The Delivery of Decor (Shiloh Ridge Ranch in Three Rivers #7) - Liz Isaacson Page 0,116

quietly into the next notes. He was such a talented musician, and so good with his voice too.

“She’s wrong, because he sees her.

He wants to call her,

He wants to know her,

He dreams of the silver between his fingers,

And the touch of her smile against his,

And the sound of her truck as she drives down his street.”

People started to come around the front and back of the truck—the truck she drove down his street—and every single member of his family carried a bird of paradise in their hand.

“She always drives away

When she should stay,

Because he wants for-ev-er with her.”

Dot had always driven away when she should stay, but this time…this time, she hadn’t. This time, she was going to get her happily-ever-after with the sexy cowboy.

“She used to drive away,” he sang next.

“When she knew she should stay.” He held that last note a little longer, and Dot realized he was compensating for the human part of this show—his brothers and sisters and cousins and in-laws who were still gathering between her and Brutus and Ward.

She couldn’t believe they had birds of paradise. She loved that flower with her whole heart, and she’d told Ward that months ago.

“Now she drives down his street,

She stays when she wants to flee,

Because he wants forever with her.” He picked out the last few notes of the guitar, his eyes dropping to his fingers for a moment. He looked up again, hope in those brilliant blue eyes. In the semi-silence, with the chord hanging in the air, he repeated, “He wants for-ev-er with her.”

Dot wasn’t sure if she should wipe her face, rush his family, or sob uncontrollably into her hands.

“Dot,” Ward said in a loud voice as he set his guitar against Brutus’s windshield. He bent down and took something from Ace, who held it up for him. “I love you completely. I want forever with you. Will you marry me?”

He held up a little black box and opened it. Though she couldn’t see the diamond, that certainly wasn’t the deciding factor.

Her throat felt like she’d swallowed something the size of Brutus, and she cleared it away and shook her silver blonde hair over her shoulders. With his entire family standing there, all of them smiling at her, Dot knew what she was stepping into.

This huge Glover family. All those women who seemed so different from her. Dogs, and cats, and chaos. Cowboys and cowgirls.

They were perfection, and they didn’t even know it.

“Yes,” she said in the loudest voice she could. “Yes, I’ll marry you.”

Ward whooped and tossed his cowboy hat into the air. Ranger and Ace reached up to help him down, and he jumped from Brutus’s hood and ran toward her. “I love you,” he said as the first wave of cheering started.

“I love you too,” she whispered, letting him slide the engagement ring onto her finger. She looked from the sparkly diamond to the perfect man who’d given it to her. He grinned, wiped her tears, and matched his smile to hers as he kissed her.

His family went nuts then, and Dot couldn’t hold the kiss as she started to laugh. “Where did you get those flowers?” she asked as Ace and Bishop arrived on the scene and handed them to her.

“I had them delivered from California,” Ward said, refusing to let her get too far from him though his family was like a tide that couldn’t be stopped. At the end of it all, she held a couple dozen flowers that reminded her of paradise, wore a new weight on her left ring finger, and had the best memory to reflect on for the rest of her life.

“All right, all right,” Ward said. “You guys are savages. Back up.” He shooed them away from her and took the big bunch of flowers. “Let’s go put these in a vase and eat lunch.”

“Congratulations,” a few people called, more and more joining in as they started to walk away to go back to work.

Inside Bull House, Dot leaned her back against the door while Ward took the flowers to the kitchen counter and a ready-made vase.

He returned to her and cradled her face in his hands. “Did you like the song?”

“It was beautiful,” she whispered, tears gathering in her eyes again. “And you know it.”

He smiled down at her. “So are you.” He kissed her again, and this time, it was a proper engagement kiss, with plenty of love and passion, no interruptions, and exactly what Dot wanted every kiss to be