36. Zane

36

ZANE

"I thought you were kidding, Zane!" Mira is standing at the kitchen counter with my laptop open in front of her and her phone wedged between her cheek and her shoulder. She's frantically scribbling things down on a yellow legal pad, but all I can really focus on is the red jersey that falls around the tops of her thighs.

I step behind her and kiss the slope of her neck. "You look good in my name."

"We'll see how good I look when I age three decades in one week!" She swats me away from her neck and goes back to list-making. "We can't get married in a week. Who gets married in a week?!"

"Probably the same people who move in together after a day," Daniel chimes in from the living room.

Mira spins around, her pen pointed at him like a weapon. "Who invited you?"

"You did!"

She frowns. "Oh, right. Then… make yourself useful! Find a florist or… or a place for the ceremony!" Mira gasps and spins towards me. "Where are we going to get married, Zane? Everything is going to be booked up, and we can't do it in a public park or Dante could ruin it. We'd have a Red Wedding on our hands."

"I'll handle music,'" Daniel suggests. "My cousin plays the cello. She's only fourteen, but she's first chair in her school orchestra. Then again, there is no second chair, but…"

Mira whirls towards him with her pen, but I grab her shoulders and spin her into me, if only to save my best friend from another amputation. "We'll get married at our house."

She looks doubtfully around the condo. I know exactly what she's thinking. It's big, but not that big.

"Not here. Our new house."

"What new house?" She must find the answer written on my face because her eyes go wide. She hangs up with whoever she's been on hold with for the last twenty minutes and gapes at me. "You bought a house ? Without telling me?!"

Daniel oohs from the living room like I'm a kid who just got called to the principal's office, but I ignore him and focus on Mira. "Davis has been wanting to sell his house, and I told him to hold off for a couple weeks so I could think."

"His sex pad?" Her top lip curls. "I do not want to live in?—"

"Not his apartment in the city; his house . The one we stayed in." The place where we spent a perfect week cooking and playing and going for walks. It was one of the better weeks of my life. Now, it can last forever. "I texted him last night after you went to sleep and told him we wanted it."

"You bought a house without telling me?" she snaps again, turning her pen on me. "We have been engaged less than twenty-four hours, and you've already made a giant decision without consulting me?"

"Do you want me to call and tell him we don't want it?"

"No, obviously not," she snaps. The messy knot of hair on her head wobbles and a few new pieces fall around her face. "That house was perfect, and I want us both to be buried there. I'm thrilled."

I press my thumb to the edge of her downturned mouth. "You should let your face know."

She tries to hold onto her frown, but it wavers when our eyes meet. She wraps her arms around my middle, her chin resting on my chest. "I'm annoyed that I'm trying to plan a wedding in a week and flailing, but you're somehow making the exact right decisions. How do you always know what to do? Tell me your secrets."

I swear I hear Daniel snort from the living room, but it's going to take a lot more than that to break me out of the bubble we're in. I grab Mira's hand and pull her away from the kitchen counter and into the hallway.

The second we're out of sight of the living room, I press her against the wall. "Do you want to hear my one truth for today?"

She shakes her head. "No, because you're going to say something sweet about how much you love me?—"

"—endlessly—

"—or how you'll like any decision I make for the wedding?—"

"You're agreeing to marry me. Your decision-making skills are obviously impeccable."

She thumps lightly at my chest. "But what I need to hear is how in the hell I'm going to pull off a full wedding ceremony in seven days, Zane. Can't we just elope? There's got to be a non-Elvis-themed chapel somewhere nearby. Or, what the hell? Elvis it is! Let's get married and have the King of Rock and Roll seal our eternal vows himself."

"As good as I'd look in a tuxedo t-shirt, I want to do this right, Mira." I tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. "We're doing it fast because I can't wait ‘til the end of the season. I want to wear an actual tux and I want you to wear a white dress. I want to kiss you in front of Aiden and all of our family and friends so that they know who we are to one another. So that everyone knows how serious I am about making you mine for the rest of our lives."

Her cheeks flush even as she scowls. "Dammit. I knew you were going to say something sweet."

I lean forward, my hand gripping her hip. "I also want to carry you down the aisle and over the threshold so I can rip that white dress off of you and fuck my wife in every room of our new house." We've shifted closer with every word. I can feel Mira's exhale against my lips when I smile. "Or was that too sweet for you?"

She blinks up at me, slightly dazed. "My one truth is that I don't think I care what our ceremony looks like as long as I get the reception you just promised me."

I hook a hand behind her thigh and bring her leg over my hip. I'd be happy to give her a taste of what she has to look forward to right here and now?—

Until there's a knock on the door.

"I'll get it!" Daniel calls.

Mira drops her leg and pulls away from me. "Who is that?"

Before I can answer, the door flies open and the condo is filled with voices.

"Daniel told me Zane bought a ring two weeks ago, and I've been dying !" Taylor shrieks. "I'm no good with secrets."

Neither is my best man, apparently.

"Tay!" Daniel hisses. "I was sworn to secrecy. You weren't supposed to know."

"No one told me," Jemma says, "but Reeves and I are happy for you both, anyway. Aren't we?"

Aside from our friends, only Hollis knows about the proposal. I need to tell Coach— invite Coach , actually. And most of the team, Carson and his goons excluded. Then I'll have to tell the team's PR people so they can draft a statement before the press gets wind of the wedding and rumors start to build.

Mira might be right. A week could be a tight turnaround.

"I don't even see them," Reeves mutters. "Are they here?"

"Yeah, probably feeling each other up somewhere," Daniel sighs. "They've been nauseating to be around all morning."

For the first time all morning, Mira smiles. She buries her laugh against my chest. "What are they all doing here?"

"I called in the cavalry." I tip her chin up and kiss her, long and slow. "I'm going to give you the wedding of your dreams, Mira McNeil."