At the Crossroads (Buckhorn, Montana #3)(77)

She looked at this handsome cowboy she’d fallen so desperately in love with and felt her heart break a little. “There is something I need to tell you... I’m pregnant.”

He let out a whoop. “I was hoping that was the case. We can start filling these bedrooms.” He grabbed her by the waist and drew her forward to place a kiss on her belly.

“You’re not just asking me to marry you because—”

“Because I love you? Absolutely! Because I want to spend the rest of my life with you? Most definitely. Because I can’t wait to get you into that big bed over there? Oh, you have no idea how much I’ve missed you.”

“Culhane, we can’t. The place isn’t ours yet.”

He laughed. She did so love that sound. “My father’s attorney had the place completely remodeled as per my father’s specifications for us. Then he furnished it—complete with Egyptian cotton sheets and down comforters—not that we can’t change it all, if you want.”

She shook her head in disbelief. That he’d gone to that much trouble for them touched her heart. “I love it,” she said, her voice breaking. “It’s as if he knows us.”

“It does feel that way, doesn’t it?”

“I wish I had gotten to meet him,” she said as she looked around. “Because everything about this place is exactly what I would have chosen.”

He chuckled. “Believe me, I didn’t want to like it. Just out of stubbornness, I tried to find fault with it when Earl Ray showed it to me. But, Alexis, I agree. It’s perfect. Now, back to what I asked you,” he said, reminding her he was still down on one knee. “Do you, Alexis Brand, take me with all my flaws, including my inability to plan anything? Will you marry me and have our babies?”

She met his gaze. The love in those eyes was what sealed the deal. She no longer questioned why he was asking her to marry him. He loved her. She loved him. And they were going to have a baby. Their baby. “You planned this,” she said. “I think there might be hope for you yet. So yes, Culhane Travis, I will marry you and have our babies.”

He reached into his pocket and brought out a small velvet box. Popping it open, she saw the engagement ring nestled there. The house and horse ranch were over the top, but the small pear-shaped diamond was perfect.

She looked up at him and smiled. “How long have you been planning this?”

He laughed. “I kept waiting for the perfect time. I almost blew it. As you can tell by the size of the diamond, I saved for the ring on my deputy salary.”

“I love it all the more because of that,” she said as he slipped it on her finger and rose to his feet. “But this ranch... It’s so much.”

He nodded. “I still haven’t talked to my father’s lawyer, so I have no idea how much my father left me, but apparently this ranch didn’t make a dent in it. I love the property and want to raise horses and make a living doing that. If you’re agreeable, I’d like not to touch the money I was left. Let our kids and grandkids deal with it. If we raise them right, they won’t need it. What do you say?”

She reached for him. “I say I love you.”

He laughed as he took her in his arms and kissed her. The kiss was sweet and tender and held a promise of what was to come—not just today but years from now.

“I wasn’t kidding about that bed,” he said, eyeing it and then raising a brow at her. “Or about this place being ours. What do you say, soon-to-be Mrs. Culhane Travis?”

“Alexis Travis. I like the sound of that. You think that bed is as inviting as it looks?”

“Only one way to find out.” He swept her up in his arms again, and in two long strides, he tossed her onto the bed and jumped in after her.

CULHANE BURIED HIS fingers in her short dark curly hair and pulled her down for a kiss. Her eyes flashed with desire filling all that warm brown in her gaze with firelight. Her lips, bee-stung full, brushed his before his mouth took possession of hers.

Slowly, he pulled back to look at her, still amazed that he’d found this woman, even more amazed that she loved him. He gently touched the soon to be scar at her hairline, then leaned forward and kissed it lovingly. She sighed and snuggled closer. In that moment, everything they’d been through seemed to meld them together in a way that not even lovemaking could.

As he drew back again, their gazes locked, then she cupped his face in her palms and drew him down in a kiss. Her tongue teased at the tip of his, making him ache as his body responded. He couldn’t wait to feel her naked skin against his.

But still he took his time, slowly unbuttoning her blouse one button at a time. Her nipples pebbled as he drew the fabric back to look at breasts covered by only a thin layer of white lace. He thumbed one nipple, making her gape with pleasure before he freed her breasts and feasted on them.

“Culhane.” His name sounded like a plea on her lips as she jerked his shirt open, making the snaps sing. Her warm palms went to his chest.

In a flurry of activity, they discarded the rest of their clothing and pressed their bodies together, both sighing with a kind of release and relief. But the moment didn’t last. Desire had them stroking and kissing and responding to a need that had always been there between them.

Alexis rolled him over onto his back. A moan escaped her lips as she settled down on him, her full breasts pressed to his chest. Desire spiraled down through him. He groaned in pleasure at the familiar feel of her as she adjusted herself to take the heat and hardness of him inside her.