Page 37 of Our Moon (JACT #1)

“Is that the last of it?” Ally asks as I walk into the apartment with two more boxes.

“That’s it,” I tell her, setting them down in the living room. I look around her, actually, our , apartment and smile when I see she has begun to unpack some of my things. Seeing my things mixed with hers is a little unreal. This moment has been years in the making.

“What’s got you smiling over there?” She tilts her head and smiles as she looks at me.

“This, all of this. I just can’t believe how far we’ve come.”

“I can,” she says confidently. “I knew when I was seventeen that I was going to be with you for the rest of my life.” I smile at her confidence. I was that confident once, too. Then the accident happened and the love of my life was lost to me for four years. “Did you ever doubt it?”

I can’t lie to her, not again. Never again. “There were times over the past few years when I wasn’t sure what was going to happen.”

She pauses her unpacking and steps around the kitchen table to me. Resting her hand on my cheek she says, “I’m so sorry I ever made you doubt us.”

I shake my head. “No, baby girl. You have nothing to apologize for. Neither of us could help what happened. What matters is that we’re together now. That you found your way back to me.” I lean forward and kiss her forehead.

“I love you so much, Chase Baker.”

“I love you so much, future Mrs. Baker the baker. ”

She laughs and pats my chest. “Funny.” She returns to the kitchen and finishes unpacking my minimal kitchen supplies.

What she doesn’t know, is that I plan to make her Mrs. Baker the baker sooner rather than later.

Her ring has been burning a hole in my pocket for six months now.

Yes, the moment she came back to me, I bought the ring.

I haven’t decided how I’m going to ask her yet, but I will make it epic.

Her brothers would kick my ass if I didn’t give Ally the very best.

Things were different, to say the least, after she regained her memory.

She and I were as good as we were before the accident, but her brothers found the situation so incredibly awkward.

I couldn’t exactly blame them. I’m sure some part of them was holding out hope that I hallucinated the depth of our relationship or our relationship entirely.

But when she all but confirmed it at the restaurant after her memory came back, they couldn’t hide in denial any longer.

It might have been easier if they had been eased into the whole thing, but to Ally, she loved me the same as she did the night of her high school graduation.

Much to her brothers’ chagrin, she wasn’t about to hold back.

While she was diving in head first, I was trying to ease into things.

I loved her more and more with each passing day, but I wanted to make sure her new life meshed with her old life.

I wanted to make sure her current feelings were equivalent to her recalled feelings.

I didn’t want to pressure her, even though I couldn’t imagine life without her.

She never wavered in her love for me though.

And eventually her brothers stopped acting weird and accepted it for what it was.

She started asking me to move in almost immediately after her memories returned, but for the aforementioned reasons, I declined.

Of course, I ended up spending more nights at her apartment than not, but that’s where I drew the line.

We still hadn’t slept together. Yes, I’m now a twenty-six year old virgin.

But if it means being with the only girl I’ve ever loved with my whole heart, then Ally is worth all the sexual frustration in the world.

“Babe!” I jump at her shout. She’s back in the kitchen unpacking the box and I’m still standing in the living room, doing nothing. “Where’d you go?”

“Just thinking about how far we’ve come, baby girl.”

She smiles. “We have come a long way, baby.”

***

One week later.

I decide I’m going to propose to Ally tonight. I spoke with Trevor and Alex earlier today at the studio, and they gave me their blessing, after giving me some grief. I pick up some champagne and roses on my way home.

“Baby girl, where are you?” I ask after I set the vase on the kitchen table and put the champagne in the fridge.

“In here.” Her voice is coming from the bedroom. I walk down the short hallway and open the bedroom door. What the fuck? There are candles lit on nearly every surface of the bedroom, and rose petals on the floor and bed. Why did I not think of this? She better not be proposing to me!

“Ally?” I don’t see her in the bedroom, but her voice came from here. Just then, the closet door slowly opens and my jaw drops. Ally is leaning on the doorframe, wearing nothing but a sexy, red lace nightie. I gulp. “Baby girl?”

