Page 84 of Fireworks & Forehead Kisses

“You’re not?” I was surprised to hear that. He’d spent seven years with the woman, and from what he’d just told me, she sounded pretty incredible.

“No. If I hadn’t walked in on her, I would have married her.”

“Exactly, and then you wouldn’t have had to… you know…”

“I wouldn’t have had to you know what?” he asked.

“You wouldn’t have had to marry me.”

He glanced over at me. His eyes darkened. Again, the intensity in his eyes stole my breath.

When he looked back at the road, his voice was raspy and deep as he restated, “I’m not sorry.”

There was a heavy silence in the air. He wasn’t sorry that he had to marry me. Once again, I found myself swooning over less-than-romantic statements. It wasn’t even close to a declaration of love, yet the butterflies were back, and my heart was pittering and pattering.

Declan’s phone rang, and an international number came up on the dashboard screen.

“Sorry, I need to take this.”

He answered the phone, and I was surprised to hear him speaking another language. French, if I wasn’t mistaken. The call lasted the majority of the drive, and it was clear he was fluent.

The call ended just as we pulled off the highway in Savannah.

“How many languages do you speak?” I asked.

“Including English, five.”

Five?Who spoke five languages?

“Which ones?”

“French, Spanish, Japanese, and Mandarin.”

“Wow…that’s impressive.”

“Not really. My grandfather insisted I learn two of them for business. My mother was from Spain. And one of them was a foreign language requirement for school. It wasn’t all at once, either. My grandparents emigrated from Madrid when my mom was three, so she spoke to me primarily in Spanish, so I was bilingual when I started speaking. When I was three, I began martial arts, and my instructor only spoke Japanese, so I was trilingual when I started kindergarten. Once I went to boarding school at age seven, I started French. And my grandfather had me start taking private Mandarin lessons when I was nine. It’s easier for children to learn and retain language skills than it is for adults.”

“Still, that’s impressive. The only language I ever learned besides English was Pig Latin.”

He chuckled a little as we turned into the hospital drive, and a warmth spread through me. I had to admit making Declan Wolfe laugh gave me a completely unearned sense of pride. For some reason, I didn’t think there were a ton of people in Declan Wolfe’s life who made him laugh.

I expected him to drop me off in the front, so when he turned into the parking garage, I was very surprised.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Parking.”

“You can just drop me off.”

Before he responded, my phone rang, and I saw that it was Skylar.

“Hey,” I answered.

“Where are you?” she asked.

“I’m parking.”

“Luna is in the waiting room with the boys and Reagan, Cheyenne, and Isabella. Check on her before coming back to me.”

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