Page 31 of The Night Ride (SEALs on Wheels #3)

I was at the counter of Sweet Dreams Bakery when Aiden waltzed through the front door.

My jaw dropped.

“How are you here already?” I rounded the counter toward him. It’d been months since I’d seen him. He’d spent the last few months before his retirement overseas.

“I couldn’t wait to see you.” He scooped me up and held me in his arms, his mouth fused with mine.

I sighed into him. The last two years had been nothing short of a miracle. I thought I had loved Aiden before, but it was nothing compared to now. He had a few more lines around his eyes, but I thought they made him look distinguished.

“Is it done?” I asked as he set me on my feet.

“It is.” And in the middle of the bakery with customers milling around, he dropped to one knee. I gasped.

Aiden smiled up at me and said, “You waited for me, and I can’t tell you what it means to me. Marry me, Beth. What do you say, want to promise to love me forever?”

“In a hundred thousand lifetimes and in a hundred thousand ways, my answer will always be yes.”

He slipped a single diamond solitaire onto my finger. Then rose and cupped my nape. “I love you so damn much, Beth. Words can never express how much I love you, woman. And I’m humbled that you said yes.”

“Don’t you get it, Aiden, it’s always been you for me. And you were worth the wait.”

Aiden kissed me in broad daylight, in the middle of my bakery, with thunderous applause around us. He was a hero worth waiting for.

Because Aiden Miller was the love of my life, and I was his.