Claimed By The Possessive Fireman - Flora Ferrari Page 0,29

hate is required.

I feel like I flow into a sort of haze, not even really there, and by the final scene I can’t even tell if I’m doing well or if everything has fallen apart.

It’s only the crowd that tells me it’s the former, leaping to their feet and pounding their hands together, their screams and whistles hurtling at the stage like Cupid arrows.

Even now, I don’t let my eyes stray to the chairs where Mom and Dad sit, because I don’t want to ruin this, the final moment of the narrative arc.

I move to the stage side as the applause becomes louder and Calvin strides forward, clapping his clipboard against his ring-heavy hand.

“Excellent, excellent,” he cries. “Oh, dearies, that was just sublime. Go on, get out there. Take your bows. And I think, Lilah, I think it would be fitting if you go out there first on your own. You are the lead, after all.”

“Oh, no,” I say, feeling breathless, my throat a little sore from all the projecting. “Everybody did a great job. I wouldn’t feel comfortable—”

“Lilah,” Cassie says, tossing me a stern look that I now realize everybody, the whole cast, is aiming at me.

They’re wearing smiles that seem to imply a lot, too, but clearly I’m missing the hidden message.

“Get out there,” Cassie says. “Please.”

“You guys are acting really weird,” I say. “But fine, if you insist.”

I walk back onto the stage and let out a quivering breath when I see him, spotlighted on the stage and surrounded by rose petals.

He’s wearing a tuxedo that clings to his powerful body, and he’s kneeling in the middle of the roses, and in his confident hands he’s holding a ring box that displays a diamond winking in the spotlight.

The crowd is silent as I walk toward him, tears already making everything blurry, my hands trembling as I lift them to my face to wipe the tears away.

“I heard you thought I’d miss this,” Dom says quietly, looking up at me with emotion wrought across his face. “But I wouldn’t, not for the world. I didn’t mean to worry you, Lilah.”

“No, no,” I whisper. “You didn’t. I mean, you did. But that doesn’t matter now.”

“Lilah Thompson,” he says. “I guess you could say our path here has been a little … ah, unorthodox.”

Laughter springs from the crowd, good-natured and warm. I look across and see, dimly in the dark, Dad’s face split into a grin, and fresh waves of tears pour out of my eyes.

“But I love you, I love you, I love you. And I need you to be my wife.”

Each love fires through me as my tears get hot, burning down my face, making me want to throw myself at him and collapse atop him right here on the stage.

“I love you,” I gasp. “Oh, God, Dom. I was so worried you didn’t feel the same. I love you so freaking much.”

“Good,” he smirks. “Because that would make what I’m about to ask pretty awkward if you didn’t.”

I giggle and his lips twist upward, our eyes meeting as we share a private moment even as he kneel in front of three hundred people.

“I love you and I knew it the moment I saw you—”

“Saved me, you mean.”

The crowd erupts into laughter and Dominic chuckles.

“Okay, saved you,” he says. “I knew it. I knew I could never be with anybody else. I knew I had to spend the rest of my life with you and build a life, a family, together. So, Lilah Thompson, will you marry me?”

“Yes,” I cry, a sob making the word warbled. “Yes, yes, yes.”

He slides the elegant diamond ring onto my finger.

“How did you know …”

“I measured it in your sleep,” he says, standing up and pulling me close, the cheers and clapping of the crowd receding into the background as he enshrouds me in his embrace.

“Creep,” I joke through my tears. “It’s not creepy. It’s beautiful.”

“You were incredible, by the way, Lilah. I was watching from the lighting booth. You were even better than I knew you’d be.”

I stand on my tiptoes and take his face in my hands, bringing my lips to his and he leans down to brush his along mine, and then our mouths open and our lust ignites, and we both have to step away before we consume each other right here.

“I love you,” I whisper, laying my head against my chest, his heartbeat hammering just as frantically as mine.

“I love you,” he growls. “Forever.”

I glance into the