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She looked up and squeezed his hand back. “Better than alright.”
He dropped a kiss to her lips, one she wished he’d take deeper. He pulled back and smiled and his look told her he knew exactly what she was thinking.
He leaned in and brushed his lips over hers again, this time only giving her a hint of contact before pulling back.
She growled at him and he laughed. He knew exactly what he was doing to her and he was having entirely too much fun with that knowledge.
She narrowed her eyes. Payback was going to be fun.
Chapter 42
Thanks to Mrs. Poole, Kelly and Jack were back to hosting get-togethers at their house a month later. Jennie and Chad were heading down to Jack and Kelly’s house for an official welcome-home-Jennie party. She had laughed when Kelly suggested it since she’d been home over a month.
Kelly would use any excuse to host a party. Mrs. Poole alternated between shooing Roark away from her and putting him to work spreading pies and cookies out on a table.
Kelly had invited Jennie’s family and Kyle’s parents had driven down for the event. It amazed Jennie to see them embrace Chad and to see the way Chad responded to them.
He seemed to treat Kyle’s parents as if they were simply an extra set of parents to Jennie. It made her feel secure for some reason, knowing she could keep that part of her life intact instead of losing them as she moved on to find new love with Chad.
She sat, surrounded by friends and family, smiling and laughing, her heart free and light for the first time in a very long time. She felt like she’d come through a long hard winter and was seeing the sun for the first time.
Everyone wanted a play-by-play of the whole story, from the trip to Florida to the shooting, even though by now, everyone had heard it before. She sat back and let Chad and her parents tell the tale.
It was surreal listening to them tell her story. Chad skimmed quickly over her heartache over Kyle’s death. She assumed that was to spare her from reliving it, but she felt oddly at ease. She would always love Kyle, but the pain didn’t cut as deeply anymore.
Most likely, her pain at losing Kyle had lingered for so long and had been so great because she had felt she had a hand in his death. When her parents and Kyle’s parents convinced her she didn’t, it was as if they set her free. Set her heart free too.
“I’ve asked him to marry me six times in the last month, but he said no,” Jennie piped up as Chad finished the story.
Chad’s mother smacked him on the back of his shoulder from her position at his side. Jennie guessed she would have liked to target the back of his head, but Mabry couldn’t reach that high on Chad when he was standing up.
“Oh, you’ll marry her, all right, mister,” Mabry said.
Chad only laughed and before Jennie could process what was going on, he was down on one knee in front of her. He pulled a ring from his pocket.
“When did you get a ring? We’ve been running from killers and I’ve been lying in the hospital with a bullet meant for you in my arm and you’ve been driving me to physical therapy for a month…and y-you went ring shopping somewhere in all of that?” she sputtered.
He laughed. “They took the bullet out Jennie. You didn’t lie around with a bullet in your arm. And, I’ve had this ring for months. Before we went on the run.” He smiled and then he took her left hand in his.
As he spoke, he slipped the ring on Jennie’s finger. “Will you marry me, Jennie Evans?”
She grinned at him. “No.”
She shook her head but she didn’t stop him from putting the ring on her finger and the wide smile on her face told him a different story. Apparently, everyone around her saw the same thing Chad did. He stood and lifted her in his arms, spinning her around as their friends cheered.
Jennie laughed. “I thought I told you, no.”
“I heard, yes. Didn’t you guys hear, yes?” Chad asked over his shoulder.
Her traitorous friends all took his side, but she only laughed. She felt lighter and happier than she’d felt in a long time.
She wrapped her arms around Chad and pulled him close. “We can negotiate this later, sweetheart,” she whispered.
By now the group around them was chatting and laughing so no one heard Chad whisper back. “We can negotiate your surrender later.”
She threw her head back and laughed. “I won’t ever surrender.”
“Oh, you’ll surrender,” said Chad as he captured her mouth in a heated kiss that had Jennie wondering if maybe, just maybe, she would surrender.
