I examined the tree that sprouted from the ground below Lanie’s window and calculated my odds of being able to scale it to make it to her room. There were a couple of low-lying branches, so I figured my chances were pretty good. That is, until I actually tried to climb it.
Thanks to bare feet and moss-covered bark, I couldn’t get a foothold on the damn thing. I grabbed the branch overhead and pulled myself up and was nearly close enough to straddle it when it broke under my weight, sending me thudding back to the ground. The wind was knocked out of me briefly, but I hadn’t driven four hours to give up that easily. Just as I stood to make another attempt, I saw the curtains shift behind Lanie’s window, and the sash rose to reveal her standing there.
“Noah?” Lanie’s confused voice called down, having apparently been roused by the sound of the cracking limb. “Are you crazy? What are you doing here?”
My face turned toward the darkened sky. Raindrops fell into my eyes and I blinked against them to keep her in my sights. I stared in awe, unable to take my eyes off the woman of my dreams. Her hair was in a messy ponytail, a few tendrils having fallen loose to cradle her face, and her eyes were slightly puffy with sleep. She looked perfectly imperfect, and I wanted to make her mine for all time. And then two little words tumbled from my lips, unplanned and unabated.
It wasn’t a question. It wasn’t an order. Hell, it was a plea.
“Marry me.”
8: The Bubble is Popped
Lanie
I stood there at my window looking down at Noah. He was half naked. No shirt, no shoes, just a pair of soaked jeans that were molded to his scrumptious form. His hair was plastered to his forehead, his long lashes batting raindrops away, his tongue darting out to capture one of the perfect beads that hung from his bottom lip precariously. And he was looking up at me like I was the second coming, even though I knew I looked like death warmed over.
“Marry me.”
His words drifted up to me, cutting through the unforgiving wind that threatened to pummel him until he was left beaten and battered.
My heart felt like someone had used defibrillation paddles on me. My knees went weak and the floor beneath my feet seemed to fall away, so I tightened my grip on the windowsill to try to keep my balance.
Tried and failed.
I teetered forward, nearly falling from the open window, but I caught myself on the branch before me just in time.
“Lanie!” Noah called up to me, fear evident in his hoarse voice.
I had to get to him, jump into his arms, and wrap myself around him. Taking the stairs would’ve taken too long, and hell, it was just too damned traditional for us. Screw it, I figured—since I was already halfway hanging on to the branch before me, I crawled out onto the limb, icy raindrops pricking my bare skin and soaking through the white shirt I wore—Noah’s, the one I had taken with me.
“Get back in that fucking window, Lanie, before you break your goddamn neck!” Noah ordered. But since when had I ever listened to him?
I’d made it off one branch and down to another with only one more to go before I could jump down to him. And that’s when the klutz in me decided to wake up. Yeah, there I was trying to make some sort of grand gesture, and that psycho bitch decided to rear her ugly, deformed head.
“Oh, shit!” I lost my footing.
Imagine my surprise when my body met not the cold, hard ground but a wall of flesh instead. Noah had broken my fall with his body, but the impact sent us both tumbling.
I propped myself up and looked down at him, still amazed that he was there in the first place. A rumble of thunder sounded in the distance, but no words passed between us. We lay there in the mud looking at each other. His gaze was intent on mine, and I searched his eyes to see if I could find an ounce of regret about his unexpected proposal.
I saw none.
What I did see was a longing that matched mine, a certainty that dispelled any doubt, truth that mirrored my own. I loved that man, and he loved me, and it was right.
The muscles in his jaw tensed. He reached up and cupped my face in his hands. Then he exhaled a breath slowly and swept a wet lock of hair from my forehead. “I don’t ever want to be away from you again. I can’t do it.” His voice was broken, shaken.
I felt the same way, but the words were lodged in my throat, engulfed by a myriad of fathomless emotions. So since my verbal communication skill was clearly broken, I did my best to convey my feelings through other means. I kissed him like I’d never kissed him before. I was lost in Noah Crawford. Everything else in the world ceased to exist: the unrelenting storm, the fact that it was four o’clock in the morning, the barking neighborhood dogs.
Noah rolled us over until I was writhing beneath him, doing everything I could to get closer. Sensing my desperation, he hitched my bare leg over his hip. The soaked denim of his jeans pressed against my center and I moaned into his mouth. He always knew what I needed, and he would always take care of me like he’d promised.
My hands roamed over his naked chest, his muscular shoulders, his thick biceps, every inch of him wet and slick under my touch. I wrapped my other leg around him, holding him captive, unwilling to ever let him go again.
Noah cupped my ass in one hand and rolled his hips, his kiss hot and demanding. When his lips finally left mine, his talented mouth trailed along the underside of my jaw until he reached the sensitive spot below my ear.
And then he stopped, pulling back abruptly as he looked down at me. His brows were furrowed, his lips parted, and he just stared at me with a confused expression. Rain hung like teardrops from the tips of his hair, and one fell onto my cheek only to slide down the side of my face. Funny how a gazillion other raindrops were pummeling us, but that was the one that caused me to shiver and my skin to pebble.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, unsure why he had stopped.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
I giggled and rolled my eyes. “Noah, I climbed out a window and fell out of a tree, nearly breaking my neck, just to get to you. Do you really need me to say it?”
“Well, yeah, I kind of do.” The expression on his face was so sincere. “I’m asking you to be my wife, to bear my children, to grow old with me by your side. I’m asking you to marry me, Delaine Marie Talbot, for better or worse, in sickness and health, for richer or poorer, until death do we part. Does that sound like something you might want to do for the rest of your life?”
I bit down on my lip to stop the goofy grin that spread across my face and shrugged nonchalantly. “Maybe.”