The adrenaline of the proposal finally began to settle, leaving the grand ballroom wrapped in a low, exhausted warmth. No one was permitted to leave tonight; Henry Vance had flatly refused to let a single soul cross the gates in the dead of night, forcing the entire inner circle to claim the estate's endless guest wing. Up in the main corridors, the older generation had finally retired to bed, leaving the heavy silence of the mansion to the younger crowd. Dane was more than happy with the arrangement. His dark gaze crawled over Annah from across the room, his mind already weaving a wicked, uninhibited thread of thoughts about exactly what he was going to do to little miss Vance behind a locked door tonight.
As the music faded to a soft hum, the girls collapsed onto the velvet cushions, th
