Page 65 of The Cupcake Cottage

“Tell me.”

“I’m just overwhelmed.”

“Yeah?” He sat in one of her chairs and crossed an ankle over his knee, pulling one of the coffees from the lilies and taking a sip. “Pour it all on me.”

“Everything’s so fast, and everyone wants to know our plans. I’m used to having everything laid out and various speeches at the ready when there’s this kind of attention. In pageants I was prepared for the onslaught and it was predictable and short-lived.” Her voice shook. “I don’t know where we’re getting married or when I’m moving in or even where we’ll live. How many kids we want? I don’t even know how to act like your fiancée.”

“Just be yourself.”

Her voice was small when she said, “I don’t know how to do this. It’s not just walk on stage and smile at the lights, then go back home to being a nobody. This is…constant.”

Maverick’s heart dropped, and he sat forward. He checked his watch, calculating how quickly he could make it to her side. He had an afternoon practice, and the soonest he could be there to help settle and reassure her wouldn’t be until after supper.

They needed to get married sooner rather than later.

He also needed to fix this. And the first thing he could do was buy her some privacy and downtime.

“I’ll get us an apartment in the city and hire a driver for the days we don’t want to drive back home,” he said. “I’ll bring some of these gifts back to Sweetheart Creek tonight. Then we’ll sit down and figure out the details and make a plan. We’ll have a united front to present to those who ask.

“The publicity is good. It’s friendly. Just put on your beauty queen persona and smile and wave. We’ll get through this. They love you. And they love us together.”

She sighed. “Mav, they’re going to figure out that I’m poor and uneducated. I’m so afraid I’m going to screw up without even realizing it. This is a different world for me.”

“Whoa. You’re doing amazing things here at work and nobody is saying otherwise. You’re amazing.” Sensing she wasn’t fully convinced, he added, “You’re the only one to break my one-date rule in over four years, you know. That says a lot.”

“Yeah, because Louis said he’d kick you off the team if you didn’t stick with me.”

He laughed with her, moving back to the window. The crowd showed no hints of subsiding. “Okay, so maybe there was some outside pressure to kick us into gear. But we didn’t have any problems agreeing to a second date. Remember?”

“I guess I broke your rule, didn’t I?” There was a smile in her voice, and Maverick felt like he could breathe again.

He lowered his voice. “But also, I want you to know thatnever, not even for one hot second, did Ieverwant to back out of a date with you.”

There was authority and confidence in her voice again when she said, “We can’t move in together. Not until we’re married.”

“You’re worried about our reputations?”

“It already looks like a shotgun wedding or entrapment.”

He sat down hard, finally understanding. Daisy-Mae wasn’t afraid of the attention. She was afraid that people might see her in the way her mother did—that she was desperate and poor, and looking for a flashy life and had trapped him with a pregnancy. She saw herself as some small-town gal punching above her heart’s pay grade when in his mind he was too.

“Fine. Separate places until we get married. But you need a place closer to work, and because this is my mess, I’m paying for it all.”

She didn’t argue, and he considered it a win.

“Just, you know, don’t stretch out the engagement, okay?”

“Don’t worry,” she said warmly, “I’ll be the good wife. I’ll wait until you’re legally obligated to me before I bankrupt you.”

He laughed, knowing she’d never do such a thing, but his heart warmed as her voice turned more upbeat again.

There was just one more thing to put the icing on the cake.

“Hey, Daise?”

“Hm?”

“Landon got an offer this morning. A really sweet one.”

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