I’ve just fallen to one knee, and now I stare up at her, sliding a hand into the inside of my suit jacket.
“I love you, Fiona,” I growl passionately. “I loved you the first moment I saw you in the café window. I love you with everything I have, with everything I’ll ever have. I love you more than I knew a man like me was capable of loving.”
I take out the ring box and open it, presenting a diamond that is just perfect for my lady. It’s full-bodied and elegant, shiny and subtle all at the same time. It’s Fiona in jewelry form.
She stumbles over to me, her mouth falling open, tears glimmering in her eyes.
“I love you too,” she says, her voice shaky.
She stands over me, clasping her hands together.
“I wanted to say it. But I wasn’t sure you felt the same.”
“Of course I do,” I growl. “Fiona Yates, will you make me the happiest man alive? Will you marry me?”
She gasps out a sob, as though the question has made this all real.
“Yes,” she whispers, and then she raises her voice. “Yes, yes, yes.”
I leap to my feet and pull her into a hug, both of us laughing as I clamber to find her right finger for the ring, but we’re kissing each other at the same time, messy clumsy magical kisses. I kiss her cheek and her forehead and the corner of her mouth, all while I grab her hand and slip the ring on.
She holds it up in the setting Parisian sun, catching the light.
“Do you like it?” I ask.
“I love it,” she says, smiling up at me. “And I love you.”
“I love you so damn much,” I growl.
I pull her into an embrace and crush her lips with mine, and then break it off and hold my face close to hers.
“You were right earlier when you said I was nervous,” I say. “It’s the most nervous I’ve ever been.”
“I’d never dream of saying no,” she whispers. “I want this more than I’ve ever wanted anything. A life with you, a family with you... It’s—”
“The perfect end to Snails for Breakfast?” I say, a bantering note in my voice.
She giggles, wiping a tear from her eye.
“It’s the perfect end to our story,” she says.
“No, firecracker,” I murmur, kissing her forehead softly. “This is just the beginning.”
Epilogue
Three Weeks Later
Fiona
My fingers fly across the keys like I’m a woman possessed.
It’s so easy to sink into the writing flow from the balcony of our hotel suite.
After Forrest proposed to me on the Eiffel Tower, we decided to stay in Paris for a month longer, exploring all the sights and smells and tastes – with fewer snails this time – at our leisure. It’s been so much more relaxing with Zack and his cronies hanging over our every move.
A week after Forrest fought them off, we got word that Zack’s father had been arrested by the FBI, as well as all their top associates.
Zack is going away for a long, long time, not just for the assault charge, but he has a litany of other charges against him as well.
I pause in my writing, looking down as wonder cascades through me.
First, my eye is drawn to the word count. I’ve written forty thousand words in three weeks, and it feels important, big, magical in a sense. I’ve never gotten this far in a project before.
There’s something about spending my evenings and mornings with Forrest that fires me up for long writing sessions, our love fueling my need to create love-filled scenes.
Then my gaze moves to the table, to the object that sits on the table next to my laptop.
My breath catches when I hear the door to the suite open.
I close my laptop and place it atop the object, my heart suddenly loud in my ears, hammering as though it’s trying to deafen me.
Forrest is early. The sun is still a yellow penny a good few inches above the horizon, bathing the city in its golden glory.
I stand up and turn to find my man – my fiancé – standing there in his steel suit.
He smirks at me, his summer-sky eyes moving down to my hands clasped in front of me.
“Any reason you’re standing so formally, firecracker?” he smiles, walking onto the balcony.
I raise my hands with a giggle, gripping the back of his muscled neck and standing on my tiptoes. We kiss passionately, both of us making hungry sounds through the collision of our lips and bodies, both of us panting and moaning and desperate for more.
I’ll never get bored of kissing my man.
It ends naturally, and I rock back on my heels, gazing up into his face, at his captivating eyes and his strong jaw.
“What is it, Fiona?” he asks, his voice a low growl even as he smiles.