61
I won’t regret this, I kept telling myself.NôvelDrama.Org: text © owner.
Despite how fucked up the timing was and the order of the way everything was going down, I wanted Oaklyn, I wanted this house, and I wanted it for us.
I just hoped Oaklyn wouldn’t have any regrets.
I just hoped that however things ended up with my sister, Oaklyn wouldn’t grow to resent me.
And I just wished more than anything that I knew how Hannah was going to react.
Fuck.
She slowly nodded. “Okay.”
“Are you sure?”
She sucked in a breath, one that was so deep that I felt it. “The only thing I’m sure of is that I love you.”
A smile grew across my lips. “That’s all I needed to hear.” I glanced at my watch. “Craig should be arriving just about-” My voice cut off when I heard the front door open. “Never mind. He’s here.”
“Who’s Craig?”
“Dominick, Jenner, and Ford’s private chef.”
Her brows rose. “And he’s cooking dinner for us? Here? Tonight?”
I gave her a kiss, growling, “I hope you’re hungry.”
“You’re unbelievable.”
I kissed her again and then found her hand, locking our fingers together before I brought her into the kitchen, where Craig was starting to set up.
“Welcome,” I said to him and shook his hand. “Craig, this is Oaklyn, my girlfriend.”
“Nice to meet you, Oaklyn.” The moment he released her, he voiced, “Nice place you have here and one hell of a kitchen. I’m excited to cook in it.”
“Thanks for coming,” I said.
“I was able to get all your requests. Dinner should be ready in about an hour and a half. We’ll start with some appetizers. I need about thirty minutes for those. Thirsty?”
“Yes,” Oaklyn replied.
“I found some great wines that’ll pair well with what I’m making tonight.” He opened one of the bottles and filled two glasses he’d found in a cabinet. “Cheers.”
“Cheers,” I replied. I handed one of the glasses to Oaklyn and took the other for myself.
I brought her outside onto the patio. I turned on the fire that ran along the back of the pool, along with the fireplace that was in the sitting area, and I put on the pool lights before joining her on the couch. My arm slipped over her shoulders as we took in the sick view.
“Pretty magnificent, isn’t it?”
“That’s quite an understatement, Mystery Man.” She smiled as she looked at me. “I’m still in shock that I’m going to live here with you someday.”
“Whenever you’re ready.”
She exhaled, gripping the wine like it was going to fall. “Really?”
“Again, it doesn’t have to happen right away, but, yes, really. That’s what I’d like.” I held her chin, tugging her bottom lip with my thumb. “You’re going to be my wife one day. And then everything I’ve built-the condo, the others I plan to buy, the investments I intend to make over the next couple of years-it’s all going to be ours.”
Her eyes squinted, squeezing, and a whole new set of tears rolled past her lids.
I leaned into her face. “Yes. You heard me right. I said my wife.”
When her eyes opened, I saw everything I’d ever wanted-things I hadn’t even realized until Oaklyn made that proposition.
When Macon and Declan forced me to admit what I’d been pushing away.
When my whole life changed.
When I came to the conclusion that I couldn’t go another fucking day without her being mine.
“I’m obsessed with you,” she declared. “I’m talking next-level kinda love.”
I laughed. “You say that now, but I told my sister I was meeting up with a realtor tonight who was going to show me a few places and that I fully intended on banging her.” I paused. “Still love me?”
She pounded my arm. “Yes … dick.”
“For the record, I’m not banging you tonight, so get that thought right out of your head. But we are completing lesson four-something I’ve thought long and hard about.”
“Oh, yeah?” She took a drink of her wine. “And what’s that going to look like?”
“Something that’s going to make you fucking scream.”
Oaklyn
“F
uck me,” Camden hissed as I walked into the bedroom, wearing the lingerie set my man had surprised me with.
Who would have thought he would be into something so sensual? I hadn’t, but I certainly loved it. This one was a different style of nightie than the first one he’d given me. Still the same color green, but it came with a matching pair of boy shorts, and the material was all lace and see-through.
“Get over here.”
He was slightly sitting up on the bed with an arm behind his head and his legs crossed, wearing only a pair of boxer briefs.
Every ripple and muscle on his body was on full display.
But it wasn’t just the incredibly sexy sight that had me aching, that had my heart thumping, that had wetness already pooling between my legs.
It was also the bed that he was actually lying on and the fact that it was going to be ours until we picked out a new one. One detail in a treasure trove of information I’d learned just a few hours ago.
And the best gift anyone had ever given me.
But that wasn’t all. There was even more that had unraveled tonight.
Camden had told me he loved me.
Words that only reconfirmed everything I felt for him.
Words that I’d been dying to hear him speak for over half my life.
Words that I cherished.
Not only because they had come from the man who had my heart, but also because I’d never heard them from another guy.
Camden Dalton had so many of my firsts.
I stopped near the fireplace, feeling the warmth from the roaring flames, and I held on to the wall, giving him a full-length view of my body. “You like?”
“Not like. I fucking love.”