Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 82474 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 412(@200wpm)___ 330(@250wpm)___ 275(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82474 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 412(@200wpm)___ 330(@250wpm)___ 275(@300wpm)
I squeeze his hand tightly, knowing exactly what he means. “I’m sorry,” I say. “About the company.”
He shakes his head. “Don’t be. I got the better deal out of this.” He winks at me. “I got you.”
A happy rush trickles through me. Lark is free of his past now. We both are.
As for me, my mother did start seeing a therapist, finally. It took a few months before she caved in. But she seems happier now. We even managed to eat an entire meal together without fighting—and at the end of it, she footed the bill, without so much as a single snarky comment. It’s slow progress. But we’re getting there. And more importantly, I’ve learned how to hold fast to my boundaries. How to show myself as much respect as the other people in my life.
“Look at us,” I murmur, smiling. “We’ve come so far in just half a year.”
“We really have.” Lark tilts his head to look out over the side of the rooftop. “I’m proud of us.”
“Me, too,” I whisper. Then I follow his gaze, going quiet. We take a moment to gaze out over the city at our feet, like we’re the only ones in our own private world right now. I feel… comfortable. It’s an unfamiliar feeling. I didn’t realize before, how much of my life I spent yearning and struggling. Not until I finally found a comfortable balance with Lark.
Now, I understand balance. I understand how to work hard, but also how to give myself a break, and balance that hard work out with self-care, days off, time with the ones I love.
“Thank you, Cassidy,” Lark murmurs, startling me out of my reverie.
I turn back to him, smiling. “For what? I’m the one who forgot our six month anniversary,” I joke. “I should be the one thanking you.”
But he shakes his head, his expression suddenly much more serious than it has been since we walked out here. “I mean it. Before I met you… I was willing to just settle for mediocre. I thought it was better to be secure financially but miserable in every other way. I thought…” He pauses, a rush of emotion coming over his expression. “I thought I’d never really know what love was. Not the kind other people talk about, where you’d do anything for your partner, where you put their happiness before your own and vice versa. But then I met you.”
I couldn’t break my gaze away from Lark’s now if I wanted to. Those deep, handsome green eyes pull me in like gravity.
“You made me see that I could be happy again—really happy, not just getting by.” A smile touches the corners of his lips, ever so slightly. “And you taught me that I can start over if I really need to. That I’ve still got what it takes to build something from the ground up.”
Now it’s my turn to hesitate, if only because my throat has gone tight. “Lark…”
“I’m so glad I met you, Cassidy.” He doesn’t blink. Doesn’t break my gaze. He extends his other hand too, the one I’m not already holding, and I reach out to let him take both of my hands now. His palms feel warm and familiar against mine. Reassuringly strong. I always feel safe when he holds me like this. “I can’t imagine the rest of my life without you,” Lark says softly.
I let out a little laugh, now, my chest clenched with emotion. “You sound like you’re proposing,” I say, if only to break the tension, because if I try to say anything else, I’ll start to cry, I just know it.
Lark lifts one eyebrow, and nods at my wine glass.
Frowning, I look down at it. I hadn’t even noticed the waiter pouring the champagne earlier. I’d been so focused on Lark, on being here with him.
At the bottom of my glass, something’s glittering. Bubbles drift around it, obscuring it. But… it looks circular, maybe. With a different shape on one end.
When I look up again, Lark is kneeling next to my chair. On one knee. Holding only my left hand, now.
My stomach leaps up into my throat. I let out a strangled sound, half cry, half laugh, and my free hand flutters up to cover my mouth. “What…” I manage to say, but Lark shushes me, a little half-smile he can’t quite suppress on his face.
“Cassidy Marks. You’ve been the best thing to happen to me in my entire life. For all the reasons I just listed, and about a million more. You are the reason I believe in love again. And, if you’ll have me, I want to be yours. I want you to be mine. For the rest of our lives.” He lifts one eyebrow, the sly, knowing expression that I first fell in love with crossing his features. “Will you marry me?”