“She probably doesn’t even love me anymore. I would be dumb to assume she would marry me.”

“You’d be dumb to assume she wouldn’t. She obviously loves you. Girls like her don’t sleep around for the hell of it. You forget that we’ve been drunk a lot together, and I know yours and her story.”

He did know. He knew everything, the cancer, the whirlwind romance, and the soul-deep connection. Lacey was—is—his everything. Looking past JT to the Tiffany’s, he let out another breath.

Maybe he was right.

Or maybe he was a complete idiot.

Karson wasn’t sure, but for some crazy reason, his feet started moving and he brushed past JT, heading straight for the jewelry story that possibly held the ring he’d give to Lacey.

When he heard the footsteps behind him, he found JT running to catch up. Smiling at him, he said, “I get to pick it out.”

Karson rolled his eyes. “I’m not getting anything. Just checking things out.”

“Sure you are, but really, I get to pick it.”

“Fuck off, Thomas, you aren’t picking anything.”

JT laughed. “No, I am, and when you give it to her, make sure you let her know that your firstborn will be named Jordie.”

“You are fucking unbelievable,” Karson groaned as he pulled open the door to Tiffany’s.

JT’s laughter followed Karson in before he said, “What’s unbelievable is the fact that I convinced you to get a ring for a girl you haven’t seen in almost ten years!”

Yup, Jordie Thomas was an asshole.

And Karson might be an idiot for listening to him, but he couldn’t help but feel like his best friend was right. Now all he could do was hope and pray that Lacey would be on board.

In her trusty Martin, number twenty-one jersey, Lacey bit the inside of her cheek as she headed out the side door to the elevator that took her to the box where her father and Rachel and the boys would be. Her heart was pounding in her chest. She knew as soon as she got up there, everyone would know that something was up, and that made her body quiver with nerves. She really didn’t know what she was doing here because if her dad found out that something was going on with Karson, he would flip his lid. He had made it known through the years when she would bring him up or if he came up in conversation that he would die before he would let Karson King near his baby girl again.

Well, sorry, Daddy, but I’m in deep with whom you consider to be the devil.

And she didn’t feel the least bit wrong for it. She did, however, spend the whole day in knots about coming not only to the arena but going out for drinks afterward. She was nervous. She wasn’t sure what was going to happen. What he was going to say. What she was going to say. But she knew she had to go. Needed to go. After cleaning herself up and then being mad at herself for doubting him, she’d decided to take a trip down memory lane. She wasn’t sure why she did that, but for some reason, she felt the undying need to.

Getting out the red and black box she had decorated with pictures of them, she sat in the middle of her bed and looked at each picture, every single letter, email, and everything that had anything to do with their relationship. It was like she relived their relationship all over again through all the documentation she had. When she got to the bottom of the box that held the shirt she went home in after they had sex for the first and only time, her body caught on fire with the memory of that moment. She still remembered it like it was only yesterday.

“Karson,” Lacey whispered. He looked down to see her and smiled.

“Yeah?”

“If you asked me to go with you when you leave, I’d go without hesitation.”

She could see that that surprised him. “Really?”

She nodded. “I don’t want to be apart from you, and I can go to school wherever you get picked up. I’ll take out loans and get a job. It will work as long as we have each other, right?”

“Yeah, it will.”

With a grin, she said, “Good, ’cause I think so, too.”

As she cuddled into him, Karson wrapped his arms a little tighter around her, placing sweet kisses against her chest and then her neck before looking up into her eyes. “Hey, Lacey?”

“Yeah?” she whispered against his lips.

“Will you go with me wherever I go?”

She didn’t even hesitate; looking into the eyes she loved more than anything, she said, “Yes.”

“Good, baby,” he said against her lips, kissing her over and over again. She felt immersed in his love but yet scared for their future. It might be hard; it could go all wrong, but she couldn’t help but feel it would be all worth it as long as it was with him.

Kissing her chest, he ran his finger down the center on it, right down the spot that would be a valley if she had breasts. When he looked up at her, all she saw was love, and it left her breathless as he said, “As much as I want to sit here and just memorize your gorgeous body, I need you to get dressed before Grady gets back.”

She smiled as she agreed. He was right, and if Grady did find them like this, he would lose his shit. Getting out of the bed, she helped him get dressed and then he did the same to her, but instead of reaching for her shirt, he reached for his Chicago Cats tee that had his number on the back. Sliding it over her body, he smiled when he met her gaze.

“I love seeing my number on you.”

She cuddled into the large shirt before cuddling into his chest. “I love you so much.”