The Cinderella Mission (Family Secrets #1)(61)
Author: Catherine Mann

It was well past midnight. His Cinderella stood on a wind-swept building rather than in a ballroom. Her coach was nothing more than a dirty Jaguar. Her gown exchanged for a maid’s smock, she was covered in sludge and blood, hair falling in her face.

And never had his Kelly been more beautiful.

Ethan’s hand clenched around the chain and the aquamarine. He might not have a princess-cut diamond on hand, but he had something far more precious and lasting.

He had a future. If he could just convince Kelly to share it with him.

The night inching toward the next morning, Kelly counted as church bells chimed the hour. Three, maybe four times. Stepping out of the hotel lobby into the crisp air, Kelly didn’t know for certain. Didn’t care.

Ethan’s jacket around her shoulders, they made their way through the snowy back lot for his car. Valet service was a bust tonight in the mass exodus of guests, not that any agent worth his salt would ever use a valet service and risk car tampering. Thirty-degree weather tempered the adrenaline heating her.

The cold reminded her they were alive.

Snow whispered down on the stragglers leaving, a handful of police checking out, a couple that looked suspiciously like Aunt Eugenie and Director Hatch.

Kelly stayed silent. Let them steal any moment together that they could.

Life should be savored.

Peace echoed in the parking lot and in her ear, the listening devices deactivated. Mission complete. They’d linked the thieves to Rebelia, where, it was hoped, Alex Morrow would be found. Better yet, they’d disbanded an entire network of Rebelian spies in the DC area.

After the shoot-out on the roof, Ethan and Kelly had assumed their roles as concerned guests accidentally caught in the crossfire. Kelly preferred it that way, always having liked the secret satisfaction of one-upping the unsuspecting with her deceptively unassuming exterior.

They’d retrieved her dress, crumpled mess that it was. But it was warmer than the overall and she hadn’t wanted any reminders of Peter’s eyes on her. So she’d put the gown back on and snuggled into the warmth of Ethan’s tuxedo jacket draped around her shoulders. They strolled to his car, side-by-side; they hadn’t touched since that moment on the roof.

Until now.

Hands on her hips, he hiked her up onto the hood of his Jag. At least she didn’t have to worry about the dirt ruining her dress.

His fingers dug a gentle massage into her hips. “Congratulations, Agent Dragon Lady.”

“Thank you.” She waited for him to make a move, anything, but for once he seemed unsure of what to say. She slipped his tie free and pitched it over his shoulder. “Where do we go from here?”

Ethan took her hands in his. “During that time when I thought…” he paused, head tipped back toward the stars. His throat moved with a swallow.

All his words earlier rolled back over her. “Ethan, I’m sorry. I tried to tell you, but—”

“I know.” He looked back down at her and smiled. “That’s not my point. I realized none of this other mess matters. However I can have you, that’s how I want you. I won’t waste another minute that I can spend with you.”

His words soothed over years of rejection. He wanted her. Brainy Kelly, who preferred messy hair and clunky shoes. She owed him the same acceptance.

After hearing the anguish in his voice earlier, absorbing his pain into her, she understood well what the offer cost him. She loved him all the more for making it. “I realized something in there, too. I heard you, Ethan. Every word you said. I heard it all. Even more than that, I heard what it did to you, and you’re right. I love you too much to ask you to go through that again. If it’s a matter of having you or the job, there’s no question. You win. Hands-down.”

His hands glided up to cup her face. “There was a time I’d have taken you up on that.” He shook his head, snow drifting to her lap. “But I’d have been wrong. Seeing you tonight, Kelly— God, you were magnificent. You were made for this. I can’t take it away from you.”

He clasped her wrist in his hand and kissed her palm. “Besides, after tonight, I’m finding I’m not quite ready to be put out to pasture yet. The way I see it, we make a pretty good team. I’ll rest easier if I’m the one watching your back, and if you’re the one watching mine. How about we give this a joint effort?”

“See the world and let the government pick up the tab?”

“Make love in a dozen different war zones in a dozen different languages.”

She draped her arms over his shoulders. “Oh, you’re making me hot.”

“Told you I wasn’t ready to be put out to pasture just yet.”

She toyed with the hair on the back of his neck and looked forward to the day he could let it grow again. “Wanna come prove your youthful virility?”

“I think this old warhorse can manage.” He brought her face to his and kissed her with an intensity that proved he could manage that and a lot more.

Kelly shivered against him, sagged into the warmth of his chest and looked forward to a lifetime of toe-curling kisses more exciting than any op.

One last question niggled at her logical brain. “What about children?”

His hesitation clenched her stomach. She’d just assumed he meant marriage.

He dropped a kiss to her head. “I want them before I’m ready for the nursing home, so that gives me a little while longer to wait until we retire from active operations.”

Kelly exhaled. He did mean marriage and family. How could she have doubted him? Sure he wanted compromise, but that was okay.

She truly believed she could balance it all, but had learned to embrace his fears, as well as his dreams, just as he’d taken on her own. Life wasn’t about fairy-tale fantasies but real-life balance and compromise. “I think maybe five or six years in the field will prepare me for the hazards of motherhood.”

A smile worked its way up his face and into her heart. He threw back his head and laughed. She started to scoot off the hood. “Let’s go home.”

He stopped her. “Wait. I’m not done yet.”

Ethan plopped her back on the hood and dropped to one knee in the snow-covered parking lot.

Her heart thudded.

His hand came out of his pocket. His fist opened. Nestled in his palm rested her semi-precious stone that meant more to her than any princess-cut diamond because Ethan had given it to her.

“Kelly, will you marry me? Be my partner, my lover, my love. Take on the world with me…take on me. Forever.”