“Say it again,” she said softly.

With a smile, I looked deeper into her eyes. “I don’t want to be your fling. I want to be your everything.”

A pause, a breath, a smile. “Never in a million years did I ever think I would hear you utter those words, least of all to me.”

“Should I say it again? Louder maybe?”

She laughed, the sound sweet and tender. “No—if your mom hears, she’ll come down here, and then you can’t kiss me. And I really want you to kiss me.”

“Anything you want, Tess,” I said, my heart singing as I brought my lips to hers.

I’d kissed her a hundred times. In the dark and in the sunshine. Gently and with demand. I’d kissed her greedily, and I’d kissed her with adoring care.

But this was the first time I kissed her with possession—not only of her, but her of me. The warmth of her body, the light in her heart, the matching of two flames in the meeting of our lips. When the kiss broke, I saw ownership written all over her face. And I knew it was written all over mine.

Her eyes opened slowly, meeting mine as her lazy smile spread. “What are you gonna do with me now?”

“Oh, I have an idea or two,” I said, bringing my lips to hers to steal a kiss and seal a promise.

I was about to boyfriend the fuck out of Tess Monroe.

I scooped her up, the kiss breaking when she squealed her surprise. Her arms hooked around my neck, her cheeks high and smiling, flushed and pretty.

“We have work to do,” she halfheartedly argued around her laughter as I hauled her to the back.

“We will. As soon as I’m sure you know I’m serious about you.”

She giggled. “Even if I already believe you?”

“I don’t think there’s any way you could possibly know just how serious I am, Tess.”

Her face opened up, her smile falling.

I kissed her to cover the depth of the admission, though I feared my lips gave it away.

Into the greenhouse, down to storage I carried her, not setting her down until we were all the way in the back, in the section we’d claimed for our own.

Supplies filled the space, dumped unceremoniously in the back corner near the leftover hay from winter mulching. There were frames for hanging installations. Tables and baskets. Things I’d built, things we’d salvaged. Dried flowers hung in bundles from some racks, and across the space, we’d haphazardly strung white twinkle lights we’d used in the last installation. So we could work comfortably in the dark, I’d explained to my mother.

I’d omitted what exactly I was working on and why I needed to be comfortable.

I moved to plug the lights into the extension cord, snagging the flannel blanket from an ancient rocking chair to spread out into the hay pile.

Tess sighed, smiling sweetly as she looked around. “You know, if I’d organized this, everything would be in neat little rows and tidy piles. And I’d never have known that I preferred it this way. It’s organized chaos. Kinda like you.”