“I know,” he told her, mentally holding fast to the word loved. If she had loved him then, she had to love him still. It couldn’t burn out that fast, no matter how angry she was. “I know.”
He pulled her close and kissed her once, twice. It was soft and hard, passionate and tender. That one kiss carried his heart and he nearly sighed in relief when she leaned into him to return that kiss, however hesitantly she did it.
Pulling back, he let his gaze move over her features, as if burning this moment, her expression, into his brain. Finally though, he drew away and said, “I told you I wasn’t ready for you and that’s the honest truth. But I don’t know how I could have been prepared for what you would do to me.”
“Rafe…”
He shook his head and laid his fingertips over her mouth. “No, let me say it. You grew up with your grandmother, your mom. You knew you were loved and you knew how to respond to it. I didn’t. My dad was a lousy role model and I hardly knew my mother. When I got married, it was for all the wrong reasons and when she left, my ex let me know that it was my failings, my inability to love, that ruined everything—”
Katie’s eyes shone brightly as she reached up to smooth her palm across his jaw. “She was wrong.”
“No,” he said, “she wasn’t. Because until I met you, I didn’t know how to love.”
“Oh, Rafe…”
His heart felt light for the first time in days. His soul was warm again because she was near. Rafe knew that this one woman was the center of his world. If he couldn’t convince her to take a chance on him—to love him in spite of all the reasons she shouldn’t—then he’d never have anything worth a damn.
“Look, I’m a bad bet,” Rafe told her, determined to be completely honest with her even if it cost him what he wanted most. “I know that. But I love you, Katie. In my whole life, I’ve never loved anything else.”
Tears glittered in her eyes and his stomach hitched. Happy tears? Or goodbye?
She took a breath, let it slide from her lungs and admitted, “I want to believe you.”
Rafe smiled and pulled her in close to him, where she could feel the hammering of his heart in his chest. Where she would feel the strength of his love wrapping itself around her.
“Take a chance on me, Katie,” he whispered, dipping his head to kiss the curve of her neck. He inhaled the scent of her and smiled as cinnamon and vanilla surrounded him. “I swear you’ll never regret it.”
“Rafe?”
He pulled back to look into her eyes and before she could speak again he said, “Marry me, Katie. Marry me and let me live with you in that great old house. Let me make you happy. I know I can. I’ll prove to you that I can be what you need.”
“Yes, I’ll marry you.” Finally, a slow smile curved her mouth and she reached up with both hands to cup his face between her palms. “Don’t you know that you’re already everything that I need?”
“Thank God,” he whispered and kissed her again, a promise of more to come.
“After all, you did build me a nearly perfect kitchen.”
“Nearly?” he asked with a grin.
“Well, I’ve suddenly decided that since I’m marrying a carpenter, he should be able to build me a pantry.”
“Anything you want, Katie,” he promised with a grin. “But I warn you, as soon as he finds out we’re getting married, my brother Sean’s going to want cookies.”
“For family?” she said, “Anything.”
Rafe dropped his head and rested his forehead against Katie’s, feeling his world, his life slide into place again. The woman he loved was in the circle of his arms, and the future was suddenly looking bright. He was right where he wanted to be. Where he was supposed to be.
With Katie Charles, the cookie queen.
Epilogue
Katie grinned as she looked out the kitchen window at her crowded backyard. “I never dreamed there were so many Kings in California.”
Julie King, married to Travis, laughed as she pulled a bowl of pasta salad from the fridge. “And this isn’t all of them by any means.”
“Wait until your wedding,” Maggie King, wife of Justice warned her. “They’ll all be there for that.”
“Yep,” Jericho’s wife Daisy agreed. “They never miss a wedding. Jeff and Maura will even come in from Ireland for that.”
“It’s a little intimidating,” Katie admitted, unwrapping a platter of cookies designed especially for their engagement party. There were dozens of golden crowns, frosted in yellow or white, with Katie and Rafe inscribed on them.
She glanced down at the emerald engagement ring glittering on her finger and almost hugged herself just to make sure she was awake and not dreaming all of this. But remembering the night before, when Rafe had made love to her for hours and then held her as she slept was enough to convince her that yes. Her life really was perfect.
It had been a month since she’d stormed her way into his office and he laid siege to her heart with the truth. And in that time, she hadn’t once regretted taking a chance on Rafe. He’d shown her in countless little ways just how important she was to him. He’d built her that specially designed pantry just as he’d promised. He sent her flowers, made her dinner and when she was tired, he gave her a fabulous foot rub that inevitably led to long, lovely hours in bed.
“Uh-oh,” Daisy said with a laugh. “I know that smile.”
“What?” Katie grinned, embarrassed to be caught daydreaming.
“It’s the same one I get when I remember how I ended up with a gorgeous baby girl.” Standing up, Daisy smiled. “And speaking of Delilah, think I’ll just go and make sure Jericho’s not teaching her how to do something dangerous. The man’s got a thing about his daughter being the first female Navy SEAL.”
“I know how she feels,” Ivy King said, rubbing a rounded belly. “Tanner already plans on our poor baby being the next computer genius of the universe. But no pressure.”
As Daisy left and the other King wives laughed and chatted about their kids and their husbands, Katie took a minute to enjoy where she was. Her nana had been right all along of course. Which Emily had continued to remind her of over the last month. Love was worth taking a chance on. Because Katie had risked it, she was about to marry the man she loved, become a part of a huge family and, one day, start her own.