“Hey, handsome,” she smiles, obviously pleased by the fact that she’s completely struck me stupid. She struts over to me, and I can’t take my eyes off her perfect body with its perfect curves in all the right perfect places. She’s just perfect. “What’s the matter? Cat got your tongue?”

“You look beautiful,” I say, and my voice comes out hoarse. She giggles in response.

“Can’t say that I don’t love that I have this effect on you,” she smirks.

“What’s going on?” I ask, running my eyes up and down her body, fisting my hands by my side to resist reaching out and touching her everywhere.

She leans towards me, pressing her upper body against my chest. “I’m ready, Chase,” she whispers seductively in my ear.

“Ready?”

She nods. “For you to make love to me.”

I gulp again, “Make love to you?”

She nods again. “I want you to take me, Chase.”

Holy shit .

Before Ally and I got together years ago, I’d fooled around with some girls. Mostly over the clothes stuff, never anything serious. But damn if I don’t feel like a twelve year old boy looking at his first Playboy magazine. I don’t know whether to jump for joy or cry.

“Chase?”

“Hmm?”

“What do you think?”

“Think?”

“Are you going to keep repeating everything I say?” She laughs, and I snap out of it.

“Sorry, baby girl. You’ve caught me completely off guard. You’re so damn beautiful. Perfect. You’re perfect, too. ”

She smiles sweetly, “Thanks, baby.”

“I would like nothing more than to make love to you,” I say as I place my hands on her hips and pull her lower half against me, too. She smiles as she looks up at me and I can’t help but kiss her. She tastes so sweet. I pull back, “but there’s something I need to do first.”

She looks at me in question, then her eyes widen in surprise as I get down on one knee. “Chase?”

“Allyson Monroe, I know we only fell in love a few years ago, and we’ve spent quite a bit of time since then apart, but I feel like I’ve loved you my whole life.

Those years you were lost to me, I never gave up hope that one day we’d be together again, that you’d find your way back to me.

And you did. Twice. I love you more than life itself, and I want to spend the rest of my life with you.

I asked your brothers permission, they said yes.

” She smiles through the tears in her eyes.

“But there’s something else I need to tell you, too,” I continue.

“At your high school graduation, your mom,” I pause to control my emotions.

It’s still hard thinking about Mr. and Mrs. Monroe.

“Your mom told me that she and your dad knew about us.” Ally’s eyes widen in surprise.

“She said that they wanted you to be happy, and they could tell that I made you happy.” The tears she had been trying to contain spill over and she kneels down in front of me, wrapping her arms around me.

I can feel her body shaking with her tears, and I hold her and rub her back for a moment.

When she stops crying, I pull back and look into her eyes.

“She said she knew I’d take good care of you, so I feel like they would have given this their blessing, too.

” She smiles a watery smile and nods. I reach into my pocket and pull out the ring.

It’s different, a perfectly round pearl set in a ring of diamonds.

I picked this one out because the moment I saw it, it reminded me of the moon.

Of our moon. “Allyson Marie Monroe, will you marry me?”

More tears spill as she nods enthusiastically. “Yes. Yes!”

I push the ring onto her left ring finger and pull her in for a kiss. “I love you, baby girl.”

“I love you, too, Chase. So much.”

“Now, no more tears,” I say as I wipe her eyes. “I want to make love to my fiancée, and it would be a real hit to my ego if she’s crying when it happens.” She smiles and blushes, her earlier braveness obviously having dissipated some. “We don’t have to,” I say quickly.

“No,” she shakes her head. “I want to. I’m more than ready for this. I love you so much, Chase. ”

“I love you, baby girl.” I stand from the floor, lift her up in my arms, and carry her to the bed.

Best night of my life.

THE END.

Keep reading for a sneak peek of Trevor’s story,

Hearts in the Sand,

book two in the JACT series!