Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 102781 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 514(@200wpm)___ 411(@250wpm)___ 343(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102781 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 514(@200wpm)___ 411(@250wpm)___ 343(@300wpm)
“Really? We have the entire house to ourselves for a night and you made plans on Valentine’s Day?”
“Sorry, babe.”
Talk about disappointment. The lid on the pot full of water on the stove to cook the pasta started to make noise. Apparently there were two things boiling now.
I stepped around Bennett and went to the kitchen. Grabbing a pot holder from the drawer, I turned down the heat and lifted the top to let out the steam. But as the seconds passed, I became more and more annoyed that Bennett had spoiled the evening I’d planned. I’d even gotten him a few gifts I didn’t feel like giving him anymore.
Never one to hold back when it came to fighting with him, I clanked the lid down on the counter and decided to share how upset I really was.
Only when I turned, he wasn’t standing there anymore.
He was down on one knee.
I gasped in shock.
Bennett held a black velvet box in his hand and smirked. “You were going to rip into me, weren’t you?”
My heart was beating out of my chest. I covered it with my hands. “Of course I was. Why did you screw with me like that?”
He reached out and took my hand. “You did all this because I never had a date with a girlfriend on Valentine’s Day. I’m hoping that streak continues and I’ll be having a date with my fiancée.”
My eyes started to tear.
He squeezed my hand, and I noticed the box in his other one shaking. My confident nemesis-turned-love-of-my-life was nervous to propose. Underneath all the tough exterior was a man with a giant, soft heart—it’s why he suffered so much for so long and put up a wall to protect it from breaking again.
Bennett swallowed, and the humor in his face was replaced by sincerity. “When I met you, I was broken, and I didn’t want to be fixed. You vandalized my car, tried to take my job, and called me an asshole, all within a few hours of strutting into the office. I did everything I could to hate you, because somewhere down deep inside, I knew you were a threat to my need to be miserable.
“When I insulted you, you invited me to a meeting even though you were my competition and you could have gone alone. When I made an ass of myself telling you your mom was hitting on me, you encouraged me to stay for dinner. When Lucas’s grandmother died, it was you who immediately said we needed to take him. You should’ve run the other way, but that’s not who you are. You’re a beautiful woman, but the true beauty that shines from you comes from the inside.”
He shook his head. “I don’t deserve such selfless love. I can’t imagine how I deserve you. But if you’ll let me, I want to spend the rest of my life trying to live up to half of what you somehow see in me.”
Warm tears started to stream down my face.
“Annalise O’Neil, I want to argue with you every day at the office and make up with you every night in our bed. I want to fill your belly with crazy-haired little blond babies who look just like you and overflow our home with happiness. I want to grow old with you. So, will you not be my girlfriend and do me the honor of being my fiancée this Valentine’s Day instead?”
I dropped to the floor, almost knocking him over as I wrapped my arms around his neck. “Yes. Yes.” I kissed his face again and again. “Yes. Yes, I’ll marry you.”
Bennett steadied us and pressed his lips to mine. His thumbs wiped the tears from my eyes. “Thank you for loving me even when I hated myself.”
My heart let out a big sigh. That’s the thing about love. We don’t fall in love with the perfect person; we fall in love despite a person’s imperfections.
“I love you,” I said.
He lifted my hand and slipped a beautiful emerald-cut diamond on my finger. “I didn’t see you coming, Texas. Didn’t see you coming.”
“That’s okay.” I smiled. “Because you’ll never see me going now, either.”