Summer Kisses (327 page)

Just a lovely dream. And it was time to get back to reality.

Lou had argued with herself for hours about whether or not she would come to LA for the finale. She had vowed a dozen times not to torture herself by watching all of her dreams go up in flames. But here she was, nonetheless, herding Emma and TJ in their Sunday best, getting ready to smile for the camera in the final family shot.

Jack himself was on the beach under a flower-draped trellis, waiting for the girls to arrive so he could propose at sunset with the waves of the Pacific crashing behind him.

Lou felt like she was going to be sick all over the lovely hardwood floors of the beachfront cabana where she and the kids waited. Crew members scurried around them. Usually they didn’t fuss with Lou much—she was only background, after all—but today the hair people had poked and teased and sprayed, the make-up people had smeared more paint on her face and the wardrobe people had draped a glittery sapphire necklace around her neck. Lou was of the never-wear-anything-on-your-neck-worth-more-than-your-head camp, but it was too much effort to protest.

She felt drained of all energy. No matter how much she slept, she’d been tired ever since Paris.

Dave, her friendly sound guy, appeared at her side and clipped a small microphone to the shoulder strap of her dress. “For the reaction reel,” he explained when she looked at him questioningly.

Lou didn’t think her reactions to today were suitable for primetime, but it would have taken too much energy to argue. She just nodded numbly and waited. Soon the girls would arrive. Soon he would pick. Soon he would propose. Soon it would be over and she could go about the business of healing her heart.

A round-faced girl with a headset appeared at her side. “Miss Tanner?”

Of course.
Now
they would get her name right.

“Yeah?”

“Dr. Doyle would like a word with you before we begin. Would you follow me please?”

She was tempted to say no. She was tempted to tell them all where they could shove their show and take off down the beach, running until she hit Mexico. She didn’t want to watch Jack propose to someone else. She couldn’t. But Emma was watching her with wide blue eyes and TJ knelt on the floor, seemingly engrossed in his Nintendo DS, but with his head tipped to the side to show that he was listening.

They’d noticed something off about her in the last couple days and she didn’t want to do anything else to upset them. This transition was going to be difficult enough for the children as it was without her freaking them out unnecessarily.

So Lou obediently stood, smoothed out the skirt of her cocktail length cream-colored chiffon dress, and walked calmly after the PA, for all the world as if she wasn’t on her way to face the man who had inadvertently ripped out her heart and used it as a racquetball.

The path down to the beach was lined with red rose petals—of course it was. Lou followed the PA around a curve in the walk and suddenly the beach came into view, a long sprawling golden swath of sand to keep the ocean at bay. Down a short flight of stairs and across a short stretch of sand, Lou saw the flower-covered trellis and the tall, dark haired man waiting beneath it.

Her heart squeezed tight as a fist, as the PA stepped aside to let her continue alone. Jack looked amazing, decked out in a dark tailored suit and gilded by the last few rays of the evening sun. Lou had a moment’s thought that the producers ought to hurry and get the girls down here before they lost the perfect light, but it slipped away as soon as she was close enough to see Jack’s face.

He looked nervous. And contrite. And he was sweating
way
more than the cool evening called for.

Between one heartbeat and the next, Lou realized she would always love him, even if he married someone else.

He hadn’t made her any promises. She’d built her dreams with a fairy tale ending, but he never promised there would be a happily ever after. He’d given her Paris. He’d given her one amazing night she would never forget. That would have to be enough. In a few hours, maybe only minutes, he would belong to someone else. She couldn’t be angry with him, just because he hadn’t wanted what she had wanted.

She would find a way to continue their friendship. She would find a way to stay in his life and be a part of Emma and TJ’s lives. And then she would find a man of her own. One who could give her more than a twenty-four hour fantasy.

Out of the corner of her eye, Lou saw cameramen tracking her walk down to meet Jack— probably doing a test run for when the future-fiancé made the walk. She shook her head, banishing all thoughts of the other women. This moment was just between her and Jack. Even if it was going to be among their last.

