Page 111 of Jacob
“Could you be any more romantic?” She grabs my face.
“I didn’t know I was until I met you.” I slide her hand off my face and kiss the top of her aquamarine solitaire engagement ring. The one the two of us picked out together. It’s understated and smaller than I had planned, but Skye didn’t want anything too big or too flashy.
She looks away, arching her neck back to take in our new home.
“Wow.”
“Want to view your new home?”
“Do I ever? I’ve never been up the tower,” she gasps, getting excited.
For the next hour, the two of us explore every nook and cranny of the five-bedroom, twelfth-century castle. Having been renovated in the nineteenth century, it’s in need of a little tender love and care, which I am certain Skye will give it lots of.
While we explored the castle, she reeled off dozens of facts about its history. How it used to be a safe haven for monarchs and archbishops of the past and rendezvous for secret meetings between lords and their mistresses.
Buzzing with excitement, she went into detail about what she planned to do with the vaulted wooden ceilings, draping them in cloud-printed canopies to drop the ceilings in the bedrooms in an effort to make them cozier.
She has so many wonderful ideas.
“I have one more room to show you.” I push open the door that leads to the towered corner on the farthest side of the castle.
She sucks in a breath as she steps into the magical space. “It’s a library.”
“Big enough?”
“It’s enormous.” In the center of the wall-to-wall book-filled space, she spins around with her arms in the air, making her long jacket look like a flared flamenco dress.
She comes to a standstill and skips across to one of the shelves. Running her finger along the spines, she hooks her finger into the top of one and pulls it out, flicks through it, and pushes it back in.
I watch on, fascinated by her fascination as she pulls another, and then another, from the shelves.
“The books are included in the sale.” I interrupt her browsing.
“Some of these are first editions and look.” She points up to the rolling library ladders that move back and forth along wrought-iron tracks. “I’ve always wanted those.”
I know she has.
Moving over to the turret area, Skye reaches up and rests the palm of her hand against the crisscross leaded windows.
“This is really ours?”
“The sale went through at midday today.” At one point I didn’t think it would happen when the deed for the castle went missing. But like some kind of magical miracle, the owner found it.
“It’s beautiful,” she whispers, gazing out of the window.
Nothing makes me happier than seeing her happy.
I look up and down the shelves at the thousands of books we now own as I make my way over to her. I know if she ever goes missing in the house, this is where I’ll find her.
“Look,” she squeals, pointing at the window. “A family of deer. There’s even a baby one.”
“You might kill me with all of this cuteness.” The weight of my stare makes her turn around.
Her face, now serious, falls into place as she looks back at the library in the circular turret we’re both now standing in. “Do you ever get anything wrong? This is so…” Her eyes become glazed, and she looks overwhelmed.
“The only thing I ever got wrong was not asking you out on a date the same night I kissed you after that game of truth or dare.”
“I don’t think it was wrong.”
