Page 82 of The Scot's Perfect Match
Ensconced in her husband's arms, the castle could have come under attack, and she wouldn’t have noticed. All that existed were the walls of their bedchamber, the softness of their mattress, and the heat of Gavan's touch. The way his whispered confessions in the dark unraveled her until she couldn’t tell where she ended and he began.
This quiet with Gavan was one she never thought she’d know. Not just the absence of noise, but the peace of it.
“Ye’re still awake,” Gavan murmured, his breath stirring the loose tendrils of her hair.
She smiled faintly against his chest. “So are ye.”
“I was thinking,” he said, his voice low and thoughtful.
“Dangerous,” she teased softly, tracing idle patterns against his forearm. “What about?”
“Our future.” He didn’t hesitate, didn’t dance around the word like so many men she’d known.
Her hand stilled. “Our future?”
“Aye.” He shifted slightly, propping himself up on one elbow so he could see her better in the firelight. “What ye want for it. What we want for it.”
Her throat tightened at the weight of it. “I dinna know if I’ve thought that far ahead,” she admitted. “No’ really. I’ve spent so much time arranging everyone else’s lives, I dinna know if I ever truly believed I’d get to choose my own.”
“Ye do,” he said simply. “Ye get to choose everything. With me.”
She let out a shaky breath, staring at the way his fingers brushed hers, gentle and grounding. “What do ye want, then?” she asked. “For us?”
“Peace,” he said without hesitation. “A home full of laughter. A place where ye never feel like ye have to play a part but can be yourself.” His thumb stroked across her knuckles. “And children. Someday. As many as ye’ll allow me.”
Gavan’s words, the idea of the future they were building, and the family they might create sent something profound and unexpected spiraling through her. Warmth, fear, and a hope so big it made her chest ache. “Children,” she repeated softly.
“If ye want them.”
She smiled faintly, imagining a tiny Gavan riding a pony, hell-bent for leather, and a wee Ava giving chase. “I’d like that. Someday.”
“Then someday it will be.”
She studied him in the flickering firelight, memorizing the way the shadows softened his strong features, the openness in his gaze. “I think ye’ve made me the happiest lass on earth,” she asked.
He grinned, leaning down to press a kiss to her temple. “That is all I could ever want.”
Ava’s chest swelled, her heart thudding behind her ribs. She tucked herself closer to her husband, letting the steady beat of his heart lull her. “I love ye, Gavan,” she whispered into the quiet.
Gavan tugged closer, his arms around her back, and he met her gaze with the same heated need and emotion as her own. “And I love ye, too, my sweet matchmaker.”
Ava smiled, knowing that love wasn’t a fantasy to arrange for someone else. It was hers. Tangible. Fierce. Real.
And at last, she had her happily-ever-after.
