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Rafe helped Jane sit up, propping pillows behind her until she got annoyed at him and swatted him away.
“Stop making such a fuss,” she said. “I’m fine.”
He scowled at her, growled at her. “You almost died, Jane. You are most definitely not fine.” Then he blinked slowly and hung his head, looked up at her from under his lashes. “Don’t ever do that to me again, baby,” he said, and no power in the world could’ve stopped his voice from cracking at that point. Sobs of relief and untold emotion wracked his body as the pain and the worry of the last two days were set loose. Burying his face in the crook of her neck, he said, “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“I’m not going anywhere, lawman.” Jane’s voice whispered over him, soothed him, and she stroked her hands over his head and neck, across his shoulders. Rubbed her cheek over his cropped hair.
“Ah… Rafe?”
“Yeah, baby?”
“Where’s my hair?”
Rafe sniffed back his tears as a bubble of laughter rose inside him. He’d wondered how long it would take her to notice. Not long apparently. He fingered the much shorter strands of pale ginger hair framing her lovely face. “The firies cut a huge chunk out of your hair when they cut the seatbelt getting you out of the car. The nurses tried to even it up a bit but… I think a trip to the hairdresser might be in order when we get you out of here.”
She felt around her head, her fingers pulling at her hair, testing its length and a stricken look overtook her pretty features. It was very short. “I’ve never had short hair before.”
Rafe heard her unspoken question. “I think it looks sexy.”
“Yeah?” Her voice said she wasn’t so sure, but her mouth tipped up in one corner. “It doesn’t make me look too much like my mum?”
“Are you saying your mum isn’t sexy?” he teased.
Her eyebrows shot into her hairline. “Are you saying she is?”
He pretended to frown at her, the smart, funny, courageous love of his life. “I think you need to rest now. You’re very tired.”
“Oh my God.” Jane chuckled, her emerald eyes wide and shining with humour. “You totally think my mum is sexy,” she said, her voice scratchy.
He kissed a trail of feather-light kisses along the line of her jaw. “Not as sexy as you, beautiful.”
Small hands scraped over his head and around his neck, urging him closer. “Rafe?”
He nibbled her earlobe. “Yes, Janie?”
“I love you,” she sighed.
He leaned his forehead against hers. “I love you too.”
“And Rafe?”
“Yeah, beautiful?”
“Will you marry me?” she whispered.
Rafe, careful of Jane’s split lip, pressed his mouth to hers in the softest kiss he could manage, then smiled, happier than he’d ever been in his life. “I thought you’d never ask.”
Epilogue
Brisbane registry office, November, the best day of Jane Melville-Bennett’s life.
“I,Elizabeth Jane, take you, Rafael Ulysses to be my lawfully wedded husband. I take you with all your faults and strengths, and will stand by your side through both success and failure. I will help you when you need help and I will comfort you when you need comfort. I will honour the trust you have placed in me,” Jane repeated the vows Rafe had said to her only moments earlier. “I love you and cherish you, and choose to spend my life with you and no other.”
She hiccoughed a laugh as her husband reached out and gently swiped her tears away with the pad of his thumb.
It had been almost two months since Jane had been released from hospital, her injuries had all but mended, and life had slowly gotten back to normal.
During the week she continued working at Straight to the Hips, testing new recipes for her cook book on the unsuspecting public, plus Street Sweets Mobile Patisserie had officially launched. And thanks to a recent article and glowing review in Foodies Weekly magazine, the business was attracting a steady stream of weekend bookings, catering mostly to small weddings in out-of-the-way venues.
