"Hello?" Pt. 2

Proper Engaged

Finally, asking for Jimmy Delaney's permission to marry his daughter had been thoroughly thought out. I'd been invited to the middle Sunday at Wimbledon and knowing that Jimmy was a fan, I had asked him to accompany me. This, naturally, was before either of us found out that his three daughters and my brother had been arrested for various misdemeanours in America. All the plans I'd put in motion had been scuppered and instead of having a nice day with my prospective father-in-law, I'd been forced to ask him on the red-eye flight to New York City while there were other people around. 

"You want to marry my daughter?" Jimmy had said, looking at me confusedly. "Jaysus, you're a brave buck. You love her?"

Instantly, I nodded. "I do."

"Aye, you can marry her," Jimmy shrugged. "If she'll say 'yes,' o' course."

And that,kids, is how Daddy asked Mummy to marry him, I would tell mine and Sophie's children in the years to come. It wasn't a fairytale proposal, but it was ours and I was ok with that. In fact, the more I thought about it all, the more I realised that this was a perfect proposal because it was imperfect.

"We'll need to set a date, you know," I say, repositioning myself on the sun lounger at the side of the pool. Sophie and I had secluded ourselves from everyone and were currently enjoying the Fourth of July alone, basking in the sun. Sophie, as she was accustomed to do whenever we were lying side by side, had rested her head on my chest, her dark hair fanning across my skin. 

Shifting slightly, Sophie turned her head so that she was looking up at me from behind her sunglasses. "A date for what?"

"For the wedding," I say slowly, as if she'd completely missed the point, which was exactly what she had done. "You know, the whole reason that you have that exquisite ring on your finger."

"Oh, that date," Sophie smiles widely at me. Sitting upright, she swung one of her legs over onto the other side of my hip so that she was straddling me. Instantly, my eyes moved down to where our bodies connected and I couldn't stop myself from smirking. That was, until Sophie clicked her fingers dangerously close to my eyes, making me jolt backwards. "Pay attention, pervert. You were talking about setting a date. Did you have one in mind?"

"That depends," I answer, crossing my arms behind my head and using them as an uncomfortable pillow. I could feel my hands twitching, wanting to touch Sophie and explore her body, but considering the topic of conversation, it felt inappropriate to do that. Instead, I tried to focus on wedding talk. "Do you want a long engagement or a short engagement? Do you think we should live together first? I mean, you could be a nightmare to live with and I wouldn't know until it was too late. And, are there any family members close to death's door and we should fast track our wedding just to make sure they're alive to be there?"

Sophie stares at me. "You are seriously disturbed, Whitaker."

With that, Sophie slaps her hands down on my chest and gets up onto her feet. Walking away from me, she ignores all my protests and pleas to come back. Seeing her disappear into the house, I sigh and weigh up the pros and cons of following her inside. On the downside, she could be totally annoyed with me to the point that she doesn't want to acknowledge my existence. On the upside, she could only be teasing me, in which case, my day was looking up. 

"But seriously," I speak as I walk into the kitchen area. Sophie, dressed only in a white bikini that made her tan skin look even darker, was sat on the kitchen counter, seductively licking an ice lolly. Seeing the way her lips encircled the frozen snack, I immediately regretted coming inside. "Can you please put that down so we can talk?"

"Nope," Sophie replies, popping the 'p' sound. "Why, does this distract you?"

I nod. "Very much." Turning so that my back was towards her,  I ask, "Long engagement or short?"

"Short," Sophie replies, her voice coming from closer to me than she was before. Suddenly, I felt something extremely cold run down my spine before something warm and wet ran up my spine. I shivered. "Didn't I always say that you and I would marry on New Year's Eve?"

Once again, I felt the cold against my skin, followed by that warmth. "What are you doing?"

"Running my ice lolly down your back and then licking it off," Sophie answers, like it's the most natural thing in the world. "So, December, thirty-first?"

"Done," I say in a quick growl. Spinning, I capture Sophie's wrist in my hand and yank her closer, until her chest was pressed against mine. I could feel her chest moving up and down frantically, or perhaps that was my own. Either way, the sexual tension was hard to ignore, especially when all my animalistic instincts kicked in and I went all caveman by throwing Sophie over my shoulder and rushing up the stairs to the bedroom. "New Year's Eve, it is. Then you'll be Duchess of Kendal."

Bouncing on the bed where I threw her down, she shakes her head in protest. "I'm cool with being Sophie Whitaker, thank you very much."

"Babe, you can call yourself whatever the hell you want," I tell her, taking her face between my hands and kissing her senseless. "As long as you're my wife, everything else is just semantics."

"Ok," Sophie winks at me. "Now, are you going to finish what you started, or do I need to get another ice lolly to cool us both off?"

~*~*~

A/N

Urgh, these two are perverts!