Total pages in book: 59
Estimated words: 56885 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 284(@200wpm)___ 228(@250wpm)___ 190(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56885 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 284(@200wpm)___ 228(@250wpm)___ 190(@300wpm)
“Texting is easier,” she says.
I grin. “Loving you is easy. Being with you is easy. Dedicating my life, career, and future to you is easy. But even if it wasn’t, even if it gets hard or challenges get in our way, I’ll never stop fighting for us. Piper Blake…”
When I let go of her hands and take a small step back, she gasps, dabbing her cheeks. “Oh, Logan. Baby…”
I kneel, reaching into my jacket pocket and taking out the ring box.
“Will you marry me?”
I open the ring box, displaying a large diamond, as full and eye-catching as my woman. The white-gold band is custom. On one side, there’s a small engraving of a phone. On the other, a book.
She stares down at it, her lips trembling, not saying anything for a long time.
“What is it?” I ask. “Is it too corny? I can get something more traditiona—”
“It’s the most,” she says, taking a shuddering breath, “beautiful ring I’ve ever seen. Yes, Logan. Yes. I’ll marry you. I want you forever. I can’t even imagine being with anybody else. Ever. Yes, yes, yes!”
I wrap my arms around her and spin her in a circle. She laughs, finding my lips. “You’re making me dizzy.”
“You make me dizzy,” I say, smiling like I never thought I’d be able to, loving like I never thought possible for a broken soul like mine. “Being here highlights it, Piper. This place tried to ruin me. You’re the love of my life, the only woman I’ll ever want and need.”
“I love you, Mr. Boss,” she says, kissing me again.
EPILOGUE
PIPER
Four Months Later
Iwalk down the aisle with tears glittering in my eyes, threatening to ruin my makeup. Elliot holds my arm in his as the music swells, my heart beating with happiness. Sometimes I can’t believe it. It’s made so much sweeter because Elliot is giving me away.
We’re holding the ceremony in a function room that has been turned into a palace of books. Tall bookshelves hold glittering, gilded volumes: The Grapes of Wrath, sure, but also countless other volumes, the works we’ve spent countless evenings discussing, sitting by the fire in our forest home, the home that was once a place of so much misery.
With each step, as we get closer to my man – dashing in his suit, his silver hair glistening in the overhead light, his intense blue eyes glistening just as much – I can feel the drama that brought us here drifting away. Elliot stopped judging and resenting us the moment he saw the custom ring glittering on my finger, the moment he saw with his own eyes just how much love swelled inside us.
Ruby holds my train, and all around us, our guests watch with love etched on their expressions. When I walk past Milo, he clutches his hands to his chest, his husband staring with the same appreciation.
Finally, we reach the altar… and fine, call us cheesy. Call us lame. But it’s cell phone-themed. Everybody knows how important cell phones are to us from the rehearsal dinner. Texting bonded us in a way even intimacy never could. Cell phones changed us, shaped us, made us.
Once Elliot has given me away, he stands on Logan’s side since he’s serving as his best man, too, a dual role that is so significant. He hasn’t just forgiven us. He’s supporting us.
We’ve decided to share our own vows, so after the officiator has given his preamble, my man and I are free to lovingly clutch hands and stare into each other's eyes.
Logan smiles, brushing a tear from my cheek with his warm thumb.
“My perfect woman,” he says. “I loved you from our first kiss. I loved you for three long years, and every time I tried to convince myself I didn’t, it was a lie. When you came home, my heart shattered into a million pieces, thinking I’d be close to you, text you even, but never make you mine. But then you, being the beautiful soul you are, being the flawless, loving, funny, cute, curvy…”
When he squeezes my hands, an illicit shiver dances beneath my wedding dress.
“You showed me what love truly is; you showed me that before you floated into my life after three long years, I was only pretending to know how it felt.”
He wipes the tears from my cheeks. When it’s my turn, with a mischievous smile, I turn to Ruby. “Please, do the honors.”
Logan is smirking when I turn back to him. “Have I missed something?”
“I figured, for my vows…”
Ruby sends the text. Suddenly, phones make beeping noises. Or, for those who switched to vibrate, going whirrrr against the wooden seats.
“I thought I’d text them.”
Logan opens his mouth in a robust laugh, leaning down for a pre-vows kiss.
EPILOGUE
LOGAN
One Year Later
“We’ve tested it extensively,” Piper says into the speakerphone, gently rocking Joy back and forth, love radiating from her every pore, even when her tone is perfectly poised for business.