As she approached the trellis arch, her heels stuck in the sand—clearly whoever had designed this dream proposal had forgotten to factor for high heels and beaches. Jack stepped forward, extending his hand to help her. Lou grinned, a wry little self-deprecating twist, and gratefully took his support. He was still the guy who opened car doors and carried groceries for little old ladies. She should have known the show wouldn’t change who he was at heart.

No matter how many grouper kisses Katya smacked on him.

Jack helped her onto the little pedestal beneath the trellis arch and turned to face her, holding both her hands. “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you this in Paris—”

“No, there’s nothing to say. I understand,” Lou interrupted.

“Louisa,” he said sternly, formally. “This is my big speech. Just hear me out, okay?”

Lou rolled her lips inward, making a show of absolute silence.

Jack took a deep breath and gave her hands a gentle squeeze. “There are things that should have been said in Paris and things I should have said a long time ago.” His eyes held hers, the piercing blue solemn. “You’ve been the cornerstone of my life for the last four years. I felt guilty for relying on you. I felt like I abused your kindness and your affection for me and the kids. I worried that you would stay with me not because it would make you happy, but because you knew it would make me happy. I told you when I agreed to go on this show that I wanted to do it because you deserved to be loved, but what I didn’t realize until I was a thousand miles away, what it took a dozen other women and every possible ridiculous reality adventure for me to finally figure out, was that I wanted to be the one loving you.”

Lou gasped and then stopped breathing entirely. He wasn’t saying this. She was hallucinating.

“You’ve been my best friend and the best mother anyone could hope for to my kids, but I don’t love you because my life doesn’t work without you. I love you because my heart doesn’t beat without you.”

Holy wow. He’d just said that.

Lou’s knees turned to jelly. She clung tighter to Jack’s hands, her only link to the surreal reality of this moment. He still wasn’t done with his speech.

“I don’t know when I started loving you as more than a friend. Now that I do, it feels like I’ve always felt this way, but ever since that night in the Jacuzzi…” A wicked glimmer entered his bright blue eyes. “I haven’t been able to stop wanting you.”

Still holding her hands, Jack sank down onto one knee in front of her. Lou began to tremble.

“I went halfway across the country and all over the world looking for love, only to realize the love of my life was right in front of my face all along. My entire life I’ve tried to do everything right, to be Mr. Perfect, and you’re the only one who’s ever made me feel like it was all right if I was just me. I don’t want to ever risk losing you again.”

He looked up at her, his blue eyes earnest. “I have a question for you. An important question. But I don’t want you to tell me what you think I want to hear. I want you to answer for yourself. I’ve stolen a lot of your adventures and I’ll try to give some back to you, but you know how it is with the kids, so if this isn’t the life you want, you have to be honest about that, okay? So really think about your answer—”

“Jack,” she interrupted again. “Will you ask me already?”

He grinned, those unfairly blue eyes twinkling. “Louisa Renee Tanner, will you marry me?”

She was dreaming. She had to be. But it felt so real. His hands. The sand. The sunset.

The cameras.

“You aren’t proposing to Marcy?”

Jack’s smile had begun to fade into a nervous grimace, but now it widened again. “You are the only woman I’m proposing to today. Or ever again, if you say yes. I sent Katya home as soon as I got to Switzerland and Marcy already knew. I’ve known for weeks that you were the only one I wanted to be with, but I couldn’t say anything because of the show. Turns out I signed a contract saying I couldn’t tell anyone I loved her before today and I had to pick a winner. Which reminds me.”

Jack dropped her right hand and dug into his jacket pocket. He pulled out a small, blue-velvet jewelers box. He flipped it open, one-handed. Inside, a beautiful diamond engagement ring sparkled in the setting sun. It looked nothing like the plain gold bands he gave away at the ring ceremonies and it was the most perfect ring she’d ever seen.

“I know reality TV isn’t reality, but trust me when I say that
this
is real. What we have between us is no fantasy. And it’s not going anywhere once the cameras stop rolling.” His thumb gently rubbed across the third finger on her left hand. “Lou, will you accept the final ring? You’re the only Suitorette I want. If you’ll have me. No pressure.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Lou saw the cameras circling closer. There was a microphone on Jack’s lapel and another clipped to her dress. Miranda was doubtless somewhere rubbing her hands together with delight.

