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“Yes, literal death,” I insist, pressing a hand to my ribs with a wince. “I can feel it now. Need to Know is stabbing my spleen.”
“And once you lose the spleen, you’re really screwed.”
“So screwed,” I murmur.
He turns to face me beside the gourd display by the hostess’s stand. “All right, then. Might as well have at it.”
I blink, then narrow my eyes. “Have at what?”
“Your gift. I originally planned to surprise you in the library later, then I realized you’d be rabid with curiosity by this point, so I brought it with me.”
“Oh, yay,” I squeak, clapping my hands. “Thank you. I really am rabid.”
He laughs. “I know.” He nods toward the stand. “Pop the top.”
I reach out, lifting the wooden top to expose the storage area beneath. Inside is…
My jaw drops, and I shift wide eyes West’s way. “An antique Scrabble set?”
“Even better,” he says proudly. “A hand-carved special edition commissioned by my great-grandfather in 1948. Here all the way from my family’s estate in Canterbury.”
“Oh, so pretty.” I reverently lift the heavy, gorgeously carved box from the stand and set it on the table behind me.
“My father sent it over with a business friend of his. That’s where I was—treating the friend to lunch as a thank you for playing messenger. He had a change to his schedule and needs to leave New York earlier than expected so…” He pulls in a breath and lets it out long and slow. “It was now or never.”
I glance up with a grin. “You sound nervous. I promise I won’t break it.” I run a gentle hand over the wood.
“I know you won’t,” he whispers. “Go ahead. Open it. The suspense is killing me. I want to see if the tiles are as fancy as I remember.”
“Fancy tiles, huh?” I grip the edges of the hinged case and lift. “That will make beating you even more…”
I trail off. There, on top of the closed game board, those fancy tiles spell out one word—Always?
I jerk my gaze back to West and say perhaps the dumbest thing ever, “This set has punctuation?”
He exhales and nods. “Yeah. I’m not sure the carver really understood the game all that well. But it adds another dimension. And is helpful at times like these.” He pulls a small box from his pocket and my heart ping-pongs again as he opens it to reveal an astonishingly large diamond.
Holy. Smokes.
“This is the real reason for the hand delivery. My father wasn’t about to send this via post.”
I cover my mouth with my hand as tears fill my eyes, a part of me unable to believe this is happening.
“It was my great grandmother’s,” he says softly. “Then my mother’s. And now, I’d really love for it to be yours and for you to be mine. For always.”
Tears streaming down my cheeks, I hurl myself at him, wrapping my arms tight around his neck as I say, “Yes. Oh, yes. And you’ll be mine, and I’m never ever going to let you go.”
“I certainly hope not,” he says, hugging me tight as he sighs. “I confess I’m glad that’s over. I was nervous.”
I pull back, grinning up at him. “You seriously thought I’d say no?”
“I thought you might think we should wait. But I couldn’t put it off. I needed to see my ring on your finger. It’s become an almost primal thing.”
I laugh as I hold out my trembling hand. “Abby was just talking about her primal tigress. You’re a very primal pair.”
“Oh, God, don’t tell me. If I hear any more about her sex life, I’ll never be able to look poor Eduardo in the eye again.” He slides the ring into place on my finger. “There we go. Beautiful.”
I blink faster. “And a perfect fit.”
“I had it sized. That’s what else I was up to this afternoon.”
“Clever man.” I hold out my hand, cocking my head as I watch the diamond glint in the light. “Wow. There’s only one thing that could make this moment any better.”
“Sex in the basement before we go to the gallery opening?”
“I was thinking the bathroom, but…”
I race for the stairs, giggling. He follows me, and we prove that my ring looks gorgeous when my hands are braced against the brick wall while he fucks me from behind.
And then we get dressed and head to Ruby’s gallery to share the good news with the people we love, and finally head home with four new paintings of our very own and a December wedding to plan.
Because we can’t wait for spring or summer.
“We can stay on in London after the ballroom dancing competition,” West says. “Get married in a frigid old church with no central heat, have a huge party after at my brother’s fancy penthouse in Notting Hill, and then stay on for Christmas in the country with my dad and his new girlfriend.”
