Page 409 of The Winslow Brothers

“I’m glad to hear that, Rachel,” he says, his voice soft but sad, like it’s causing him physical pain to be in my presence. It’s the worst scenario I can imagine—hurting Ty more than I already have—so I rush on to the good part and silently pray and wish and hope he’ll be in a place to receive it.

“I love you, Ty!” I shout so loud, I swear it could’ve shattered glass, the words are so eager to exit my body.

His chest heaves and his fists come to his hips, and I can’t help but say it over and over again.

“I love you,” I whisper this time, tears falling down my cheeks unchecked. “I do, Ty. I love you. I’minlove with you.”

“Thank fuck. It’s about time,” he mutters, and then he’s on the move, his legs closing the distance between us in three long strides.

Within seconds, I’m in his arms and he’s kissing me and I’m kissing him and his fingers are in my hair and my hands are gripping the material of his shirt.

Which only makes me cry harder.

“I love you,” I whisper against his mouth, and I can taste my own tears on his lips.

“I love you too, Rachel,” he says against my lips. “I didn’t have a childhood fantasy of making the perfect family of my own…but these last twenty-four hours have been fucking misery without you. I want it all now. A life, a family, kids—the whole nine yards—and I want it with you.”

Sounds like a dream. And I want it too.

I kiss him harder. His hands are on my ass, forcing my body to get as close to his as physically possible without climbing inside each other.

I don’t know how long we stay like that, kissing and touching and just desperately holding each other, but at a certain point, the background noise gets so loud, it’s impossible to continue pretending we’re the only ones in the room.

Like, there are alotof other people, and they’re cheering and clapping their hands and saying things like,“Hell yeah!”and“Get a room!”

Ty breaks the kiss on a laugh, and I blink past the remnants of tears in my eyes. The entire Winslow gang is here, celebrating for us.

“It’s about fucking time!” Ty’s brother Jude shouts, and his mother reaches out to smack him across the back of the head.

“Language!” Wendy snaps as Winnie and Wes and Lexi all file in to take seats.

“I just read a Colleen Hoover book where they acknowledge that language is nothing more than a construct placed on us by society, Grandma. Fuck doesn’t actually mean anything. It’s just a fucking word,” Lexi advises, rendering Ty’s mom speechless and spreading another smile across both Ty’s face and mine.

“Let’s eat!” Ty’s uncle Brad shouts, pushing past us and settling into a chair at the other end of the table.

By the looks of things, our moment is over and family dinner is in session, but Ty doesn’t put me down. Instead, he kisses me again.

“Paula, pass me the potatoes,” Brad requests in the background, and I pull away from Ty’s mouth on a giggle.

An insult flies in one direction and a laugh in another, the chaos around us making me smile.

When Ty sees mine, his grows even deeper. “You ready for this to be our future?”

I pretend to consider it seriously for five seconds, but I already know my answer. “Only if you promise it’ll last forever.”

Ty shakes his head. “Dinner won’t. But we will.”

“I love you, Ty.”

“Me too, Rach. Me too.” He kisses me again, but then he sets me back on my feet.

I glance around the room at the love all around us. “You think we should, uh, maybe sit down and eat?”

“You’d rather sit down and eat?”

“As opposed to what?”

“As opposed to getting the fuck out of here so I can keep telling you I love you,” he whispers quietly into my ear. “But only, naked and with my cock buried in you.”

---