Page 109 of Outlier

I gripped the steering wheel too tight, my driving jerky as we turned down the long gravel drive.

When I pulled up outside, there was a large van in front of the house. It was the exact make that I’d looked at last week to buy. As I was frowning at the van, Vicky took the opportunity to fling open the passenger door of my Land Rover and jump down onto the gravel.

“Vicky!” I said as she walked straight up to the front door. “What the hell are you doing? You can’t?—”

I broke off as I watched her unlock the door and push it open, then disappear inside.

“Shit,” I muttered, stalking from the Land Rover to the open door.

When I made it inside the house, Vicky was standing in the middle of the large space, watching me with cautious eyes.

“Baby,” I said, striding over to her as I checked for the likely irate new owners, but there was nobody else there. “I don’t know how you got hold of a key, but you can’t just barge in here. It’s not?—”

When I was right in front of her, Vicky reached out and grabbed my hand, lifting it up, turning it over and then dropping a set of keys into it before she closed my fingers over them.

“I wasverycross with you when I heard you were selling this house,” she said.

I was blinking down at the keys in my hand, frozen to the spot in shock.

“This isyourcabin, Mike. I won’t let anyone else set foot inside the house you built.”

“Our cabin,” I said, looking up from the keys to Vicky’s face.

“What?”

“Our cabin,” I repeated in a firm voice as I tightened my grip around the keys.

“Our cabin,” Vicky whispered, her eyes filling with tears as a tremulous smile formed on her lips.

I dropped the keys and shot forward to sweep her up in my arms. I was not wasting any more time without this woman.

One of her tears fell, but her smile grew as she threw her arms around my neck.

I kissed her once, closed-mouthed, hard and brief, and then I strode over to the staircase. When we made it to the bed, we landed with me on top of her.

Two more tears made their way into the hair at her temples as she smiled up at me.

I kissed one then the other as I brought my hands up to frame her face.

“You bought our house back for us, baby,” I said in a low voice.

She nodded.

“You’re going to live here with me,” I told her, frowning at the thought of her returning to London. “You can commute. I mean, we can stay in your house in London sometimes, but mostly we should?—”

“I’ll live here with you,” Vicky said, and the tension in my body I hadn’t even realised I’d been carrying relaxed.

“You’ll marry me,” I told her.

“Okay,” she said simply.

“You’ll have my babies,” I bossed some more.

“Okay, Mike.” Her voice was soft now as her hand came up to stroke the side of my face.

I let out a relieved sigh. After so long thinking I’d lost her, I was feeling like I needed to lock her down in every way possible.

Oh bollocks, that might not have been the most romantic way to propose.