I’m not sure what he’s referring to. “What have you fucked up now?”
“I had it planned to propose to you later. I’ve organised for a horse and carriage to pick us up and I was going to do the romantic thing for you, but fuck, I couldn’t wait any longer.” He pulls me in for another kiss and then says gruffly, “You have that effect on me.”
I love that because he has the same effect on me. “You haven’t fucked anything up, Jett.”
Smiling the smile that caught my attention the first time we met in that club, he says, “Thank fuck, because I want you to be the one I get to wake up with every morning, and the one I get to cook Sunday breakfasts for, and the one I get to argue with over domestic shit, and the one I drag along to boring ass things you’re not interested in, and the one who makes me sit through your shopping trips, and the one I get to make love to for the rest of our lives, and the one who has my babies. I want you to be my everything.”
I smile through my tears. “I want that, too.”
His lips come to mine again and he kisses me long and deep, and when he is done, he raises his arm with another fist pump. “Fuck yes!” he yells out.
Shaking my head, I laugh. “I do love you, Mr. Rockstar.”
He joins in my laughter and while he spends the next few minutes blessing my lips with more kisses, I thank the universe for sending me this man.
A man who fought for me and showed me how much I really wanted him in my life.
A man who showed me that he could be the one.
Steal My Breath
by Nina Levine
Prologue
Callie
I never used to understand what people meant when they said life wasn’t black and white, because to me it was. Things were black or white, wrong or right. There was no in-between space or spectrum of colours.
Then I met Luke, and he taught me that we do exist in shades of colour. He also taught me that although we inhale light through this rainbow of brilliance, we also exhale dark. The colours of life can give us the best of times just as easily as they can crash us into the darkest days of our lives.
Luke will be forever etched into my heart.
This is our story.
Part I
1
Callie
I’m not getting any sex tonight.
I know my three-month sex drought is going to continue the minute the guy sitting across from me says, “I love that shade of pink you’re wearing. I have a tie that would match it well.”
No man should wear a pink tie.
In the history of ever.
I pick up my glass of wine and drain it before standing. “I don’t think we’re compatible, Rick. And while it’s been fun learning about all the puzzles you put together and the pink tie you own, I’ve been on so many dates lately that I just don’t have it in me to sit through another hour or more knowing we’re not going to see each other again.”
A pang of guilt hits me when his mouth drops open, but the sex-starved woman inside me screams, “Don’t do it! He’s not the one who will make your vagina happier than you can.” So I stand my ground and offer a quick apology, “I’m sorry I’m being so rude, but you’ll thank me when you do finally meet the one for you,” before making a hasty exit.
Fifteen minutes later, I enter Elixir, the bar that’s my home away from home, and exhale a long sigh of relief.
“You look like you’ve just dodged a bullet,” Avery, one of the bartenders, and my best friend, says as she reaches for the vodka she knows I’m going to ask for.
Slumping onto the barstool, I nod and rest my elbows on the counter. “Yep, I just had another date that was a complete waste of time. How many men do you think I’m going to have to go through to find the right one? Hell, at this point, I’d just settle for a guy I thought could offer me some hot sex for the night.” I take the vodka and Coke she passes me and drink nearly half the glass in one gulp.