Crushing on Love (The Bradens of Peaceful Harbor, Book Four) (31 page)

“May I have this dance, beautiful?”

She bounced to her feet. “You can have every dance.”

“I want to dance with my
husband
,” Jewel said. Still wearing her knee-length white lace wedding dress, she tugged Nate up to his feet. Nate went gladly, with a look of love in his eyes.

Cole and Leesa followed, as did Shannon’s parents. Ty offered a hand to Anita, who graciously took it. Steve held Shannon in his arms, dancing beneath the moonlight, thinking about how lucky he was. Not only for falling in love with such an incredible woman, but for having friends who’d taught him to dance, so he could feel her melting against him like a candle in the sun.
Pure bliss
.

“I CAN’T BELIEVE they told the
Frankie
story.” Shannon gazed into Steve’s eyes, recognizing the flicker of nervousness that usually sent his hand cruising through his hair. “Are you okay?”

“I wish I’d known you then,” he said thoughtfully.

“Why? Because you think I would have made out with you in a boathouse? By the way, we
all
called him Frankie spanky because his little brother called him that.”

He kissed her softly. “Making out in a boathouse does sound pretty hot, but that’s not why. You once said you wanted the strength of years behind us. I want that, Shan. I would have loved to be your first kiss, your first date…”

The sincerity in his voice made her insides go soft. “You were the first person to have shmores with me, and a Happy Pack, and some sexy things we won’t talk about here.” Her cheeks flushed. “You were also not just the first but the only person I’ve ever fallen in love with. That’s a lot more important.”

“You’re right, baby. And I want you to know that I understand how important your family is to you. If you ever want to move back here, I’ll make it work. I’ll figure out a way. I want you to be happy, and I’ll do whatever it takes to give you the best life you could possibly want.”

“I know you would do anything for me, but I love our life in Colorado. This is all I need, a few days here and there to touch base. You saw how much I missed the mountain when we tried to move into town. I can’t imagine moving this far away from the place we fell in love. My heart is on that mountain now.”

“I want this with you forever, baby. Everything. Family get-togethers, our own family.” He reached into his slacks pocket and pulled out a red velvet bag.

“Grizz?” she said with a shaky voice.

He withdrew a gorgeous rose-gold ring with tiny white and yellow gold butterflies along the band and a teardrop-shaped diamond in the center.

Her hand flew to her chest, and she choked out, “I can’t breathe.”

He dropped down on one knee and held her left hand. She was trembling all over, vaguely aware of her family gathering around as he said, “Marry me, Butterfly. Be mine and let me be yours forever. I want to see you in a wedding dress and round with our babies. I want to grow old and gray together listening to your endless sentences and waking up with you in my wrinkled, arthritic arms.”

“Grizz,” she whispered. Tears slid down her cheeks. She’d dreamed of this moment, but nothing could come close to the love filling her veins as she gazed into Steve’s loving eyes. His hands were shaking, as were hers. “Kids,” she said softly. “You want kids?”

“As many as you want, sweet girl.”

She choked past her thickening throat. “As many as I want? Sugared-up baby Grizzes? Can we give them Happy Packs and teach them to make shmores and to dance?”

“Baby,” he said, rising to his feet. “If you marry me, there’s nothing we can’t do.”

“We’ll need more space. Not now, but when we have kids. Maybe we can add on to the cabin. Married! Grizz, we’re getting married!”

He held the sparkling ring in front of her finger. “Is that a yes?”

She pushed her finger into the ring and squealed, leaping into his arms as she said, “Yes. Double yes. Triple yes. Quadruple y—”

Her final words were smothered in the most delicious kiss of them all. The kiss of promises to come, hopes, and dreams from the only man who could ever make them come true.

From New York Times bestselling author Melissa Foster comes a new sexy romance,
WHISPER OF LOVE
, in which Tempest Braden, a music therapist, meets Nash Morgan, a reclusive artist, and single father, with a secret past.

Buy WHISPER OF LOVE

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CONTINUE READING for information on more of Melissa’s upcoming releases, including her sexy new stand-alone romance, Tru Gritt.

Fall in love with Matt and Mira in

SEASIDE WHISPERS (Seaside Summers)

MATT LACROUX NEEDED a shower, a vacation, and to figure out what the hell he was doing with his life—in that order. And sex. Sex would be good. It had been a long time since he’d had a warm, willing woman in his bed instead of a research project to work on, papers to grade, or notes to coordinate on the book he was writing. In fact, now that he was thinking about it, he might move sex up to the top of his list—if he didn’t have someone else’s blood on his hands.

He tugged off his torn shirt, tossed it in the hamper, and turned on the shower. He’d been back on Cape Cod for less than three hours and had already broken up a fight between drunken college kids over by the Bookstore Restaurant, where he’d eaten dinner and
thought
he would write for a while. Maybe he should have done what so many other professors did when they took a sabbatical and gone to a nice resort somewhere, or holed up in a mountain cabin. He could have stayed at his cottage on Nantucket, but he missed his family, and his father wasn’t getting any younger. Plus, his siblings’ joint wedding was only two months away, and it was taking place on their mother’s birthday, to honor her memory. It was time to reconnect.

His mind drifted to the other person he’d like to reconnect with, Mira Savage, his father’s employee and the woman who had been occupying Matt’s thoughts since he met her last summer at his younger brother Grayson’s engagement party. They’d spent the entire day together with her adorable son, Hagen. He’d seen her half a dozen times since, during brief visits home. They’d taken Hagen to the park together and a few other places, although they’d never gone on an official date. They’d exchanged occasional texts over the weeks in between, but that was as far as it had gone.
It
being Matt’s attraction to a woman who lived too many hours away to get involved with. Mira wasn’t the type of woman whose life he could complicate with intermittent encounters. She was a selfless woman who put her son and others first. The type of woman who blushed when he got too close. The type of woman a man took the time to get to know—
almost a year, that’s pretty damn long
—to show her she could trust him, a woman who should be taken care of and protected but not smothered. And she was the only woman he’d like to undress slowly, loving every inch of her incredible body until she was trembling with need and slick as a baby seal. Keeping himself in check had been like dancing on hot coals, but he’d never stopped thinking about the sexy single mother and her inquisitive son.

He stripped off his slacks and stepped into the shower, turning the faucet to cold now that he was hot and bothered over Mira. He closed his eyes and exhaled a long breath.
One thing at a time
.

The water shifted from his head to his back, and Matt looked up at the faucet, which promptly fell, clipping his cheekbone.

“Ouch! What the—” He grabbed his cheek and pulled away from the water spraying in all directions from the broken spigot.
Perfect. Just perfect
. He washed the fresh blood from his fingers and quickly rinsed off.

He stepped from the shower and dried off, eyeing the offending showerhead. The damn thing had a crack around the housing and rust on the inside. He’d rented his friends’ cottage in the Seaside community for the summer. The place was in great shape, but things like showerheads were easy to miss when renovating. It was after nine o’clock, and Amy and Tony had a little girl. Matt wasn’t about to bother them about a freaking bathroom fixture. He pulled on clean clothes and called his father, who owned Lacroux Hardware Store.