Touch Me Not (Manwhore, #1)(87)
He chuckled. “You still haven’t answered my question yet, Lily Bells.”
“I don’t know if I want to marry an ass or not,” she said, but there was no heat behind the words. She did want to marry him.
“Yes, you do,” he countered, a wicked grin spreading across his face.
“I do, do I?”
“Uh-huh.” He nodded. “Who else is going to put up with your prudish tendencies?”
“I am not a prude!”
He gave her the patented Kincaid stare.
“Well, if I’m a prude, then you’re a manwhore.”
“Did we or did we not agree to never use that word again?”
“As long as you continue to call me a prude, then I’ll call you a manwhore.”
“I love you,” he said, laughing.
“I’ll marry you, Kincaid, on one condition.”
“What?”
“I want your car.”
“Ellie? You want Ellie?” He looked stricken, and Lily nearly laughed out loud.
“Yes.”
He got up and started to pace. “I can buy you any car you want, Lily Bells. Just name it and I’ll have it sitting in the hospital parking lot today.”
“I want your car, Nikoli.”
Nikoli took a deep breath and came over to sit on her bed. He leaned down until all she could see were his eyes. They were warm, and she could see the love in their dark depths. “If it means I get you, then fine, Milaya, you can have my car.”
Her mouth dropped open. He’d give her the car? He loved that car…he loved her. He really loved her if he was willing to hand over the one thing he loved more than anything.
“Well, how about you just let me drive the car once in a while?”
He grinned. “Is that a yes?”
“Don’t you think it’s too soon, though?” she fretted as he leaned back. “We’ve only known each other a couple of months.”
“My father married my mother a week after he met her. Kincaid men waste no time in staking a claim when it matters. I love you, Lily. Not for a week or a month or a year. I will love you when I’m old and gray, when I’m too senile to remember your name, but I’ll still remember that I love you. I don’t need months or years to know I want you to be my wife. You’re all I need, all I’ll ever need. Marry me, Lily. Please.”
“Yes, Kincaid, I’ll marry you.”
He leaned over and placed a butterfly kiss on her lips. “I love you, Lily.”
“I love you too, Nikoli.”
He smiled and kissed her softly once more, but her eyes were drooping shut.
“Sleep, sweetheart, just sleep.”
Epilogue
The Christmas tree was a mess. They were all gathered at Adam’s family home for the holidays, and his mother had left them in charge of decorating it. She, Nikoli, Adam, and the twins were staring at the lopsided tree with both horror and awe. All the ornaments were on, the lights twinkled at them, but it was the Leaning Tower of Pine.
“Maybe we should tie it to the wall?” Luther suggested.
“You put a hole in my mother’s brand new living room, and she’ll shoot you,” Adam said. “Don’t think she won’t either. That woman has a mean streak wider than the Mississippi.”
“That’s the God’s truth,” Lily said. “You remember when we brought snowballs in the house and they melted all over the hardwood?”
Adam shuddered. “Don’t even think about it.”
“It gives it character,” Nikoli said thoughtfully. “Kids, do you like it?”
The twins jumped and down, their shouts of ‘yes’ all that Nikoli needed. “See? They love it. That’s all that matters.”
Lily slipped an arm around him and laughed at his logic. She had no doubt as soon as the parents saw the Christmas tree nightmare, they’d make them redo it. Her mom loved Christmas, and it had to be just perfect. Her mother had swooped in like a hurricane and descended on the Christmas decoration bins like a tornado. Now the quaint farmhouse was decked to the nines and looked like they’d stepped into some kind of holiday showcase home.
“Promise me you’ll never make us live in a place where Santa threw up,” Nikoli whispered in her ear, and she laughed out loud.
“I never make promises I can’t keep,” she teased.
He groaned.
“Duct tape!” Adam shouted, and they both looked up, startled.
“Duct tape?” Nikoli asked, staring at them like they’d lost their minds.
“Duct tape fixes everything,” Lily said, and he looked down at her in amusement.
“Well, it does,” she said defensively.
Adam went running and came back a few minutes later with one of those heavy duty Command hooks and a roll of duct tape. He put the hook on the wall, and then wrapped duct tape around the trunk near where the tree started to lean, and then pulled until it was straight. Luther held it in place while Adam tied off the end of the tape to the hook. Then they maneuvered the tree so you couldn’t see the tape, and Nikoli burst out laughing. It had worked. The tree stood straight, and Adam looked like he was going to strut around the living room.
He looked at Lily, and then Luther, and then his gaze took in Adam and the twins. One thing struck him. If he hadn’t met Lily, he’d be the same old Nikoli, spending Christmas at Luther’s, feeling like he was a third wheel. Instead, he had friends and family to spend the holiday with, and he owed it all to the woman wrapped around him. She’d made him whole and given him back his ability to love someone other than himself. She was his home, and would always be.