I slipped off my shoes and walked quietly to the bed as I pulled off my clothes. Climbing onto the bed, I pressed my lips to hers before making a trail down, and felt her stir awake when I passed her breasts.

“Hey,” she mumbled huskily, and lightly dragged her fingers through my hair. “Did you get food?”

“I did.”

Her breaths became louder when my kisses hit her lower stomach, and after a few seconds, she decided, “It can wait.”

Propping myself up on my elbows, I settled my body between her now-bent knees, and traced imaginary circles on her stomach. “You’re not on birth control.” It wasn’t a question, but she still shook her head. “I didn’t wear condoms last night.”

The corners of her mouth tilted up for a second. “I know.”

“And I didn’t buy any when I was out just now.”

Her eyebrows slanted down over her dark eyes, and she asked, “Why not?”

“Jason told me you were ready to get married and settle down. Was that true, or was he saying that because he was hoping it would make me realize what I could lose?”

“That’s true,” she answered, drawing out the words to sound like a question.

“I wasted a lot of time with you, Paisley, I don’t see a reason to wait for anything with you.”

One eyebrow lifted, and a sharp laugh burst from her chest. “Are you saying you want to knock me up, Eli Jenkins?”

“I’m saying I’m trying to start on everything I mapped out for you in the shower, and everything I wasn’t sure how to say.” I glanced down to where I was still tenderly touching her stomach before meeting her gaze again. “I want to have a family with you, and I want to marry you. I want to love you for the rest of my life, Paisley.”

Her wide brown eyes slowly filled with tears, and a beautiful smile covered her face. A line of tears fell down her cheeks when she shook her head subtly. “Eli, it has only been one month since you realized you were in love with me. I have been dreaming of that future with you for years, but for you and for us, we need to wait. We can’t just get married right now.”

“Why?” I asked impatiently, and earned a light laugh from her as she gently ran her fingers through my hair.

“Because I want you to be sure that is something you—”

“I am sure,” I said honestly, cutting her off. “I told you, Pay, I feel like I’ve been waiting for this for years.”

“And I have,” she reminded me. “If you asked me—and I mean seriously asked me—there is no way I would be able to say no to you, Eli. But I think you’ve felt like you’ve been waiting for this for years because when you realized how you felt, you were immediately faced with not being able to have me. Those first two weeks, you were scared you wouldn’t get a future with me, and now it’s only been two more weeks that we’ve even been together and you haven’t had to worry about us. I want you to give it some time until the newness of us has passed before you decide that getting married to me is something you actually want.”

I studied her face for silent moments, and watched as the small trail of tears continued to fall. I knew exactly how long it had been since she’d shown up at my door to tell me she’d chosen me. But I wasn’t going to change my mind weeks, months, or years from now. When I started to tell her that, I stopped abruptly, and my eyes widened. “Paisley,” I whispered. “Are you still afraid that I’m only with you because I don’t want to lose my best friend?”

She shook her head quickly, and admitted, “I’m still afraid that I’m going to wake up tomorrow, and I’ll be in my bedroom worrying that you’ll have a girl in your bed when I come over for our Sunday morning, and all of this will have been a dream.”

“That’s not going to happen,” I promised her. “I’m going to make sure you wake up every morning for the rest of your life knowing exactly how much I love you.” With a reluctant nod, I said, “If you really want to, we can wait another month to get married.”

Paisley laughed softly and tugged at my hair. “A year.”

“Fuck no.”

“Language,” she chastised. “A year,” she repeated.

“And if I got down on one knee right now and asked you to marry me?”

“I would set the date for a year from now.”

I groaned and dropped my head on her stomach. “When I thought about this conversation, it went a lot differently in my head.”

“Oh yeah?” she asked teasingly.

“I thought you were going to have me drive us to Vegas today,” I admitted against her skin, but still didn’t look up at her.

Paisley was quiet for a couple minutes. She just continued to run her fingers through my hair, and just when I looked up to see her expression, she said, “People just wouldn’t understand. They wouldn’t know our story even if they know us, and they just wouldn’t get it. I’m pretty sure Kristen and Jason wouldn’t even agree with us doing everything so soon.”

“Who cares about anyone else? I don’t give a fuck what other people would think. I care about what you think, and what I want with you.”

“But they would all give us their opinions. They would constantly be telling us how stupid we were, and they probably wouldn’t show up to our wedding.”

My face fell. “You don’t even want a big wedding, Pay. And again, who cares about anyone else?”

Her eyes widened and her hands stopped moving. “How do you know I don’t want a big wedding?”

“Because you’ve said that at every one of our friends’ weddings.”

“You remember that?”

My brow pinched together. “Of course I do. Just because I wasn’t catching on to what you were waiting for from me, doesn’t mean I wasn’t listening to you.”

She watched me in awe for a few seconds, then said, “I’m still not marrying you until a year is up.”

I exhaled heavily and nodded. “I can wait a year to marry you as long as you’ll still move in with me.”

“As soon as my lease is up in four months.”

“No. That is definitely too long.”

Paisley laughed softly. “We can do a week at my apartment, then a week at yours, and continue doing that until my lease is up.”

“Better,” I agreed, then mumbled, “Does this mean I need to go back out and buy condoms?”

“Maybe you should have just gotten them your first time out,” she suggested, and I sighed in defeat.

“Okay. I’ll be—” I cut off when Paisley grabbed my arm and pulled me back down onto her when I’d started getting up.

“I’m kidding. I brought some with me; they’re in my bag. I just wasn’t really thinking about them last night or this morning until you brought them up.”

I placed a kiss on her nose and got up from the bed to grab her bag. “You can’t blame me if you get pregnant from last night.”

“I doubt I got pregnant last night.” She laughed softly. “But, oh my God, I can see your mom’s reaction now if we got pregnant before we got married.”

“Then I guess it would be Vegas or the courthouse for us,” I grumbled like it would be a hardship to marry her.