Page 53 of Not Yet Yours

“Ok you two, get a room,” Cullen says after a few moments of Harriet and me kissing.

We pull apart and Harriet smiles at me, her cheeks pink, and then she looks down into her lap, embarrassed that she forgot we had an audience. I’m not embarrassed. I don’t care if Cullen and Max saw us kiss. I don’t care if the whole world sees us kiss. As long as Harriet wants to keep kissing me, I will be there to kiss her, no matter where we are and no matter who is there to be made uncomfortable by it.

I turn to Cullen and smile.

“We have a room, just you and Max are in it,” I say.

Max hits me in the arm with a cushion off the couch.

“Don’t even go there,” she says with a laugh and after a second, we’re all laughing.

Max gets up and moves to the armchair I’ve just vacated, and I get off the coffee table and take the seat on the couch beside Harriet. I take her hand in mine, and she squeezes my hand, looks at me, and smiles again.

“Do any of you have any more questions about this before we bury it and vow never to speak of it again?” I say once the laughter has died down.

Max and Cullen both shake their heads and I look at Harriet.

“Actually, I do have a question,” she says.

She’s looking me dead in the eye and she’s still holding my hand, so I don’t think the question is going to be anything too damning.

“What is it?” I ask her.

“You said you never really bothered looking into how to get a divorce because you never saw yourself wanting to get marriedin the future anyway,” she says. She pauses and then she blurts her question out in a rush. “Is that still how you feel about the idea of marriage?”

I shake my head.

“No,” I say. “When I felt that way, I didn’t imagine I would ever meet someone I would fall deeply in love with as I have with you. If I could find a way out of the original marriage, I absolutely would marry you in a heartbeat.”

This seems to appease Harriet and she smiles at me.

“Wait,” Cullen says. “Is that a proposal?”

All eyes are on me, but I only have eyes for Harriet. I try to read her face and I see she isn’t angry at the crappy way this has gone, and I think she will be more happy with what I’m considering to be the worst proposal ever than she will be if I say no, even if it means only waiting for a day or two while I get things put in place to do this right.

“Yes,” I say. “I guess it is.”

Harriet’s smile widens and then I release her hand and get back off the couch and this time, I get down on one knee in front of Harriet. She presses her hand over her mouth trying to hide her shocked delight, but it’s written all over her face despite her hand.

“I don’t have a ring right now,” I say. “And this…” I gesture around me to Cullen’s living room, “this isn’t where I would have chosen to have done this. But here we are. I guess the only thing that matters is that I love you and I want to spend forever with you. Harriet, will you marry me?”

“Yes,” Harriet says in an excited squeal.

She reaches down for me, and I come up to meet her. Our lips find each other as I pull her to her feet and we wrap our arms around each other as we kiss, and this time, Cullen doesn’t tell us to get a room, although I’m sure he is dying to. He knows Max will kill him if he ruins this moment for Harriet.

When we finally do pull our mouths away from each other, I don’t have eyes for anyone or anything other than Harriet. I look into her eyes, and she smiles at me, holding my gaze with her own shining eyes.

“I love you Liam,” Harriet says, and I know how hard it is for her to say those words and that makes them mean so much more to me than I ever thought they would. I pull her against me, and we hold each other for a few more minutes, and then finally, we step apart.

“So now you’ve gone from having a forgotten wife to having a remembered one and a fiancée. Not bad going for one afternoon,” Cullen says.

I wish he hadn’t reminded me about the wife thing once more, but it’s not like I can let myself forget it now anyway. I have to find a way out of this stupid marriage so that I can marry Harriet.

I sit back down on the couch expecting Harriet to sit back down beside me, but for the moment she remains on her feet.

“Any ideas where to start with the divorce?” I ask.

“Never mind the divorce right now,” Harriet says. “Let’s get home and celebrate our engagement first.”