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I still had the other little package resting in reen Santa paper was a box… a ring box

My eyes shot up to look at hi at me

I looked down at the box, alh ed

It was hard to s Is he doing this now? Is now theto askto say? A to say yes! Why wouldn’t I? Look at hi and thoughtful You have no idea how much I love you, Ryan Christensen Yes! My answer is yes!

I carefully opened the lid to the white box The hinge on the box was quite stiff; I had to use extra force to separate it My eyes adjusted as I took in the sight of the ring nestled inside

A slight gasp of air stuttered down hts readjusted to a new response

Inside was a beautiful silver ring with a huge oval garnet surrounded by an intricate Celtic knot on each side of the setting

"It’s beautiful!" I sighed "Thank you!" It ht and the earrings and necklace I unwrapped this ht hand "It’s sterling I had it inscribed It says ‘My heart is yours’ "

After he showedfinger It fit perfectly My hand shook slightly

"I said that the property is for our future, and I mean that Even if it’s just to put a vacation home there No decisions have to be made now And e’re both ready, I intend to put a few rings on this hand" Ryan raised ers to his mouth and softly kissed my left hand

In a blur, the ten days Ryan had off had dwindled down to three We spent two days in Pittsburgh with his fa back and forth It was slightly easier to h the airports if people didn’t expect him to be there, but ere still stopped by a few fans that spotted him

All I kneas that the preciousaway

New Year’s Eve had arrived and my pub was packed A few die-hard fans traveled to the little town of Seaport after it was published in thethe holidays in his little secret love nest in Rhode Island

Ryan had hired Mike to be his personal guard full-ti that Mike was in the bar with Ryan for our evening celebration

Cory’s friend Trevor was tending the door andan extra buffer around Ryan, just in case

The band on stage was ja behind the bar I looked over at Ryan and s my Mitchell’s Pub cap; Mike sat on one side, Pete on the other, Gary was sitting next to Pete The guys were drinking and talking and just having a great tirinned whenever he laughed hysterically at their conversations I was grateful to the crowd too; for the most part his fans just aded to sneak in to talk to hiirl stepped up to hiuys intervened Needless to say, no worabbed two bottles of beer out of the cooler, only to look up and see Kyle standing on the other side of the bar I gasped, slightly startled that he was here

"Can I get one of those,at the bottles in ht with you," I unconsciously responded with a s to oing to be pissed that Kyle was here Ryan was laughing heartily until he noticed my expression His unspoken words of concern instantly turned to anger when he eyed Kyle on the opposite end of the bar Ryan stiffened in his chair and stared Kyle down

I slid a bottle over to Kyle, who had wedged his body conveniently between two ladies to get to the bar

"I see pretty boy is happy to seeof his beer

"Don’t start, Kyle," I warned and quickly hurried out fro him by the sleeve of his leather jacket to speak to hiht now, if you have any weapons on you," I asked, knowing that he had a per of his beer and patted the space under his right arm "I never leave home without it!" he stated proudly