Page 116 of Hidden Resolution

He didn’t have to elaborate; they’d both discussed it in the weeks since his release from the hospital. Had Shonda not stepped back when she did or had the bullet been right of Billy’s mark, she’d be the one in the morgue. Mason would have lost her forever, a love truer than Melanie’s ever was, and he wouldn’t have recovered.

“I think we need to make a better memory for this kitchen,” she suggested, tugging at his hand.

Shaken from his moody musings, he met her smiling moss-green eyes.

“You don’t say,” he murmured against her lips.

“It’s important to exorcise the ghosts, so to speak. I mean, according to the doctor, you’re fit to resume normal activities in moderation.”

“When has making love been moderate between us?” he asked with a laugh.

“Valid.” She drew her hoodie over her head. “But there’s a first time for everything.”

“Have I ever told you how much I adore your can-do attitude?”

He grinned, and her panties were no more.

EPILOGUE

Mason strolled into their kitchen and, with a flourish, offered Shonda a bouquet of naked rose stems.

She lifted curious eyes from her prize. “Um…”

“For you, my darling Morticia,” he purred against her neck.

“Oh, Gomez, you shouldn’t have!”

“‘Unhappy, darling?’” he asked, parroting the character’s line.

“‘Yes, completely,’” she replied, fluttering her lashes.

“‘Cara mia.’”Lifting her arm, he rained kisses and love bites along her skin from wrist to elbow.

“‘Mon cher!’”She giggled as she swatted at him playfully. “Let go. I need to put these in water.”

He laughed.

In retrospect, her furious snipping of the rose heads amused him. Instead of releasing her, he tossed the bundle of decapitated flowers on the counter, dragged her against him, and cupped her ass.

He nuzzled her neck, smiling at her happy sigh. If anyone had told him one year ago, he’d be in a long-term commitment, he’d have called them a fucking liar. But he was, and he didn’t want to be anywhere else. Ever.

“I love you, Shonda Grant.” The sentiment rolled a little easier off his tongue every time he uttered it.

“And I love you, Mason Sharp.”

“Marry me,” he said, surprising them both. But the rightness wrapped him in a warm cloak. An image of their future formed in his mind, giving him the assurance he needed.

She pulled away to gaze up at him.

Her gorgeous eyes were wider than he’d ever seen them. The uncertainty in them unmistakable.

“Yes, I’m completely serious,” he said, chuckling. “I want you to make an honest man of me. Then you can sniff me any time you want. We’ll put it in our vows.”

Laughing, she punched his chest. “You’re an asshole.”

“So it’s a yes?”

“Yes. A million times, yes.”