The Offering (30 page)
Authors: Kimberly Derting
I wanted this.
Removing my hand from my pocket once more, I held it out to him, my fingers curled in a ball. “I think it's time you give this to me. Properly.”
Max looked at me, his eyebrows knitting together as he studied my fist curiously. “What is it?” he asked, even as his hand moved over to meet mine.
I opened my fingers and dropped the pendant into his waiting palm. The chain bloomed outward, like petals opening around a sapphire eye.
He blinked uncertainly as he looked up at me. “Are you . . .” He hesitated, his voice filled with restrained hope. “Are you absolutely sure, Charlie?”
My heart swelled and my face broke, the grin I could no longer contain spreading wide. “I've never been more sure of anything in my life,” I answered. “I'm ready. I want you to be my husbandâmy kingâMax.”
I'd imagined so many scenarios, yet in not one of them had I imagined Max dropping to his knee as he took my hand and pledged his fealty to me all over again.
Yet that was what he did, his fingers closing around mine as the pendant was pressed between our palms, warm against my skin.
“I promise,” he began, his words unwavering as his eyes reached all the way to mine, “to protect you, Charlie, for as long as I live. I will love you with everything I have. And I will stand by your side for an eternity.”
I bit back my own emotion as I watched his gray eyes glisten, and then he stood and unclasped the necklace.
I watched with breathless anticipation as he slid it around my neck and the meaning of the stone settled over my chest. When he clasped it this time, I knew what it meant. It was a promiseâa vow.
Max and I were engaged.
And then he kissed me, the way I'd envisioned he would. But so,
so
much better.
When at last he released me . . . when my head stopped spinning, as did the world beneath my feet . . . and Max's hand slipped around mine to steady me, I heard Xander's voice and remembered he'd been standing there all along.
“Welcome to the family,” he said.
kimberly derting
is the author of the Pledge series and the Body Finder series. She lives in Washington State. Visit her at
kimberlyderting.com
.
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MARGARET K. McELDERRY BOOKS
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author's imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2014 by Kimberly Derting
Jacket photograph copyright © 2014 by Ugla Hauksdóttir
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The text for this book is set in Avenir.
CIP data is available from the Library of Congress.
ISBN 978-1-4424-4562-8 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4424-4564-2 (eBook)