Enraptured

Chapter 34

After I finished proposing, I carried Belle back down to the first floor and walked out to the car to collect all the blankets, pillows, and the large picnic basket I had packed.

Even though the house was completely bare down to its walls, without a single piece of furniture, I thought it would be romantic to stay in the empty castle all by ourselves for the night. It was one of the few moments where it was just Belle and me, not that I didn't enjoy little Theo's presence, but it was a rare moment where we could be as intimate as we'd like with each other.

It was pretty dark by the time we came down, so I decided to stay near the living room fireplace and set up a fire to keep us warm through the night. Belle's eye's sparkled as the flames grew bigger and bigger until they reached a roaring fire.

Although she tried to keep her voice quiet, I heard her mumbling about how it reminded her of a scene in one of her romance books where a couple snuck into a barn to hide from the rain and started a fire to keep themselves warm as they stripped out of their clothes. I didn't catch the rest of the description because her voice started to trail off at the end, but I knew that it was something sexually intimate with how brightly her cheeks shone, nearly matching the color of the flames flickering before her.

To be honest, I wasn't surprised that it reminded her of her books. I did it on purpose, after all. I had gone through all her books on her overflowing shelf and picked out the romance books with the most worn-out covers in the prior week. I spent most of my nights leading up to this day reading her books and picking out the most memorable scenes to recreate, in particular, the scenes where the pages in her book were the most smudged.

I even knew what scene she was referring to. The couple had stripped out of their soak clothes and huddled naked together in an effort to stay warm as the night temperature continued to drop. It was the book's turning point, where they confessed their feelings for each other and became one for the first time. It was a classic trope, but based on the condition of those particular books, Belle seemed to like the clichés.

But if that was what she dreamed of, then I had no trouble making her dreams come true.

I had even picked out dishes from her books and personally recreated them early in the morning before work. I was a pretty good cook due to my mother's persistence to have sons who could cook for their wives, so I had no trouble recreating the dishes, and it was well worth the effort after I watched Belle's eyes light up with bite.

How she would whisper the name of the dishes, the title of the corresponding book, or the names of the lead characters in that scene every time I revealed a new dish. Like linguine with clams from an Italian mentioned in one of her books. Or the roasted salmon made by the male lead in a different book.

How she would close her eyes and hold her cheek in delight, moaning with each first bite and turning me on so badly that I could barely think straight.

How the warm light flickered against her pale skin, dancing along the creases of her smile.

How she huddled up against my side with several bundles of blankets as the night got colder and eventually ended up climbing into my lap with the excuse that I was a human radiator.

How she hummed in contentment and leaned back into my chest with heavy eyelids after filling her tummy up to the brim.

The way she dozed off in my lap without another worry in the world sent a burst of warmth through my chest, making my heart flutter at the sight of innocent features. The light rise and fall of her chest with every breath. The adorable little snores as she snuggled deeper into my embrace. The way she wrapped herself around me as if was her safety blanket.