Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 82940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
* * *
Kissing his shoulder, still breathing fast, Erin turned herself onto one elbow. “Jay Malone, you are good for me. I never thought of myself as being that strong.”
“Are you kidding me? You are one of the strongest people I’ve ever known.”
“Maybe you’re right,” she agreed. She had made a beautiful, happy life for herself and now she was in bed with the man of her dreams in the house of her dreams. It was time to put the past firmly behind her and look forward to all the future held.
Tracing patterns on his chest with her fingertips, she said, “You know, Mila was also Team Jay from the start.”
“Wait, she knew about us?”
“I told her I had a crush on you before anything happened. Tessa, too. They both thought we’d be a good match.” She laughed. “Way before I did, actually. They encouraged me to give you a shot.”
Jay picked up her wandering hand and kissed her on the wrist, where her pulse was still slowing. “I owe those two dinner.” He kissed her palm. “Man, I love the way you support each other. If only your brothers felt the same way as the women in your family.”
“I love my family too,” she agreed. “But I’m also pretty irritated with them for butting in the way they did.”
“It’s only because they love you so much.”
“I know. But there’s a difference between love and thinking they know what’s best for me.”
He nodded. “Believe me, I don’t think anyone is underestimating you now. Least of all me.” He paused, and something shifted behind his eyes. He seemed suddenly lighter. She was beginning to recognize that look as Jay’s lightbulb moment. She waited, excited to hear what he was about to say.
He grinned. “Write this romantic screenplay with me. I’m serious about it and I think I’m on to something.”
“What?” She was stunned. “Seriously? I’m a journalist, not a screenwriter.”
Jay’s grin widened and then he looked a little sheepish. “I have a little secret. I read everything you’ve written in the Sea Shell for the past two years. You’ve got all the chops a screenwriter needs. You managed to make a high school musical sound riveting, and how there’s still an unadopted dog in all of California with you writing the Dog of the Week, I do not know.”
She was absolutely floored. “Seriously? You read my writing in the paper? All of it?”
“Sure did. Even the interview with that clown who lost a big shoe and just kept on performing. I laughed so hard.”
She joined in, and when they both finished chuckling, she said quietly and seriously, “Just in case you missed me saying it earlier, I love you, Jay Malone.”
And then he told her, yet again, that he loved her too. Words she would never tire of hearing.
Chapter Thirty-One
Erin spent the week feeling as though she was living in her very own romantic comedy movie. Nothing could have prepared her for how much fun writing a screenplay with Jay would be. In between his agenting commitments and her job at the paper, they worked together feverishly on the end of the screenplay. Of course, sometimes they argued: her ideas were often quite different from his, and that would cause them to sit back—usually naked and in bed—and discuss the way she saw the world versus how he did. Sometimes she felt it was a female perspective versus a male one, but they always seemed to come up with something better together than either of them would have been able to on their own.
By Friday night, the script was almost done and they were reading through the final draft, when Jay said, “Every one of the scenes you wrote—and the scenes of mine you’ve edited—just fly off the page. I can see these scenes onscreen already. Where did you learn how to write a romance?”
She thought about it for a minute. “From life, I guess. I watch my parents, and every day they show each other in little ways how much they’re still in love.” She gazed into her memories. “And then I watched Arch and Tessa fall in love. Smith and Valentina have had a pretty rocky time of it, but they’re so happy now and having a baby. Even Mila and Hersch. Mila was never going to fall in love easily.”
He laughed. “You didn’t either. But I think we’re the kind of people who, when we do love, it’s forever.”
She couldn’t help it. Tears filled her eyes. “Forever. I feel that too.”
They kissed deeply and then smiled at one another. “What about you?” she asked. “Where did you learn about romance?”
“From loving you. I finally get what all the love songs and movies and novels are about. I’m ready to be the kind of man who can truly love a woman.” He looked into her eyes, “I will only ever love you, Erin. I’m making that promise to you now.”