Chapter 67
CHAPTER
SIXTY-SEVEN
JULIETTE
Exhausted doesn’t begin to describe the way I’m feeling at the moment. I’m beyond tired. I don’t know if it’s a still-healing thing or what, but I am exhausted. I could curl into a ball on the couch and sleep for a few hours… maybe even twelve or fourteen.
Shuffling into the house, I pause at the sight in front of me.
There are flowers and balloons everywhere.
I don’t understand what’s going on. Pressing my lips together, I roll them a few times as I try to breathe through the confusion that slams into me, because I cannot piece together what is happening here right now.
I’m hot and sweaty from work. I spent all day scrubbing strippers’ glitter off floors and furniture. Not to mention how the bathrooms looked.
Gross.
All I want to do is take a hot shower, eat a hot meal, then kiss my man, and hopefully do more…
a lot more after a nap. But now I’m standing in the kitchen area, and there in the short distance, in the little dining room area where we eat our meals together, are at least six dozen white roses, red balloons, and both Cade and Slade.
I open my mouth, then snap my lips shut, because I don’t know what to say. I don’t know what to do. I stand where I am, frozen in place, just blinking.
Slade chuckles, his lips curving up into a grin. I watch as his eyes almost glitter as he takes me in. He clears his throat, taking one step forward and then another. My thighs begin to tremble with anxious energy as he slowly closes the distance between us.
Cade does the same, moving closer and closer to me. And then, before either of them reaches me, they stop. They’re about a foot away when Cade speaks. His voice is soft, his eyes focused on mine, and my entire body practically melts to the floor at my feet.
“Thank you for being you, Juliette,” he begins. “Thank you for the cookies and dinners. Thanks for listening to all my conversations about shows, toys, movies, and characters. Thank you for being nice.”
I lift my fingers to my lips when my eyes begin to water.
I hold my breath for a moment in an attempt to keep from bawling my eyes out before I speak.
My bottom lip trembles, but I force the words out, trying my hardest to keep from losing my shit completely and bursting out into uncontrollable tears.
“There’s no need to thank me,” I say. “It’s easy to love you, Cade.”
The moment the words leave my mouth, I watch as his own eyes water, and I realize I haven’t told him that I love him yet. This is the first time. I hadn’t intentionally said them, but the words came out so effortlessly because they’re true.
“Marry me,” a voice says, cutting through the air like a knife cuts through softened butter. So damn easy, unforced, raw, and real.
I shift my attention to Slade, and my breath hitches. He’s down on one knee, and his arm is outstretched. There in his palm is a little box, and it’s open. Twinkling back at me is a ring. The tears that I was barely keeping at bay begin to fall.
“Yes,” I choke out. “Yes, I’ll marry you.”
Slade takes the ring out and slips it onto the ring finger of my left hand. Flicking my gaze down at my finger, I gasp. It’s stunning. There’s a large aquamarine oval stone, diamonds on either side of that, and a really pretty amber-colored stone beside the diamonds. And it’s all in a gold setting.
Stunning.
“The aquamarine is because it’s Dad’s birthstone, and the yellow one, Citrine, is mine,” Cade explains. I don’t even know how to respond to that, because it’s the most perfect meaning in the whole world.
“It’s perfect,” I breathe. “Absolutely perfect.”
Slade stands, and then I feel his hands cup my cheeks. Turning my attention toward him, I look into his eyes. He smiles at me before he shifts his face closer, and my eyelids flutter closed the moment his lips are on mine.
He kisses me. It’s closed-mouth, it’s hard, but it’s also appropriate since we’re standing in front of Cade—although I’m not sure Cade would really care either way. Slade is going to do what Slade is going to do.
And I love that about him.
He breaks the kiss, resting his forehead against mine as we attempt to catch our breath.
“I planned a whole fuckin’ speech,” he grunts.
I shift my head back slightly so my gaze can search his. “I don’t need a speech. I have everything I could ever want right here in this room. You and Cade.”
“Forever,” he grinds out before his mouth slams against mine again.
I welcome the kiss.
I’m engaged.
Really engaged.
And to a man who loves me—a man who would burn the entire world down to protect me. Except he didn’t have to, because I was finally, for the first time ever, able to protect myself.
I wouldn’t have had the courage to do it without knowing he was waiting for me. Without knowing he wanted me, and it was a healthy want. So yes, I’ll marry him. He might seem scary to some, an outlaw biker, but to me, he’s the man who would walk through fire just to keep me safe.
I love him. I love Cade. And I love what we have. I want this forever. Saying yes is beyond easy. I’ve never said or done anything easier than saying yes to any question Slade has ever asked me.
This is no different.