Page 108 of Mountain Grump
“I’d call it hot.”
My gaze snaps back to Tilda.
She’s always so free with her compliments, but it still takes me by surprise every time.
I should tell her how pretty she looks.
Should’ve already done that.
But if I say it now, it won’t feel sincere.
I shift closer to her. “I’ll unbutton it again as soon as we’re done.”
Tilda lifts the bouquet to cover her smile. Then her brows go up as I watch her sniff the fake flowers. “These smell like roses.”
She holds them up for me, and I lean down, inhaling. Then I shrug. “I like the way you smell better.”
Satisfaction flows through me at her stunned expression, glad I was able to get my own compliment in.
I reach up and tap her chin. “Close your mouth, Firecracker. It’s not the honeymoon yet.”
Tilda’s mother gasps from somewhere nearby, but I ignore her and wink at my soon-to-be wife.
Chapter 65
Tilda
Heat flaresacross my skin as I keep staring up at Ethan.
I can’t believe he just said that.
“Alrighty.” Dolly steps back into the room. “If everyone is ready.”
Standing at the back of the room, we face forward. And “I Will Always Love You”starts to play through the speakers in the ceiling.
The whole situation is borderline insane. Add in Ethan making comments about my mouth and a honeymoon. Then finish it off with a classic song about love… My nervous system doesn’t know what to do with itself.
Ethan gently grips my elbow and lifts my arm out to my side, with my hands still clutching the roses before me, and he hooks his arm through mine. Then we start down the short aisle.
I know it’s all fake.
I know that even if the license is real, the marriage isn’t.
Iknowall that.
But I still feel a slight thrill of excitement over the fact that I’m marrying this man.
This rugged, handsome, stern Good Boy.
And even if it’s all for show… There’s nothing stopping us from having a little staycation bedroom honeymoon when we get home.
Maybe it’s romance.
Maybe it’s trauma bonding.
We stop before Dolly, a flower-covered podium between us.
I glance down, expecting to see a bible on the surface, but it’s a Dolly Parton cookbook.
