Page 165 of The Crowned Garza

Mirth swimming in those warm brown eyes, she bites her lip, then bounce on her toes and laces her fingers through mine. “Okay, usurper, let’s walk.”

We take unhurried steps down the boulevard, wait at the pedestrian crossing, then cross the street to the ice scream parlor.

There, she gets a mixture of strawberry, rum and raisin, and pistachio ice cream. I tell her to choose for me and she gets me vanilla, cracking up the entire time at her own joke.

“You said you wanted ice cream and you aren’t even touching yours,” she complains after we’ve left the parlor and have been walking for a while. “It’s melting! You have to eat it before it melts.”

Reluctantly, I taste some with the tiny wooden spoon.Disgusting. Really don’t get why people like this stuff. An unsophisticated blob of frozen milk and sugar. “Hmm, delicious.”

Tillie squints at me. Then she throws her head back and laughs. “Oh my God, you’re unbelievable! Iknewyour ass didn’t want no damn ice cream.”

If infinite happiness had a sound, Tillie Garza’s laugh would be it. She laughed with every ounce of her.Fuck, I love her.

“Okay, you got me. This shit is nasty,” I confess. “I just wanted to do something normal with you. Out in the open. So it feels…real.”

Because I’ve wanted you for so fucking long and it feels surreal that you’re all mine now.

“But youaren’tnormal, are you, babe? You aren’t. And that’s one of the reasons why I’m in love with you.” She steps into my path and lifts her palm to my jaw, lightly scratching my low beard. Her fingertips are cold. “Thisisreal, Saint. We’re official. We’re legit. Us over everything. I’ll never stop riding with you. I’ll never not have your back. I’ll never leave your side, no matter how crazy things get. I’m yours. Yourpiccola regina.Always.”

I cover her hand with mine. “There’s nothingpiccolaabout you, Tillie Garza. There never was. You’re loud and grand and fucking beautiful.” I lift her hand away and press a kiss into her palm. “You’reregalità.Una regina. Mia regina.”

“Ask me,” she says hoarsely.

“What?”

“I overheard Eva on the phone the other day,” she says. “Apparently, you’re having an exorbitant custom ring crafted by some famous jeweler in Sicily. She’s no doubt advising you to plan something romantically grand. But, Saint, you know me better than anyone. Better than Sunny. Better than my brothers. Better than I even know myself sometimes. So youmustknow I don’t need any grand romantic gesture or big event. Because none of it’ll have any bearing on my answer. Because Iknowwhat I want. And what I want is forever with you. So ask me. No frills, no glitter, no poetry. Justaskme.”

Well, damn. Leave it to Tillie to hoist the sail before we’ve even left the dock. How could there ever be anyone else for me?

“Mia regina, will you marry me?”

There. No frills or glitter or grandiose words. Just as she asks.

Yet somehow tears instantaneously flood her eyes.

Merda…Should I have added a bit of frill?

Before I can panic, her face splits with a blinding grin, and twin rivulets spill down her cheeks.

“Yes.” Her voice cracks. “Always yes. Forever yes. An infinity yes. Fuckingyes.”

She drops her ice cream right there on the pavement, then leaps at me, forcing me to drop mine just in time to catch her.

Her arms lock around my neck, her legs around my waist, and like a puppy excited to see its owner, she slobbers kisses all over my face. Right there next to an overflowing trashcan in front of a pet store.

And I laugh and laugh through her kisses, holding on to her for dear life. Because I wouldn’t have it any other way.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

“Buongiorno.”

Tillie

Eighteen months later

FROM THE LARGE WRAPAROUNDbalcony of a luxury villa perched on a hilly private island in the North Atlantic Ocean, I sip my too-sweet coffee and gaze out at the azure blue sea, the glare of the late-morning sun bouncing off its rippling waves.

With an audible sigh of bone-deep felicity, I let the fresh ocean breeze fill my lungs. It’s a perfectly beautiful day. In fact, every day for the last ten days here has been perfectly beautiful.