Page 68 of The Chad Next Door
I brush my hand along his scruff before leaning in. “You’re ridiculous, old man. And you never have to ask for that.”
We make out on the floor until I find a string of pumpkin guts beneath the cabinet, and Chad lets out a deep and weary sigh.
“I should probably introduce you to my family,” he says, like not doing so was ever going to be an option. “My sisters will be mad at me if I propose without letting them help.”
Then he fixes me with a stern stare that sends a shiver through me. “But Iwillbe asking you to marry me, Karen Hope Duncan, and I will not be patient about making that wedding happen sooner than later. Are you okay with that?”
I snicker. “Are you going to give me a choice?”
“Always. But I know what I want, and I will never stop trying to keep you in my life until the day I stop breathing.”
“Now I understand the sooner than later part. You’re getting up there in years.”
I cut off his answering growl with a kiss that is the first of many, many more to come.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chad
“Are you sure you didn’tget mountain fever or something? Altitude sickness? Eat a poisonous mushroom?” Micah blinks at me, maybe for the first time since I announced my intentions with Hope a couple of minutes ago. “You do know you’re talking crazy right now, right?”
Micah Taylor calling me crazy. That’s a new one. Sighing, I scoot to the edge of my seat and reach out for her hands. She places her fingers in mine, the same gesture of trust that she’s always given me since she was a baby. She’s grown up so much, but sometimes I still think she’s that little four-year-old who fell asleep in my arms the night after our mom died. I may have only been fifteen, but I didn’t move off the couch for hours because I was too afraid to wake her. And maybe I’d needed the same comfort because losing Mom felt like losing the one thing in my life that I was supposed to have forever.
Her opinion won’t change my mind, but I want her to be on board with this decision because she and the twins mean so much to me.
“You know I’m going to ask you to help plan the wedding, right?”
Micah rolls her eyes. “As if I would give you a choice. It’s only all I’ve ever wanted to do for you since I was five. And yes, Fischer knows I am obsessed with weddings.”
I glance at Fischer, who is deep in conversation with Jordan on the other side of the room. I still haven’t had much of a chance to talk to Micah’s new boyfriend yet, something I hope to fix soon. He has enough red flags that popped up when I looked into him a couple of weeks ago that I need to make sure Micah fully knows what she’s getting into now that things are looking more serious.
“Hey!” She squeezes my hands, pulling my attention back to her. “Yeah, I know about his whole embezzlement thing. Stop glaring at him and start telling me about your plans toproposeto the woman you met three weeks ago. Brook!”
I wince as Brooklyn comes into the living room after finishing up a phone call she’d gotten soon after she arrived. I know what Brooklyn is going to say, so before she can ask why Micah looks ready to explode, I grab her hand and pull her onto the couch next to me. “I’m going to marry Hope. Soon. And I know it’s fast, but I wouldn’t be doing something like this if I wasn’t completely sure that she’s it for me. Okay?”
Brooklyn, who is usually an open book, stares at me with a blank expression, like my words broke something in her brain. “I’m sorry,” she says after a moment. “Did you just say…”
“Marry,” I confirm. “I tried to propose to her this morning, but she wouldn’t let me.”
“Because it’scrazy,” Micah repeats.
“It’s not that crazy,” Houston mumbles.
Honestly, I forgot he was even sitting there despite his chair resting only a few feet from the couch. He’s been there since he got here, but Micah was quick to take all my attention as I told her about my feelings for Hope. I frown at him. “You don’t think it’s crazy?”
He shrugs without looking up. The floor must be incredibly interesting, considering he’s been staring at it for the last five minutes. I invited my siblings over for brunch so I could break the news to them before things got too far, but it quickly turned into a solo conversation with Micah. I didn’t think it was possible to forget Houston Briggs was in a room, but I did.
And there’s something bothering him. He wasn’t like this yesterday.
“Did you talk to Darcy?” I ask, wondering if Brook and Micah know anything about my brother’s situation. I still haven’t heard a word from Darcy, though I’ve been tempted to text her again.
Houston looks up at me, but only for a second. I’ve never seen him this unsure, and now I’m wondering if I should have told him more yesterday. Letting him come to his own conclusions felt like the right thing, but that might have been a bad move, no matter what he decides. “No,” he says after a long, pregnant pause. “She’s in Albuquerque.”
I’m pretty sure she’s not.
“What did I miss?” Micah asks, looking between us. “And what does this have to do with Hope?”
“Where is Hope, by the way?” Brooklyn asks.
