Page 103 of Secrets We Fight
We ate,we drank, and we danced. The sun had set and the fireworks show would start soon.
“I’ll be right back,” Rhett said and headed toward the house.
I sipped my vodka soda until he came back a minute later. “Everything okay?”
He held out a box of sparklers. “Come with me.”
“Oh … kay,” I replied skeptically. We were about to watch a massive fireworks show, and he wanted to do kiddie sparklers?
I fell into step with him as we walked toward the beach. Rhett led me down the stairs, and we kicked off our sandals and strolled along the shoreline.
“I just need a break from all the people,” he stated.
It was a gigantic party, and each year it seemed only to grow, but I loved it. Hell, it was a way for me apparently to find out what my friends were all up to since I didn’t see them as often as I’d like. I was busy interning at a civil rights law firm during the week, and the weekends I spent with Rhett and Poppy. We would go to the park or a movie or hang out at the condo and have tea parties. My life wasn’t at all like it was before Rhett came into it. Back then, a lot of my free time was spent at Chrome looking for someone to hook up with, or spending my Fridays fooling around with Declan. I didn’t need any of that anymore, and I wouldn’t change a damn thing about it.
“That’s cool. Back when I was younger, I would come down here with my brother, sister, and our cousins. We would drink the beer we stole from the party and watch the fireworks.”
“Oh yeah?” Rhett opened the box of sparklers and started to stick them into the sand in a circle around us. “You have a lot of memories here, huh?”
“I do.”
“And it was the first place you and I ever spoke to each other,” he reminded me.
“How could I forget? It was the first place you called me Fallon.”
“And the first place I realized you were going to be trouble.”
I clutched at my chest playfully. “Me? Trouble?”
Rhett chuckled and pulled two lighters from his pocket. “Yeah, you. Can you light the ones on your side while I take care of the ones over here?”
I took a lighter from him, and we both quickly got to work lighting them. When I finished my last one, I turned, and my breath caught in my throat.
He held open a velvet box, and once again, my hand went over my heart as I ogled the silver band with diamonds wrapped around it.
“From the moment we met, I knew there was something special about you. I had a hard time denying the attraction I felt for you, and since fate has a wicked way of making things happen, she made it so I would get to know the man you are on the inside and not just the sassy-talking flirt I assumed you were. You’ve brought so much light into my world, and I can’t imagine a day without you by my side. So, Fallon, who makes me laugh every day, I was wondering if you’d make me the happiest man alive by marrying me?”
A lump formed in my throat, and I tried to hold back the tears, but it was no use. Rhett assumed marrying me would make him the happiest man, but him becoming my husband would make me the luckiest man in the world. He was everything to me.
“Only on one condition,” I stated and wiped a tear from my cheek.
“And what’s that?”
“Neither of us goes to Atlantic City for our bachelor parties.”
Rhett laughed. “Deal.”
“Then yes, I’ll marry you, handsome.”
He stood, the fire from the sparklers fizzling out, and he crashed his lips to mine just as fireworks exploded in the dark sky.
Cheers erupted behind me, and when we pulled apart, I could see all our friends on the small cliff above us. Tyler and Hayden had cameras around their necks, and I realized my fiancé had planned the whole thing.
“How did you pull this off?”
“I’m Secret Service, baby boy. I can make anything happen.”
The End.
