Page 12 of A Week To Wed
“Aw, you know what I mean. It’s pretty. And you have…”—he waves gingerly at my upper body—“a chest…I mean…it won’t be too much up top.”
“So you’re saying I have small boobs.”
If a human could turn purple, he just did.
“No!”
“It’s fine. I have tiny boobies,” I say, cupping one in each hand.
He covers his face with both hands in shame. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“I’m not offended. Don’t look away; look all you want. I am your fiancée, after all.”
“Oh, man.”
“Do you regret ordering a lady with a small chest? Do you want me to get a breast augmentation?”
That finally snaps him out of it. His hands come down, and that severe line returns to his full lips. “No,” he says, his voice wavering and raw. “No, ma’am. Don’t you dare do anything to change yourself. You’re perfect exactly as you are.”
For saying something so lovely, he sure sounds a little bit mean.
All I can do is sit here and breathe because the tone, the look, the posture—all of him is sending signals straight to my core. He looks like he could lunge at me across the table.
While neither of us speaks for a minute, I let my gaze drop to his bobbing throat, the broad chest rising and falling in that fitted blue henley. The backs of those strong hands that rest on the tabletop.
Slowly, I move my hands closer and rest them on the table on either side of his—a blatant message that I want him to touch me. Just as slowly, Lincoln drags his fingers one by one over the tops of mine and leaves them there. The weight of them makes me feel alive. Tethered but also giddy.
After a time of hand-holding that feels more like a recharge of batteries than anything else, Lincoln exhales.
“It’s a real pretty dress, and you should have it.”
I beam at him.
“I don’t know why any man wouldn’t move heaven and earth to make you smile like that,” he continues. “I don’t know who Godfrey is, but I do know he’s a damn fool.”
Oh, my. Am I in danger of falling for my groom?
Yes. Yes, I am.
ChapterSix
Lincoln
“Morning or evening?”
I don’t understand her question as we drive west to Bozeman out of Darling Creek early Monday morning.
I glance over, and she’s flipping through that binder again.
“Huh?”
She looks up and smiles. “What time of day do you want the wedding?”
It’s getting tough to tear my gaze away from her ruffly skirt and the curve of her calves in those boots, but I manage to keep my eyes on the road.
“Doesn’t matter, as long as I get married before midnight on Saturday.”
“Is the carriage going to turn into a pumpkin?”
