I could still smell her on my fingers.

Fuck, that was hot, wasn’t it? I don’t know what came over me. Each hour that passed without someone pointing me out, without a photographer angling for a shot, without the subtle but powerful need to keep my guard up, I felt just a bit unleashed. A bit more reckless. And with each hour that passed with Lydia adorably and enthusiastically dragging me around Brooklyn and Manhattan, proudly showing me her stomping grounds, I felt a growing urge to bring her to heel, to show her that any other little prick that took her out before me was a goddamn imbecile, and never again in her life would she feel anything less than completely taken care of.

So by early evening, when I saw her sitting on that museum bench, mesmerized, open, ready for me, I couldn’t fucking help myself.

I understood why she hadn’t wanted to pay the admission fee for the museum, but I felt the place deserved something. Not just for giving me a memory I was going to be having a wank to for the rest of my life, but for making Lydia’s life better for all those years before I came into it. For being a place she could afford to go, that had given texture to her life. While she’d used the loo before leaving, I texted Thomas and had him make a generous donation. If it had been up to me, it would have been used to designate that entire impressionist wing for our private use.

I’d wanted to get her back to her apartment after that—I was hard as a rock and wanted her under me, and soon. But the girl had her heart set on an outdoor movie. So there we sat. Or I sat. In Brooklyn Bridge Park. On a blanket I’d bought at a shop in Dumbo an hour before. The sun had set, the air was cool but not cold. The bridge lit up in front of the perfect view of Manhattan, and Lady Liberty stood regally to the south. On the mammoth screen in front of us played Singin’ in the Rain. Now clad in a sweater and jeans she’d had stashed in that bag of hers, with her gorgeous head in my lap, the girl I was going to marry lay laughing at the slapstick comedy.

She was so beautiful.

The day had been perfect. She’d been perfect. I respected her wanting me to understand that her life was rich, even if she hadn’t had money before me. I loved seeing how her passion had made her world expansive and lush. Even if part of me had wanted to punch the coffee chap for knowing her, for caring about her, I was mostly grateful to him for looking out for her. Fuck grateful, I was in awe. My girl was loved, and not just by me. I’d never met anyone like her—who cultivated love the way she did? Who drew people in like that? Her world was incredible, and money had nothing to do with it.

She laughed again and looked up to see if I was laughing too, or maybe because she wondered why I wasn’t. I stroked the soft skin of her cheek, and fuck me if it didn’t feel like satin under my thumb. What the ever-loving fuck had I been thinking not putting that ring on her finger the second she’d asked me to. I was some kind of first-rate arsehole, apparently.

I looked at the screen and smiled for her behalf, but I really just wanted to stare at her like some kind of pathetic git.

When Donald O’Connor did his “Make ’Em Laugh” routine on the screen, Lydia was laughing so hard she was shaking in my lap, which inconveniently made my dick hard. I had to get fucking a grip. I pulled her up to sitting across my legs, which were stretched out before me. She settled in, still staring at the screen, and grabbed some of the gummy bears from the bag she’d bought at the grocery store before coming into the park. She’d also snuck in a bottle of cheap wine. It should have been horrible, but coming from her I enjoyed it. Every sip.

Grocery store candy, cheap wine, and free movies in the park. Where had this been my whole life? We were surrounded by people who felt free. Who’d come out to watch film stars from another era dance on-screen. It was part of the reason I’d become an architect—to bring people together in spaces the way we were at that moment. And it was Lydia who had dragged me in, showed me. I was the goddamn 17th Duke of Abingdon, and it had taken this wee lass from Brooklyn to make my life worth a cent.

I took the candies from her hand, and she stared at me, wondering what I was up to. I plucked one plump gummy bear from the bag and fed it to her. She rolled her eyes for good measure, making sure I knew she thought I was being ridiculous, but then she indulged me, happily, greedily, plucked it from my fingers with her lips, and I fed her another. After another, she leaned in and kissed me.

“I love you,” she whispered into my ear. How did she do that? How did she know exactly when to say those words? Words my own family hadn’t uttered to me once in my life. She kissed me again and looked back to the screen.

This was it. This is what I wanted for my life. This fearless girl who made the world fall in love with her, who brought me out of Humboldt Park and into a world that made joy seem like an everyday occurrence. This woman who made me want to crawl out of my skin with desire and who crawled into me in a way that fucking terrified me.

“Marry me,” I said before fully realizing what I was saying.

“What?” she asked, laughing at what was on the screen, throwing me a quick glance.

“Marry me,” I said again, louder. I felt more certain of what I was doing. More certain than I had about anything.

“I already said yes, silly,” she said, looking at me intently, starting to see what I meant.

“Tomorrow. Now. Marry me, now. I don’t want to wait anymore. I want you to be my wife.” I spun her around so she was straddling me. We were surrounded by people. Families. Couples. Friends. Everyone laughing. Everyone absorbed in the screen in front of them. But I couldn’t hear or see any of it. Only her.

She stared at me, looked hard to see if I was serious. I was serious.

“Tomorrow?” She looked at me, searching.

“Tomorrow.”

“Okay,” she said, and the corners of her mouth slowly started to perk up.

“Okay?”

She nodded and bit her lip in that way that made me want to take her to bed immediately.

