“What’s that spell?” Bridget called. In answer, the cheerleaders parted, pom-poms swishing, and a tall, blond man wearing a tuxedo emerged.
Zach’s hair had been recently trimmed, and his sexy dimple was in full force. Talk about input overload. The sun, the cheering, the crash of football players in the background, and in the center of it all, the very man she’d been trying to put in her rearview mirror.
“Penelope Brand,” he said, looking confident and cool, and...different from before. There was sureness in each step he took toward her. Certainty in the way he dismissed the cheerleaders with a “Thanks, ladies.”
“What are you doing?” Her voice was cautious for a very good reason. If he’d gone through this trouble, it was because he was making a gesture of some sort. One that didn’t involve sending the UPS truck to her building every single day.
And if he asked her again to share his life with him, she didn’t trust herself to tell him no. If nothing had changed in his heart, then she couldn’t allow anything to change in hers.
He lifted her hand, the hand where her engagement ring used to sit. She’d left it on Zach’s dresser the day she went with the movers to the house. She couldn’t bear to look at it on her hand when she knew the truth behind it.
That the love she felt for Zach had ultimately not been returned.
It’d all been a ruse.
“A long time ago,” he said, “I made a rule to never get hurt again.”
Oh, my God, he was doing this...right here. Right now.
“Zach, please.”
“You asked about Lonna. Do you want to hear the rest or not?”
She swallowed around a lump forming in her throat, curiosity and hope—so much hope it made her head spin—at a peak.
She nodded. He dipped his chin and continued.
“After I proposed to Lonna and she told me in no uncertain terms that she couldn’t take me seriously, I swore I’d never fall in love again. Avoiding love was the only pathway to happiness. The only path to a fulfilled life. Or so I thought. Then I met you.”
She couldn’t look away from his earnest green eyes—from the sincerity in them.
“I love our daughter, Penelope, but you have to understand something.” He gave her fingers a gentle squeeze. “I love her because of how much I love you.”
Pen froze, eyes wide, mouth slightly ajar. Did she hear him right? She shook her head, refusing to hope. Refusing to believe.
“You’re...you’re... That’s not true,” she finished on a whisper.
“I’m not attached physically to our baby girl the way you are, Pen,” he stated. “The only way I could feel this much love and devotion for her is because I felt it for you first. I’ve been in denial about this for a long time. Since the moment I proposed at my brother’s birthday party.”
She blinked.
“Even then, I knew.” He tugged her close, locking an arm around her lower back. Between them, her swollen belly pressed against his torso.
“I love you, Penelope Brand. I’m sorry I bullied you into everything. Staying when you didn’t want to stay. Moving in with me when you didn’t want to give up your place. Proposing without confessing how I felt about you. It was a childish way to get what I wanted—you—without putting my heart on the line. I take it all back. I don’t want you to marry me.”
He didn’t? She blinked, confused. That wasn’t where she saw this speech headed.
“Unless,”he added with a cocky smile, “you love me, too.” He lifted one thick eyebrow and when she didn’t respond right away, some of that certainty bled from his expression.
He wasn’t sure how she felt.
Because she’d never told him.
She’d been as guilty as he was about not sharing. She’d never given him the chance to know how she felt about him. So she’d tell him now.
“I love you so much I can’t imagine my life without you.” She curled her hand around one of his. “And believe me, I’ve been trying.”
His grin was cunning, wicked with intent and promises to come. “In that case...”