More disbelieving tears from my sister. “That is…so. Freaking. Cool,” she finally blurts.
Sawyer’s lips twist. “So what the hell does that mean?”
“What do you mean, what does it mean?” she counters.
“Oh, Spitfire.” He lets his head plummet. “Baby, can’t you just say yes?” Then swallows hard and mumbles, “Or…no.”
Fortunately, Lydia’s ready with a chiding chuckle. “Impossible to answer a question I haven’t been asked, buddy.”
I shoulder-bump Dad, mirroring his good-natured glance. Poor Sawyer, falling in love with a Crist sister. ’Dia’s not going to spare him an inch of leeway—though if I know Mr. Foley well enough, he’ll give back as good as he gets.
Sure enough, in the very next second, the guy locks his free arm around the backs of my sister’s knees and then yanks hard, destroying her balance. Lydia lets out a little shriek while toppling down—into the cradle of Sawyer’s sizable arms.
Before she can scream again, he douses her in a long, wet kiss.
Then the heat of his adoring stare.
Then the sigh-worthiness of his rough, reverent words.
“Lydia Harlow Crist, I’ve been in love with you since the moment I first met you,” he confesses. “It was a night you were meant to be celebrating, but instead you were kidnapped and trapped in a cargo net for hours…”
Despite the tears flowing from her eyes, Lydia rolls them. “And I looked hideous.”
“You were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.” Sawyer strokes a firm thumb across her cheek. “So full of courage and fire, even after what Faline had put you through…I’d never seen anyone with that kind of strength before. That kind of light.” He pulls in another breath, the air shaking with his emotion. “I was already addicted to you, and I’d barely had a chance to speak to you. And as soon as that happened, I just got downright terrified.”
“Terrified?” Lydia jerks up, her spine straightening and her brow crunching. “Huh? Of me?”
“Only of what I felt for you,” Sawyer clarifies. “Of what I was certain you could never possibly feel in return.”
I swipe heavy drops off my cheeks as my sister pulls the guy in for another mushy lip lock. Though Dad squirms a little, I’m nothing but a blubbery wet mess full of female understanding. Yeah, these Team Bolt guys are impossible to resist.
At last, she pulls up far enough to whisper, “It was never possible for me to stay away from you, mister. I’ve been just as consumed with the very idea of you. The perfect magic of you. Hell, a man who finally knew what to do with me.”
Sawyer bursts with a gruff laugh. “All I’ve done is love you, sweetheart.” At once, his features intensify. He focuses on my sister like he’s holy fire readying to carve into some stone tablets. “All I ever long to do is love you.”
’Dia presses a soft kiss to his lips. “As I love you, big guy.”
He tightens his hold, compelling her face a few inches closer to his. “So that shit’s already sticking,” he murmurs. “Now let’s just make sure the rest of the world knows it.” He consumes the side of her face with his broad palm and long fingers. “Marry me, Spitfire. Let’s do this for real now.”
In typical Lydia fashion, my sister strings out her teasing silence. Nothing mars the air except my utterly messy sob. I’m not sorry, either. I’m too damn happy, already knowing what she’s going to say.
“That wasn’t really a question, Sawyer Howard.”
All right, so it wasn’t exactly that.
“You going to marry me or what, Lydia Harlow?”
I ding a finger into the air. “That’s officially a question.”
While jabbing a middle finger up at me, she lowers a tender kiss in at her grinning, gorgeous guy.
Before finally saying, “Yes.” And then rasping, “Yes, I will marry you, magnificent god.”
As Dad and I erupt into wild, rapid applause, Sawyer tunnels his hand back into ’Dia’s hair, forcing her to accept the deep, burning delve of his groaning, rolling kiss. When they’re still at it more than a couple of minutes later, I finally intercept with a tormented groan. “All right, you two need to get a damn room.”
Dad grimaces. “How about a ring first?”
“You mean like this one?” Sawyer’s the picture of cocky confidence while reaching behind the lamp on a side table, where he’s hidden a distinctive blue suede ring box. At the same time, he offsets the weight between he and Lydia so my sister is standing again. With the box poised between both his hands and his gallant Prince Charming kneel, our secret agent surfer man isn’t just taking ’Dia’s breath away now. I get a second to flash him with a firm thumbs-up before he sweeps his attention completely back on my bawling sibling. “Come on, Spitfire,” he growls quietly, nodding at her left hand. “Let me see it.”