“Where are you going?”
Cat didn’t pause in what she was doing. She continued packing as she hissed angry words over her shoulder. “I’m leaving so I hope you had plenty of fun using me the way you did.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
Cat turned to glare at him, full of anger, fire, and humiliation. “I know everything, Rory. I know what you know. I also know that my showing up here wasn’t a surprise to you and that you wanted to teach me a lesson for what I did last year. Do you deny it?”
He crossed his hands over his chest and returned her glare. “No, I don’t deny it.”
His words hit her like a blow. “You bastard. I hope you enjoyed getting your pound of flesh.”
“I did. Every gorgeous inch of it. But what I really enjoyed was getting you to admit that you’re in love with me.”
“Why? So you can throw it in my face and use my love to hurt me the same way I hurt you last year?”
“No, I did it so I could be absolutely sure that my feelings for you were reciprocated and that you wanted me back for the right reason.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I heard you that day, Cat. I heard you declare that you needed a man. Not me, but ‘a man.’ Then you proceeded to place me on this damn wish list. I didn’t know whether you were doing so because you realized that you loved me or if you were just in need of a sexual fix.”
Cat raised both eyebrows. “How could you not know that I loved you?”
“And how could I know it? You’ve never told me, and after the way we split, did you actually think I would assume any such thing?” he demanded.
She stared at him for a long moment, and then slowly shook her head. No, after all the things she’d said that night, there was no way he would have assumed that. “So you concocted this plan of revenge?”
“Revenge had nothing to do with this weekend, Cat. After Peyton and I figured what you and Lisa were up to, I decided to see how far you would go. I needed to know the truth before risking my heart to you again.”
“But you claimed you only wanted a no strings attached, no expectations affair between us.”
“Yes, and I said that to see what your reaction would be to my offer. If the only thing on your mind was sex, then you would have gone for it. But if you loved me, and I mean truly loved me, there was no way you would have been satisfied with sharing that kind of relationship with me.”
He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “Last night when you admitted that you loved me, I was prepared to tell you the truth—and I started to, but you stopped me and said we would talk in the morning.”
She remembered. At the time she had wanted him again and hadn’t wanted to spend time talking. Beside, she hadn’t been certain what he had wanted to say. “You could have made me listen.”
“No, I could not.”
She frowned. No, he could not. She had wanted him in a bad way last night, and once she had crawled on top of him, her mind had been on only one thing: riding him.
He took a few steps to stand in front of her. “I love you, Cat. I never stopped loving you. But I had to be sure that you loved me as well. What I told you the day you arrived was the truth. My life has been miserable this past year, but I couldn’t settle back into the type of relationship that we had before. My love for you demanded more, something beyond that. I’d known the moment I laid eyes on you at Peyton and Lisa’s wedding that I wanted a future with you—and that love, marriage, and babies would be part of the deal.”
He reached out and took her hand in his. “I knew about your goals, your dreams, and at no time did I ever want to take them away from you. I only wanted to enhance them. I knew my timing was off that night and that you weren’t ready and that I shouldn’t have tried pushing you into anything. But I never thought you would send me away and end things between us like you did. Your rejection hurt. Surely you can understand my not wanting to rush into a situation for you to hurt me all over again.”
She nodded. She had hurt him, which was something she hadn’t meant to do, but the thought of giving up everything she’d worked for scared her. It had taken her twelve months to realize loving Rory didn’t mean giving up anything, but was all about gaining everything.
“And something else you need to know,” he said, interrupting her thoughts.
“What?”
“There was never a Shari. She was someone I made up to save my pride. I didn’t want you to know that I couldn’t get over you, that I was still pining for you, that I was still so deeply in love with you that some days I couldn’t even think straight.”
She sighed deeply before saying, “And neither could I. I had been so sure that once you saw things my way you would come back. And when you didn’t, it forced me to realize just what I had lost, and just how much you meant to me.”
“Was it so hard to love me?” he asked, his lips curving in a wry smile.
She shook her head. “No, in fact, it was too easy. You’re wonderful, interesting, handsome, a perfect bed partner. I just didn’t think I was ready for what you wanted at the time.”
“And now?”
Her gaze remained steadfast on his when she answered by saying, “Being apart from you made me realize just how much you meant to me, Rory. It’s always good having goals in life, but I had to find out the hard way that that’s not the only thing a person should have in life. There is more to life than accomplishing major achievements, but I have to admit that when I added you to my wish list, I considered getting you to fall back in love with me again as my all-time major goal because my life would be nothing without you in it. And now if you were to ask me to share my life with you, you would definitely get a different answer from the one I gave you before.”
He smiled. “Okay, let’s just see about that.”
With her hand still firmly clasped in his, he got down on a bended knee and looked up at her. Cat blinked when she realized just what he was doing. She watched as he pulled a small white box out of his jacket pocket.
“Cathleen Janelle McAlister, I love you, so very much. Will you make me a very happy man and marry me? Will you be my partner for life, the mother of my children, the joy of my life? Forever?”
Cat couldn’t help the tears that began streaming down her face. “Oh, Rory.”
He smiled up at her, his love shining in his eyes. “Sorry, but this is a yes-or-no question.”
She chuckled through her tears. “Then my answer is definitely yes. I would be honored to marry you.”
After placing the ring on her finger, he stood and pulled her into his arms. “I bought this ring for you eighteen months ago, but even after that night, I refused to believe that you wouldn’t eventually wear it one day. I had refused to give up on you, Cat.”
“But you never came around.”
“No, I was giving you the distance I thought you needed. But things between us were far from over—trust me.”
She smiled at her ring before taking a step forward and moving her hand up the back of his neck. “I do trust you. And I also love you.”
“Say it again.”
She met his intense stare. “I’ll say it as often as you like. I love you, Rory.”
“And I love you, Cat.”
“And I love you double, triple, a thousand times over.”
He swept her off her feet into his arms and quickly headed toward the bed, needing to have her close, as close as two people could get. And together they would get just what they most wanted and needed: extreme satisfaction.