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“Are you okay?” She looked worried. “That was a big sigh. Did you have a good time tonight?”
He wrapped his arm around her shoulders as they walked. “I had a wonderful time. It was good to see them all again. I love this place, I love being here, but the best part of all was being here with you. Did you enjoy it?”
She smiled. “I had a great time, and I agree with everything you said. I love it here, I love the people, I love the place, but the best part was being here with you.”
He drew in a deep breath and stopped walking. Taking hold of both of her hands, he turned to face her.
“What’s wrong?” She looked worried again.
“Nothing. Nothing’s wrong. Everything’s wonderful, but there’s something I need to ask you.”
She looked cautious. “What?”
“You said you love it here. You love the people. You love the place.” He hesitated. Was he really going to ask her? Wasn’t it too soon? Wasn’t he supposed to be taking it slowly? He was, but dammit, he didn’t want to. He couldn’t wait. He needed to know. “Do you think you could ever love me?”
Her eyes widened, and her lips parted in surprise. By her reaction, it really was too soon, but at the same time, it was too late now—he’s asked. He’d get to hear her answer whether he liked it or not.
She didn’t speak for a long moment. He wanted to say something. To save her and himself from the awkward truth, but he made himself keep quiet. He had to hear it from her.
Eventually she blew out a big sigh, and then, to his surprise, she nodded slowly. She looked up into his eyes and nodded again. “Honestly? Yes. I do think I could. In fact, I’ll be completely honest with you, Antonio, I know I could fall in love with you.”
His chest buzzed with happiness and he could feel his heart race. “You do? You are? Mary Ellen …” He cupped her face between his hands. “I don’t want to scare you away, but I have to tell you. I love you.”
She bit her lip, but he could see she was smiling around it.
“When I told you you’re perfect, I meant you’re perfect for me. You’re everything I want in this life, and I want to share it with you.” He lifted her hands to his lips and kissed them. “I’ve tried to be patient. I waited as long as I could. I didn’t want to scare you away.”
To his surprise, she laughed. “This is patient? This is as long as you can wait?”
He nodded uncertainly. She was laughing at him?
She surprised him again by bringing their joined hands up to her lips, so she could kiss his knuckles. “You beautiful, ridiculous man. We’ve been seeing each other for one whole week. Do you know how crazy it sounds?”
“I do. I know, but it’s true. It’s not like we were strangers when we met. We’ve known each other for a long time, and the heart doesn’t know time in the same way the mind does. The heart just knows.”
She looked shocked, as though he’d said something horribly wrong.
“What? What’s wrong?”
To his relief she smiled and shook her head, then she laughed, almost in disbelief. “My mind has been trying to stick with the conventional sense of time, and I’ll be honest, it’s been trying to protect my heart, too. But I just remembered something that I told both Cameron and Chelsea recently.”
“What?”
“I told them that falling in love isn’t a decision that you make with your head according to some predetermined timeline. It’s something that happens inside your heart that you can neither control nor deny.”
He grinned at her. “Then there’s our answer.”
She nodded slowly, but she didn’t look convinced.
“You don’t think so?” His heart was racing again, but this time with fear—fear that she might change her mind already, tell him it was some mistake, that she could never love him.
She smiled and kissed his hand again. “I do think so. It’s just … you know how I work. My mind likes to be in charge; it likes predetermined timelines and being in control. I can’t deny what I feel, but I’m not used to listening to my heart—no matter how right it might be.”
He nodded and drew her to him, wrapping her in a hug that for once wasn’t about getting his body as close to hers as possible. This was about getting his heart closer to hers. “I understand. You need time, and you can take all the time you want, but now I have hope. I know that we’re heading where I want to go.”
She looked up at him. “Just so I’m sure about this and so I don’t second-guess myself later when I’m alone and get to thinking that I made all of this up, where do you want this to go?”
“I want you to marry me, Mary Ellen. I want you to live with me and be my wife. I want us to have babies and grandchildren and grow old together. Oh, and I want us to buy a house here, so we can come visit whenever we like.”