I wrapped my hands around her perfect face and kissed her. I slid my tongue between those generous pink lips, and she welcomed me. I threaded my hands through her hair, and she relaxed into me, leaned in, so we fell towards each other. She offered herself completely, joined me in not giving one shite about the people around us. This wasn’t dominance or bossiness. It wasn’t coyness or shyness from her. It wasn’t playful. No banter. It was just us, and not a thread of anything else. “Tomorrow. You’ll be my wife tomorrow.”

To any one of those moviegoers, we must have looked like any other normal couple in the throes of early love…Actually, I had no idea what we looked like, and I didn’t care. All I cared about was her.

“Can I take you home now, sweet girl?”

Lydia snuggled into my side in the town car. I’d texted the driver our location when we’d arrived at the park. He was there in a moment, and I was grateful Lydia allowed me to take her home in privacy.

“How do we get married? Can we even get married tomorrow? Is that even legal?” she asked, keeping her head against my shoulder. She looked relaxed, but I could feel her wheels turning. The wee thing was constantly in director mode, trying to iron out kinks before they existed.

“I honestly don’t know. I’ll have my lawyer look into it,” I said and reached for my phone with my free hand to shoot him a text. My other hand was wrapped around Lydia’s thin middle and holding her hand. I found myself twiddling her engagement ring between my thumb and forefinger, silently loving the symbol of my possession like some kind of caveman.

My phone rang within a minute of having sent the text, and I reluctantly answered. I didn’t want to talk to anyone, but this phone call with my lawyer was going to have to happen at some point, and the sooner we spoke, the sooner he’d have the details for me about getting married. It was after two in the morning in London, but I guess that’s why I paid him what I did.

“Evening, Trevor.” I braced myself for the onslaught of questions from my friend, who also happened to be my lawyer, and sure enough they came flying at me, beginning with “Are you sure you know what the bloody hell you’re doing?” and “What are you? A lad with your first hard-on?” If the questions from my foulmouthed lawyer hadn’t been peppered with actual law-related questions including requests for Lydia’s full name, social security number, her parents’ names, city of birth, and what county we were in, he’d have seen a different side of me.

“You’re an absolute nob, you know that, don’t you? Just get me the bleeding information, so I can get married tomorrow. We’ll fly to Vegas if need be.” He laughed into the phone, uttered a profanity or two, and I hung up on him. I knew I could count on him to deliver.

“So? Is your lawyer going to help you find some excuse to get out of this cockamamie plan of yours?” Lydia smiled at me as we pulled up in front of her apartment, but I could tell there was some part of her that was worried I’d been impulsive, some part of her that still didn’t believe that I intended to make her my wife as soon as fucking possible. Fair enough, we were fresh on the heels of an epic row and hadn’t been speaking to each other because I’d refused to announce our engagement—the girl had a right to be skeptical.

I’d have to fix that.

I flung the car door shut and pulled her close to me, taking her under my arm as I took her keys with my free hand. I kissed the top of her head and pulled her through the door as efficiently as I could. When we were safely inside the building, and she was thoroughly confused, I lifted my darling girl over my shoulder. Her sweet laughter filled the hallway as I carried her up the stairs.

“Dylan!” she shouted, and she tried to hit my ass but couldn’t quite get the angle. Didn’t matter. I could. The sound of my palm meeting her rear echoed through the stairwell.

“Quiet, you cheeky thing. You think I mean to start my marriage off with my wife questioning my every decision?” I spanked her ass again as I rounded the stairs onto her floor, and I found myself laughing with her as I put her down. The idea of Lydia ever being a submissive little stay-at-home-wife was laughable, to both of us. She was ambitious as all hell, and I loved that about her. I mean, fuck, she could do as she pleased. I hoped she knew that. If not I’d make it very clear—my only concern was her happiness, whether she was CEO of her own company or did yoga all day, I couldn’t give a fuck.

“Intend to make me your sex slave, do you? As soon as I sign on the dotted line?” Her words reminded me of our first real fight, when she’d called herself my fuck buddy, and I’d flown off the handle, hating that she thought of herself in such crude terms when she meant so much more. I knew now that even then she’d probably known I loved her. Somewhere, somehow, she knew. Even before I did.

“My wife, the comedian.” I kissed her nose as I backed her against the closed apartment door. “Let’s get a few things straight, shall we?”

She looked up at me in that way she did whenever I took charge—ready, willing, but with fire right there at the ready to put me in my place if I stepped too far. I took her hands in my own and raised them above her head, effectively pinning her in place.

“First, I’m marrying you tomorrow. I’ve never wanted anything more. So no more doubting it.”

God, she looked so petite standing beneath my frame, with my forearm on the door above her head. She nodded.

“Good. Brings me to the second item. You must tell me if this isn’t what you want, damsel. Will you regret not getting married with a big white wedding and all that?”

She shook her head. “Couldn’t care less.”

“Are you sure?” She nodded vigorously, and I kissed her again.

“I’ll give you whatever party you want when we get back to England. Or here. Fuck, I don’t care. But tomorrow is for you and me.”

She nodded again, her eyes never leaving mine.

“And third, you will never call yourself my sex slave, my fuck buddy, or any other demeaning ridiculous pile of horse shite again—got it, my sweet girl?” I stroked her cheek with the back of my hand, and let it drift down the front of her chest and up the inside of her sweater. “Because tomorrow, Lydia, you will be my wife.” She nodded slowly, her eyes never leaving mine. “You’ll also be a duchess.”