“You’ve turned me into a maximalist too. No such thing as too much,” I say with a smile. “I just wish she could have been here to meet you. That’s the part that gets me sometimes. All the things she didn’t get to see. All the things she’ll never get to see.”
Lila stops skating.
She turns to face me and puts both hands on my face.
“She sees this,” she says. “I really believe that. She sees all of it.”
I close my eyes for a moment.
“Yeah,” I say, when I can. “I think so too.”
Tears slip down Lila’s cheeks. I brush them away with my fingertips. “Baby, what is it?”
The lake is turning to liquid gold beneath us as the sun emerges from behind the clouds, the mountains doubled in the ice. But Lila’s looking out at the snow-dusted peaks like she’s not seeing any of it, like her heart is breaking.
“I don’t know how I’m going to do it,” she breathes. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to let you go.”
“You’re not,” I tell her, voice husky. “You’re not letting me go any more than I’m letting you go. Not now, not ever.”
Lucky trots up to us, wagging her tail. Lila gives her a scratch between her ears, then looks up at me with her cheeks pink and her eyes wet and her breath coming in small clouds between us.
“But,” Lila starts to say.
I take both her hands.
It’s time to tell her everything.
Chapter 55
Roots
SLADE
“Icalled my agent three weeks ago,” I say. “Told him I’m retiring.”
Her breath catches.
“I’m not going to Denver,” I say. “I’m not going anywhere. I want to stay in Marble Falls, at Wild Rose. I want to wake up in bed with you every morning and work this land and watch you turn everything you touch into better-than-gold.” My fingertips trace her cheek. “You’re building something here. Something real and beautiful and brand-new, and I want to be the man standing next to you while you do it.”
Her eyes are very bright.
“You walked into my life,” I say. “And you changed everything. You made me want things I’d spent years telling myself I didn’t need. I want to put down roots and call this place home and mean it. As long as you’re making it a home with me.”
The mountain peaks turn golden as the clouds move awayfrom the sun. Tear tracks shine on her soft cheeks as she gazes up at me. My wife.
“I love you,” I tell her. “I’m completely head over heels in love with you and I’m done keeping that to myself. Words still ain’t my strength but you’ll be hearing those three from me every single day of our lives, I promise you that.”
I go down on one knee on the ice. She’s already wearing her diamond ring, so I trace it as it rests on her finger.
“Marry me. For real. Eyes open, no deals, no expiration date.” I kiss the back of her hand. “Just you and me. Forever.”
She launches herself off her blades and into my arms.
She’s laughing and crying at the same time, her arms locked around my neck, her legs around my waist, her face pressed into the side of my neck and her tears cold against my skin in the cold air. Lucky barks around us and attempts a twirl before scrambling on the ice and catching herself.
Then she pushes her nose between us and shoves her whole head against Lila’s hip. Lila laughs through her tears and wraps one arm around Lucky’s neck, the other still around me. The three of us are standing on a frozen lake in Montana, but I’ve never felt warmer in my life.
“Yes,” Lila says, into my neck. “Yes. A million times yes.”
