Page 14 of Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend (Catching Feelings #1)

“Thank you!” I take a sip. I put my jacket on an hour ago, but I’m still just cool enough that I shiver when the heat hits my stomach.

With under a minute left, something shifts.

I don’t know if the pace changes or the stakes, but the energy in the rink goes electric. I can see it in the way the players move. It’s faster, harder. More reckless.

The puck bounces off someone’s stick—possibly on purpose, but honestly, I can’t tell—and suddenly it’s loose, skidding across the ice. Sean cuts across the chaos like he already knew it was coming.

And then he takes off.

He catches the puck with a flick of his stick, and I swear, the thing clings to him like it has a crush. The guy in blue closest to him tries to block his path, but Sean glides around him easily.

Another defender comes at him harder, sticks clacking like swords, but Sean spins.

Spins.

Like a ballerina with shoulder pads.

“Wow,” I whisper.

He weaves around a third player, but he doesn’t stop moving. Doesn’t flinch or show mercy. His body is all focus, all drive, like the goal is the only thing that matters.

And then Sean pulls his stick back and fires.

The puck is a blur. A tiny, speeding dot I lose track of until the net snaps taut.

The crowd yells at the same time as the buzzer blares. A couple of his teammates on the bench smack the glass with their sticks, laughing, shouting.

But Sean doesn’t join them.

To look at him, you’d never know he just did something so impressive. He doesn’t grin or fist-pump. He doesn’t skate backwards or showboat.

Instead, he skates straight toward me. When he hitches his thumb, looking right at me, my heart leaps in my chest, lodging somewhere around my throat.

“Well?” Scottie asks, still holding her hot chocolate. “Go over there!”

“Are you sure he’s looking at me?”

Fletch snorts. “He’s not looking at me.”

“Okay.” I put down my drink and tug my sleeves lower on my hands as I walk back over to the break in the plexiglass, where the bench meets the tunnel.

When I get there, I grin and put my hands on the low railing between us. “That was amazing!” I say.

Sean looks as determined and locked-in as he did earlier, when he was storming across the ice toward the goal. He opens his arms for a hug, and it feels more natural than it should when I accept it.

“Remember at the bar when you asked me to go with it?” he says in my ear, still panting from the exertion. With every huff, his breath stirs my hair and the tinyhairs on my cheek and neck. “It’s your turn.”

And then he pulls me from the stands and throws me over his shoulder.

He skates with me as I laugh in disbelief. I know he wanted to get my mind off my troubles, but I didn’t expect him to do victory laps while carrying me like a sack of potatoes.

Except, he doesn’t do a victory lap.

He stops at the center of the ice and carefully sets me down in front of him.

The cold creeps through my shoes and into my feet, but I barely notice.

“Kayla,” he says a bit louder than necessary, but not in a showy way. It’s like he’s trying to make sure I can hear every word.

He holds my hands between us. He’s so tall with his skates on, I feel tiny beside him. His eyes twinkle with something flirtatious. But beyond that twinkle is a feeling of rock-like assurance that I always get with him. A feeling of safety. A sense that I can trust him.

I’m starting to question that sense, though.

Because this is getting weird.

“I know we’ve only been talking about this for a short time, but when you said in the bar the other night that we were engaged, it made me realize it’s high time we made that official.”

And then—before my thoughts can catch up, before I can process what he’s saying, before I can figure out what on earth is happening—he drops to one knee and pulls a ring out from behind his back.

And I gasp.

It’s a round-cut solitaire on a gold band of around two carats. It’s simple and elegant and sparkles like the night sky without feeling flashy or showy. It feels like it was made just for me.

If only it weren’t a year and an entire relationship premature. I thought I knew Sean better than this. I thought he seemed, you know, not insane.

“Sean—”

“I’d say you made me believe in love again, but since knowing you, I’ve realized I didn’t even know what love was. You make me believe in love, period.”

“Is that a hockey reference?” I blurt, because shock evidently makes me hilarious. Sean just laughs.

“Kayla Carville, I want to love you for the rest of my life. I want to give you my heart, not just my zip code. Will you marry me?”

Not just my?—

Zip code.

Relief floods my mind as oxygen fills my lungs. And that pinched feeling of confusion (and worry mixed with flattery) releases.

Go with it, he told me. Just like I told him.

He’s proposing for the zoning ordinance. He’s offering me a lifeline, giving me a way to get around the town’s absurdly antiquated rules so I can keep the team for as long as I want.

And, honestly, maybe he’s doing it to protect himself from Serena, too.

I know what I should do. I should say no. I should pull him aside and thank him for caring so much but tell him I’d rather fight them in court.

I should go the next few days and weeks and months knowing that Aldridge is trying to control my life from behind the scenes, trying to force me back into his arms, all while fighting him above board, proving through sheer grit and savvy and mettle that I can beat him at his own game.

I should keep proving myself to the town, day in and day out, until I win them over, make the right covered dish, wear the right colors, whatever.

But this seems a lot more fun.

I look at our hands, the way his right hand is holding my left hand, his big, strong fingers folding around mine. Yet, even though his hands are bigger than mine, my hand doesn’t feel small in his. It didn’t have to shrink down to the right size.

It just fits .

Sean is staring up at me with those rich, caring eyes, and those eyes … they could make me give in too easily. Could make me want things I shouldn’t.

Should I?

In that moment of looking at him, every anxiety and frustration and fear melts away, and suddenly, it’s just Sean and me. A question and a ring.

“Yes.” I laugh, and a cheer rises up to the rafters. “YES!”