All in the shades of the sappiest love of all.
In obvious confusion, Natasha looked at him. “What’s going on?”
“Just hang on.” Damon squeezed her hand. “We practiced this part earlier today, but they
are
little kids, after all.”
Then, “Happy Valentine’s Day!” the children screamed.
They filled the room from wall to wall, gleeful third graders madly waving posters. Someone—possibly the romantic-minded teacher—turned on an upbeat love song. In the center of the room, Milo proudly yanked a string, releasing dozens of red and pink heart-shaped balloons. On both sides of the doorway, two little girls flung out Valentine’s Day confetti, literally showering Damon and Natasha with it.
Openmouthed, Natasha touched the confetti in her hair.
“Come see mine next!” With his heart pounding, Damon pulled her to the marker board. He stepped back, then waved. “Ta-da!”
Natasha’s brow furrowed. “Spelling words for next week?”
“What?” Terror-stricken, Damon did a double take at the board. Through hazy vision, he saw ... “It’s supposed to be—”
“Gotcha.” Natasha grinned. “Payback for that ‘are we going steady?’ remark a while ago.” Then she took a closer look at the image that had been drawn on the board. “Are these two puppies in love? I see hearts shooting everywhere. But those two snuggled-up creatures in the middle are all wobbly.”
“They’re
us
!” Really panicking now, Damon swept his arm toward the marker picture he’d drawn. “They’re
us
, in love! It took me two hours to draw that. I had to start over and over—” Desperately, Damon rushed to the adjacent marker board, almost bulldozing Jason the Otter in the process. He apologized, then kept going. “Look! There’s one over here, too. It’s a little better.” He pointed. “There’s you, and me, and Milo, and Finn—”
“
I’m
carrying a Dr. Seuss book!” Milo pointed out gleefully from across the room. “There’s still a lot of them you haven’t read to me yet, Damon. Like
If I Ran the Zoo
. It’s kind of like
If I Ran the Circus
, only with a zoo. It’s really good. Maybe it can be the next one you read to me?”
Where everything else had failed, Milo’s comment seemed to make Natasha take this seriously. She gazed around the room at all the eager, poster-holding children, at all the balloons, at all the confetti and construction-paper hearts ... and smiled.
“You arranged all this for me?” Natasha asked.
“Well, most of it,” Damon told her honestly. “The party was happening anyway. I just hijacked a part of it.” He handed Natasha a hand-scissored, hand-colored, hand-glued valentine. “There’s a lot of glitter there,” he said. “The construction paper looks cheap. The tacky plastic white doily behind it isn’t aesthetically correct. But it’s the best I can do, so—”
Natasha lifted her gaze. “It’s eclectic. I love it.”
Damon couldn’t help laughing. Maybe he was becoming hysterical. “Did you just say ... never mind. Screw your demands.”
The teacher gasped. “Mr. Torrance! Language, please.”
“Sorry,” he told her. Then he took Natasha’s hand—the hand that wasn’t holding his woebegone excuse for a
non
verbal love declaration—and stared straight into her eyes. “I love you, Natasha. You’re just going to have to get used to hearing me say it. I love you in the morning, when you’re all crabby and groggy. I love you during the day, when you won’t stop talking and planning and running around. I love you at night, when—”
Here, Damon broke off. He gave the wide-eyed kids and their eavesdropping teacher a cautious look. Then he looked at Jason. “This might be a good time for the candy-bar tasting, Mr. Otter.”
Mr. Otter saluted. Then he all but skipped to the other room to fetch the already prepared chocolate samples they’d brought. With that settled—and the children all clamoring in his wake to be the first to try the goodies—Damon turned to Natasha again. With a lump in his throat the size of Wisconsin, he hauled in a deep breath. He gazed into her eyes. He smiled.
“I love you with all my heart, Natasha. I’ve been waiting so long for you. All I ever wanted was to be loved—to know what it’s like to have someone waiting for me, someone caring for me, someone needing me ... and
you’ve
been that for me, all along. I don’t know how I’ve gotten by without you these past few days, because once you kissed me, I couldn’t think about anything else. There’s only you. Just
you
. You make me want to try harder and be better and give you more and more—”
“All I need is you!” Natasha insisted, and she looked just as beautiful and generous and necessary then as she always did to him. “All I’ve ever needed is you, with me.”
