Total pages in book: 20
Estimated words: 18927 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 95(@200wpm)___ 76(@250wpm)___ 63(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 18927 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 95(@200wpm)___ 76(@250wpm)___ 63(@300wpm)
“You know I made a stop on my way here?” he says, a twinkle in his eye.
“Yeah? Where was that?”
“Well, it’s better that I show you rather than tell you,” he says as he sets me down.
I gasp and cover my mouth with one hand as he drops to one knee in front of me and pulls out a tiny blue box from his pocket.
“Daddy…” I say, my voice shaking.
He opens it and shows me the most beautiful sparkling diamond ring I’ve ever seen in my life.
This can’t be happening.
“I know we haven’t had the most conventional relationship, Mandy,” he says with a smile. “And that not everyone will approve. But marry me, Mandy. Marry me. Be my wife, be with me forever, no matter what anyone else says. I’ll take care of you like I always have, for the rest of our lives, wherever life takes us.”
My jaw is practically on the floor. I know I’m supposed to speak here, but I can’t.
“Will you make me the happiest man alive and be my wife?”
I nod and manage to whisper out a “Yes…”
Cooper’s face explodes with delight as he slides the ring onto my finger. It fits just right, and I leap back into his arms, locking my lips onto his.
Our naughty little secret is about to become not so secret, but I’m okay with that, and so is he. We love each other, and whatever the rest of the world thinks of that is not going to get in our way.
Epilogue
Mandy
Two months later…
“Are you sure you want to do this?” I ask Daddy as I lie on the bed watching him going through his closet. He’s packing all his suits to be shipped over to Italy for the move. He turns and glances back at me.
“Are you sure you want to? I mean, you’ll be leaving Sarah behind.”
“She’s going to school in California,” I reply. “The time we’ll get to hang out is already going to be cut down dramatically. And this way, she’ll have an excuse to take trips to Europe.”
Daddy smiles, then leans down to kiss me. It’s been two months since I said yes to his proposal and six weeks since he let me know that he’d been offered a job at an Italian-American law firm in Rome and asked me if I’d be interested in moving there.
“I’ll only take it if you want to go too,” he told me. “But I remember how much you said you loved it while you were there, and it would also be a fresh start for me and you. No judgments from anybody. It would just be us and our love.”
I didn’t even have to think about it.
“Yes,” I told him and immediately signed up for online Italian lessons.
Daddy already has an apartment picked out for us that’s to die for, and I just can’t wait to get there so I can see it in person.
“Your firm must be sad to be losing you,” I say to Daddy.
“They’re not happy about it.” He chuckles as he continues packing. Our flight is the day after tomorrow, and I’m pretty much finished with everything I have to do, defying the stereotype. “But they wished me well, which I appreciate. They offered me a lot of money to stick around, but no amount of money could convince me to give up my dream of Italy with my dream woman.”
“You really should have been a songwriter,” I smile. “You have such a way with words.”
“I dunno about that,” he chuckles. “I need to bring home the bacon for my missus, and I doubt I could do that singing.”
He comes right over to me with a sexy grin on his face, and I get all giddy inside like I still do when I’m around my beautiful husband-to-be. My heartrate quickens as he leans in and kisses me, his two-day stubble scraping gently against my cheek.
Mine. All mine.
As I always do when we kiss, I twist our engagement ring around my finger with my thumb. I don’t know why I do it—just a silly little habit, I guess. Or maybe it’s just a reminder to me that it’s there and that he put it there and that I belong to him.
He pulls back and smiles at me, then kisses down my neck and down to my belly. He looks up at me, his eyes glistening. “You think you’ll be all right on the plane? How’s the nausea been lately?”
“It’s been okay,” I say. “So I hope I’ll be all right too, but then again, I’ve never been pregnant on a plane before.”
It was just a few weeks ago that we found out I was pregnant. I wasn’t sure how Daddy would react. I don’t know why, but part of me still thought maybe he wouldn’t be ready just yet, but he totally freaked out with excitement, grabbed me under the armpits, and lifted me up like he was the happiest man in the world.