“Hmmph,” I say, completely unconvinced.
“Hmmph?”
“Yes. Hmmph.”
“You don’t believe me?”
“Nope.”
“You wanna bet?”
“We can’tbetbecause there’s no way to objectively prove it.”
“Oh, yes, there is.”
“Prove it, then.”
“What do I get when I do?”
“I dunno. If you prove it, then I’ll decide after the fact what you win. You’ll just have to take a leap of faith.” I roll my eyes, even in the dark. “But just because you had a violinist doesn’tproveyou would have taken the next step and told me you love me. In fact, I think it’s highly unlikely you would have said it with a violinist standing there breathing down your neck.”
Josh pauses. “Hmm. You might be right about that part. But I still would have said it—maybe after dinner, when we were alone in bed.”
“I highly doubt that,” I say. “You needed an expert push from a woman who knows you better than you know yourself.”
“No, I didn’t—I was gonna do it all by myself.”
“Nope,” I say.
“Ha!” he says. “Get ready to eat crow, Madame Terrorist.” Josh sits up, turns on the lamp next to him, and lies back down next to me on his side, smiling devilishly.
“Well?” I ask. “Why are you smiling like that? All you’ve proved is that you know how to turn on a lamp. That proves absolutely nothing.”
“Look at my arm,” he whispers softly.
“Hmm?”
“Look at my arm, babe.”
I sit up and peer at Josh’s muscled arm in the dim light and instantly gasp.
Holy shitballs. Josh has a brand new tattoo on the outside of his left bicep—a golden cat with big blue eyes, long lashes, and a mischievous feline-smile on her sleek face. Wow. She looks just like me if I were reincarnated as a cartoon cat.
For a long moment, I study Josh’s tattoo in detail, marveling at it’s amazingness. The cartoon-cat version of me is wearing a pink collar adorned with a dangling “PG” charm at its center and she’s holding a martini glass filled with two olives in her slender paw. And, best of all, her bottom legs are entangled in a swirl of barbed wire that trails from her tail and wraps clear around Josh’s bicep.
“Josh,” I gasp. “You got a girlfriend-barbed-wire-double-social-suicide-tattoo!”
“Yep,” Josh says, his face bursting with excitement.
I laugh gleefully.
Josh puts his finger under my chin, his eyes smoldering. “I know I’ve gotten some questionable tattoos in my life, babe, but do you really think I’d have committeddoublesocialsuicideif I wasn’t planning to tell you I love you?”
I can’t speak. It’s taking all my energy not to pass out, cry, or climax. This is the most incredible gift Josh could have given me—way better than a big, fat diamond any day. (Well, okay, not way better than a big, fat diamond, let’s not get too carried away here—but pretty damned close.) Certainly, in the land of Joshua William Faraday, this barbed-wire-girlfriend tattoo is the closest thing to a promise of forever I could ever hope to receive. And that’s good enough for me.
I nuzzle my nose into Josh’s. “You do realize you’re gonna have this thingflorebblaaaaaah?” I say.
“That’s the idea, baby. I’m gonna love youflorebblaaaah.” He laughs. “I promise.”