“Well ...” This was the really hard part, Damon knew. “If you’ll have me, you’ve got me. Please, Natasha. Say I didn’t make myself look like a fool for nothing—”
“The drawings aren’t that bad. I was only kidding!”
Damon gave her a quizzical look. “I meant with the ring. It’s impulsive, I know. If you accept it, it
will
mean we’re going steady, in a way, but since you’re ignoring it—”
“Ignoring it?” Now it was Natasha’s turn to look confused. “I’m not ignoring anything! Not the balloons or the music—”
Patiently, Damon smiled at her. “Look closer at the valentine I just gave you. You know, the crappy-looking one with all the glitter and the plastic lace. Right in the middle—”
“Is a gargantuan diamond engagement ring!”
Really
wide-eyed now, Natasha gawked at it. “I thought that was fake. I’ve never seen one that big. Not
ever
. I—” She broke off, gazing at him. “I don’t know what to say,” she breathed. “I’m in shock.”
“It’s as real as my love for you,” Damon assured her. “Only a great deal smaller. They don’t make them in infinity size.”
At that, Natasha bawled as hard as Damon wanted to.
“Yes!” she cried, prying at the carelessly glued-on gem. “If you’re asking me to marry you, Damon, the answer is yes!”
“Don’t worry about protecting my sorry attempt at being artistic. You won’t hurt my feelings. Rip that sucker apart.”
The sound of gleefully rent construction paper filled the room. Eagerly, Natasha plucked free the ring. Her abashed gaze met Damon’s, reminding him of everything he loved about her.
“Tiny rips like that are why someone invented tape,” she said, clutching the poor, abused valentine in one hand. “I’ll take care of it myself,” Natasha assured him. “But first ...”
“But first,” Damon repeated solemnly. “I love you, Natasha. Would you please,
please
be with me forever?” Gently, he took the ring, then offered it to her. “Will you please marry me?”
In that slow, single moment when Natasha gazed at him, it felt to Damon as though the whole world stopped moving. No matter what else, he was sure his stupid heart stopped beating.
Then, “Yes! I already said yes! Yes, yes, yes!”
“Good. I say yes, too.” With a smooth, certain gesture, Damon slid the ring on Natasha’s finger. He lifted her hand, then kissed the back of it. He sighed, then gazed at her. “Now I’ve guaranteed myself a whole lifetime of good luck.”
From across the room, Jimmy Torrance cleared his throat.
“We’ve already told you, son,” he said in the midst of overseeing the chocolate tasting. “That good-luck stuff is an illusion.”
“That’s what you say, Dad.” Damon smiled at Natasha, utterly overcome. “I feel it. It’s real. There’s no denying it.”
“I agree,” Natasha said, hugging him close. “Because from here on out, we’re making our own good luck ... together.”
“Yay!” Milo shouted. “That means
I’m
lucky too!”
From there on out, the party took on an entirely new energy. Amy gave a few conspicuously sentimental sniffles, then took snapshots of the happy couple with her cell phone. Carol and Kurt both jabbered on about their “vital” roles in bringing together the happy couple. Jason grumpily stomped over for a furry congratulatory handshake. Jimmy made Natasha promise that she’d come over to the Torrance household for dinner very soon—and Natasha made him agree to bring Debbie to the Jenningses’ place for a special dinner, too. Reminded of food, Damon glanced around, feeling satisfied and hopeful and free.
“Hey, where’s the chocolate?” he asked. “I think the happy couple could use a little pick-me-up.”
“Yeah!” Natasha agreed, looking around as well. “I heard there are supposed to be special allergen-free goodies to—” She stopped in surprise, then directed her gaze to Damon. “
You
did it.
You
are the mysterious inventor of the ‘safe’ candy.”
Damon shrugged. “Milo was counting on me.”
“I was counting on you, too, son.” His father gave Damon a brusque hug. “You did a good job today. After a round of
unbiased
testing, I’d say your new candy bar line is a hit.”
“Excellent.” Damon looked around at the bedlam surrounding him. Wow, kids were noisy. “But that doesn’t explain why we can’t find a nosh around here. I’m starving! All this emotion has me hungry enough to gnaw on some tasty number-two pencils.”
“Would you settle for some empty testing cups?” The teacher stopped by with one of the Torrance Chocolates trays. She frowned at the empty white paper cups arrayed on it. “I’m afraid all the children
loved
the chocolate. Every bite is gone.”
