she was smiling as she said it.

“The biggest,” I agreed, reaching up to cup her face in my hands. “But I’m your idiot, if you’ll have me.”

She rolled her eyes, but she didn’t pull away. “You’re going to have to work for this, you know. Trust isn’t something you can just fix with flowers and legal documents.”

“I know,” I said, stroking my thumb across her cheek. “I’ll work for it every day for the rest of my life if I have to.”

She rose up on her toes and kissed me then, soft and tentative at first, then deeper as I pulled her against me. She tasted like forgiveness and new beginnings, like everything I’d been searching for without knowing it.

When we finally broke apart, I pressed my forehead against hers. “Does this mean I get to keep you?”

“We’ll see,” she said, but she was grinning now. “Ask me again in about fifty years.”

That’s when we heard clapping behind us. We turned to find Billy and Lucy standing nearby, both of them beaming like proud parents.