Chapter 181
My checks go hot. The cab driver is very suspiciously invested in his rearview mirror, but Liam doesn’t care. He never does. When I hesitate, he reaches up and brushes his knuckles across my check like he’s trying to warm me from the inside out.
“You okay, love?”
That’s another thing. He’s clingy. Obnoxiously so. It’s subtle in public
–
a hand at my waist, a thumb brushing mine – but in private, it’s full contact like he’s making up for all the hours he couldn’t touch me. I don’t think he’s let go since the bakery.
I suddenly remember something and bite back a smile. “You should grow out some facial hair.”
He blinks. “What?”
“You’d look good with stubble. Rugged. Dangerous. Less like a golden retriever.”
!
Liam grins, wicked and amused. “You like the golden retriever look.”
“Do I?”
“You do,” he murmurs, leaning in, voice just for me. “But if you want me to rough it up a little, say the word.”
He’s entirely too pleased with himself.
I roll my eyes and nudge his leg with mine. “Just saying. You might look nice with a little scruff. Not everything about you needs to be
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squeaky clean.”
He tilts his head. “Is this your way of saying you want me to grow a beard?”
“No. God, no. You’d look like a lumberjack. Just… experiment. Live dangerously.”
He laughs. Quiet and delighted. Like I’ve given him a compliment and a challenge all in one. His fingers lace with mine, and he brings the back of my hand to his lips.
“Dangerous,” he says again. “Noted.”
“A bit of a scruff would serve you well,” the driver nods in agreement, looking even more pleased by my suggestion than I am. Fans are scary. “You’re lucky to have someone who gives you good advice. All my wife cares about is when next I can pay the bills,” he grumbles a bit and Liam chuckles.
He pinches my cheek softly.
“You won’t be like that when we’re married, right?” he murmurs, lips twitching like he’s trying to be casual but very much knows what he’s doing. “I like you just like this. Actually… I like you however you are.
My brain trips over itself so hard it forgets how to function.
“I’m sorry- what?”
The driver sighs dramatically, completely oblivious to the fact that my heart has just crashed into my kidneys. “Women always change after marriage. Can’t win.”
Liam, the menace, buries his face in my hair. “Would it be weird if I said I can’t wait?”
“}
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Yes. Yes, it would.
My skin is on fire, and the worst part? He’s acting like he didn’t just drop a casual proposal teaser in the back of a cab like it’s normal behaviour. His forehead’s resting against mine, and I swear, if someone glanced into this car, they’d assume we were already married. Or stuck together with industrial glue.
And Liam?
He’s back to pretending to listen to the driver.
His hand finds mine again, brushing over my fingers like he’s not out here destroying me with offhand comments and forehead kisses. I try to shoot him a glare but it’s not very effective when my pulse is doing gymnastics and his hand is warm and steady against mine.
—
Then – like he can feel my panic vibrating off me
he leans in again,
voice barely above a whisper near my ear.
“Don’t worry, love. Not today.”
A beat.
“But you might want to keep that cheek clear. Just in case.”
I’ve only ever imagined what the place Liam calls home would look like.
—
Turns out, it’s a penthouse – of course it is high up in one of those glass–and–steel towers in the better part of New York. The kind of building that has a doorman who calls Liam Mr. Calloway and nods at me with the faintest/smirk, like he knows something I don’t.
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By the time we’re in the elevator, gliding up toward the top floor in complete, unnerving silence, I’m… anxious. Not panic–attack nervous, but weirdly stiff. Like my body just realised I’m about to walk into Liam’s space. His world. The place he eats, sleeps, breathes. The place he probably thought of me.
When Liam notices me fidgeting with the hem of my dress, he snorts softly under his breath. I can already see a teasing remark loading
–
behind his eyes — something cocky and insufferable — but I shoot him a look sharp enough to cut glass.
He sighs instead. “You worry over the oddest things.”
“I’m not worrying,” I lie, adjusting my posture like that might fix something.
“Sure, love,” he says, amused.
“I’m not.”
“Definitely.”
The elevator dings. The doors glide open. And I freeze.
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