“Well, then. I guess we’ll just have to make more.” With a heart full of gladness—and a head full of sticky, heart-shaped confetti that
may
have been overkill—Damon pulled Natasha closer. “What do you say? Will you come back to work with me?”
“As your assistant?” Natasha asked, whipping her admiring gaze from her new engagement ring to his face. She pursed her lips, the telltale sign of overthinking when it came to her. “Well, I don’t know. After all that’s happened lately—”
“No, you dope! As my
partner
,” Damon assured her. “I honestly don’t think I can do it without you, Tasha.”
Dubiously, she took in the chocolate-fueled mayhem surrounding them. “I’d say you’ve done pretty well so far.”
“Only because I had this little monkey for inspiration.” Laughing, Damon pulled Milo nearer. He gave the kid a tickle. “But without both of you by my side, life won’t be much fun.”
“Aha.” With her eyes sparkling, Natasha crossed her arms. She gazed up at him, pretty and sexy and eternally, alluringly wise. “It always comes down to
fun
with you, doesn’t it?”
“Sometimes. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned lately, it’s that there’s enough time for everything—everything at the
right
time.” Damon raised his hand in an approximate Boy Scout salute. “From here on out, I promise to have fun
and
work
and
love
and
responsibility, every single day.”
Natasha arched her brows. “All at the same time?”
Decisively, Damon nodded. “With you, it will be easy.” He reconsidered that. “Well, not easy. But awesome. Mostly. We might have to struggle sometimes. Probably. Because—”
“Yes.” Natasha raised on tiptoe and kissed him. “I’ll be your partner. I’ll be your partner in
everything
.”
“—because a smart guy once told me,” Damon went on doggedly, casting a grateful glance at his buddy in the furry otter suit, “that sometimes your sore spots come up against each other and cause some problems. But what Jason
didn’t
tell me is that your
good
qualities come together, too. When that happens ...” Happily, Damon hugged Natasha closer. “It’s magic.”
“It’s even better than magic,” Natasha told him, hugging him back. “It’s
sweet
. For a pair of nonstop chocoholics like us, life just doesn’t get any better than that.”
“What?” At that, Damon feigned outrage. “Are you saying you’re marrying me for the free
chocolate
?”
“No, I’m marrying you for the
sex
,” Natasha teased.
Gasping, Damon clapped his hands over Milo’s ears. He made sure his feigned outrage got a little more outrageous.
“Uh-oh. Watch your language, you naughty girl.”
“You’ve got that right,” Natasha agreed in a low, seductive voice that was aimed at Damon exclusively. “I
am
naughty,” she said. “Later on, I’ll show you exactly how naughty. In detail.”
Then, with a wink to show that she knew damn well that Damon’s hands had covered Milo’s ears well enough that he hadn’t heard her racy remark, Natasha sauntered away to help clean up.
“Well,” Damon called after her blusteringly, “I’m marrying you for the true love! So how about that?”
As far as indignant rejoinders went, it was a little weak.
But as far as things that needed to be said went, Damon decided, that one went all the way.
Relieved and giddy, he dropped his hands from Milo’s ears.
The boy tugged his sleeve. “If my mom’s been naughty,” he volunteered, “you should give her a timeout in her room.”
“A timeout?” Damon angled his head. “What’s that?”
Milo explained about the typical disciplinary action that Natasha employed—something to do with making sure the wayward party stayed in his or her bedroom for a while. With everything else that was going on, Damon was a little hazy on the details.
But he
did
grasp that this so-called “punishment” would involve keeping Natasha in her bedroom a lot. Maybe all day ... and all night. Most likely, at Damon’s sole discretion.
Overall, the idea had a lot of potential.
“So, Milo ... can two people be in timeout together?”
The boy shrugged. “I guess so. I don’t see why not.”
“Me, either,” Damon agreed, already making plans as he watched Natasha circulate among the children, talking and coloring and occasionally picking up a fallen balloon. “I might have to give that timeout technique a try. Thanks, Milo!”
“Anytime!” the boy said, then he skipped away.
Satisfied with ...
everything
, Damon watched him go.
Then he looked at Natasha again. She didn’t know it yet, but their life together was going to be amazing. He might not have spent much time in suburbia until now, but Damon figured he was getting the hang of it pretty quickly. This timeout thing was only the beginning.