And none of that mattered.

Jack knelt in front of her, his heart in his eyes, her dream man, her Mr. Perfect, saying the words she’d never imagined possible. It was the fantasy—and it had nothing to do with the beach, the flowers, or the stunning sunset lighting the water. It was all Jack.

She looked into his eyes, those unfair Paul Newman-blue eyes. “You kept trying to give me space to take an adventure, but you guys are my adventure. You, Jack, are the only adventure I want. All of you. But especially you, Jack. You have been for years and I wouldn’t trade a second of the life we have together for all of Europe. I love you.”

“So that’s a yes?”

Her smile felt like it would split her face. “Yes. Of course. Now get up here.”

His smile made the little lines around his eyes crinkle and her heart flip over. He slipped the ring onto her finger, straightened to his feet and tugged her into his arms. Jack’s gaze flicked to the cameras and he arched one brow, as if asking her permission. “America’s watching,” he said softly.

Lou twined her arms around his neck, going up on her tiptoes as she drew his head down to hers. “Let ‘em look.”

~~~

Miranda watched Lou fall into Jack’s arms and almost got a little teary. That shit was beautiful.

“Great shot.”

Miranda jerked at the sound of the voice. Freaking Bennett Lang. “This is a closed set. Who let you in?”

“Haven’t you heard? I’m a legend in this business.”

On the beach below, Jack and Lou still hadn’t come up for air and some of the crew members were starting to catcall—which was unprofessional, but they’d all been pulling for Lou and Jack, so she’d just have the sound guys put some orchestral music over that part of the make-out session.

“Do they mind that you’ve made their lives into a soap opera?”

She shot Bennett a glare out of the corner of her eye, no longer the least bit weepy. “They’re together and they wouldn’t have been if not for me.”

And she had no qualms about taking credit for their happily ever after. Lou was too self-sacrificing and Jack too oblivious for them to have ever gotten together without an act of God. Miranda was perfectly willing to count herself as an act of God.

“I got the job,” she told him. “You’re looking at the new executive producer of
Marrying Mister Perfect
.”

He held her gaze for a long moment and then nodded. “Let me know if you ever want a change.”

It felt like he was offering her more than a job—which was part of why she would never accept it. “You’re supposed to say ‘Congratulations.’”

“Congratulations. Can I buy you a drink to celebrate?”

She eyed her former mentor. “Thanks, but I’m not looking for career advice right now.”

“I was asking for a date.”

A slow flush stole across her cheekbones and her mind went stunningly blank. “Well. Okay, then.”

Six months later…

Lou sat cuddled against Jack’s side on the couch. If not for the blazing hot lights and live studio audience, she might have been able to convince herself they were at home watching this fiasco on TV.

The host of the
Marrying Mister Perfect
reunion show leaned forward in his chair, his eyes, like everyone else in the room’s, locked on the pair of them. “Jack, Lou, this season of
Marrying Mr. Perfect
is already being hailed as the most ground-breaking season of reality television yet. Audiences fell in love with you as a couple and our fan boards lit up with pro-Lou campaigns from the very first episode. And I think what all of your fans are dying to know right now is how is your relationship now that the show is over? Lou, I notice you’re still wearing the ring. Have you set the date yet?”

As Jack smiled and smoothly answered that their relationship was stronger than ever and dodged the date question, Lou fidgeted with her engagement ring. The contracts Jack had signed prohibited him from getting married before the reunion show aired—it was too easy for marriage licenses to leak to the press and spoil the surprise—but they had picked a date.

None of their rabid online fans, nor anyone on the crew of the show had any idea that a pair of matching wedding bands were tucked in the inside pocket of Jack’s jacket right this instant. No one knew about their tickets on the overnight flight to Paris tonight or that both of their families were already waiting there with the kids. A quiet ceremony in a French hotel wouldn’t draw much attention here in the States. At least, that was their hope.