for you tonight, I’d like to give you one when the time is right.”
She stilled in my arms. Then I felt her chest rise and fall before she turned slowly to face me. My arm was still around her and she raised her hands to stroke my cheeks with the backs of her fingers as she smiled.
“I love you too, Dane,” she said, her green eyes twinkling under the rising full moon and in the last rays of the sun as she looked up at me. “When the time is right and you give me that ring, I’m going to grab onto it with both hands and never let you go.”
Chapter 39
LEAH
One of Dane’s hands speared into my hair, bringing my head forward as his lips crashed into mine. His other hand set down his champagne glass before my own glass was plucked from between my fingers and removed. I heard the slight clink as he put it down on the table, but then his strong fingers were on my hip, digging into my flesh.
Meanwhile, his kiss was setting me on fire. Our tongues touched, stroked, and caressed. He kissed me fiercely, with every ounce of the meaning that had just been in his voice when he said those words I never thought I’d hear from him.
As always, my body came alive under his touch and my brain turned to mush. Every nerve ending sparked with need until my clit was aching and I felt painfully empty inside. But that wasn’t what this was about.
This, tonight, was about loving each other. I couldn’t believe the effort he’d gone through just to tell me, but I hadn’t needed any of it. I’d known for weeks now that I loved him, but it had never felt like the right time to tell him.
With everything going on around us, it had always felt like we were too rushed, busy, or wrapped up in something else to have that conversation. I’d nearly blurted it out so many times while we’d been doing random things—like putting on our socks in the mornings or while we’d be brushing our teeth at night. And yet, despite how busy we’d been, he’d managed to find the time to organize all this.
Now that the words were finally out, I couldn’t wait to say them at all those random times. Because I was always thinking about it. Thinking about how lucky I was to have him in my life and about how one seemingly simple decision he’d made to come in for lunch at Rick’s that day had led us here.
We kept kissing like the world might end if we stopped, and I wrapped my arms around his neck to hold him as closely to me as I could. Pushing up on my toes, I kissed him harder as my hips started rocking against him.
I could feel the outline of his erection against my stomach, and a rush of heat filled me at the knowledge that it was all for me. All because he loved me and wanted me despite my sometimes bad attitude and my big mouth.
By unspoken agreement, we started moving toward the door to our room. We might have private access to this rooftop, but there were plenty of other roofs and windows around us, and what we were about to do was just for us.
Dane tugged the curtains closed behind us with one hand once we were inside, and then he got busy with my clothes, my pants and shoes flying off as fast as we could manage. While he worked at undressing me and walking me back toward the bed, I undid the buttons on his shirt and let it drop to the floor when it was off.
My hands dropped to his waistband, desperate to get his pants out of my way when we made it to the bed. In a flash, Dane flipped us so I was on my back with his weight above me and dipping me deeper into the mattress.
His feverish kisses kept me from looking at what I was doing, but I felt his pants and underwear under my hands when I ran them over his back from his shoulders to his ass. Clawing at the waistbands of both garments at the same time, I tugged at them and he lifted his hips enough to allow me to pull them over his sculpted butt.
We broke apart long enough for him to pull my shirt over my head thankful I was braless,