“He’ll want a delivery date.”
“I think Tuesday.”
“Tell him yourself, Lockwood. I’m not getting cross-examined by a four-year-old before nine AM.”
He grins into his coffee. This year, he’s been doing more of that—grinning, easy, like his face has remembered how. I caught Bree noticing it at the last drop-off. She didn’t say anything; she just looked at him, then at me, and I think she was glad. I think we’re both finally glad.
He sets his mug down and leans against the counter across from me, arms crossed, just watching.
“What?” I ask.
“Nothing.”
“You’re staring.”
“I’m allowed to stare. I live with you.”
“That’s a stretch of the rules.”
“I’ll take it up with management.” He takes a sip of his coffee, still watching me. “Syd.”
“Yeah?”
“Marry me.”
I stop cutting.
The knife is halfway through a strawberry, and my hand freezes. I look up at him. He’s leaning against the counter in sweats and no shirt, holding a coffee mug with a chip on the rim that I’ve been meaning to throw out for six months, and he’s looking at me like he asked what I want for dinner.
“What?”
“Marry me.”
“Archer.”
“Sydney.”
I set the knife down. My hands are pink from the strawberries. “You’re proposing in the kitchen?”
“Yeah.” His mouth softens slightly.
“With no ring.”
“The ring’s upstairs. I’ve been carrying it around for a month. I keep almost doing it and then chickening out. This morning, I came down, and you were cutting strawberries and wearing my t-shirt, and I thought, uh, yeah. Now.”
“Now?” My eyebrows lift.
“Now.”
I press my hand flat against the counter to steady myself because my legs have gone a little weak. His eyes drop to my hand and then back to my face, and he straightens up off the counter and crosses to me. His hands find my waist, and the marble is cold against my back.
“I’m sorry it’s not more romantic,” he says quietly. “I know you probably pictured something else. A view. A speech. Some, uh—grand gesture. I had a whole thing planned for next week, I really did, but I can’t wait one more day, Syd. I’m sorry.”
“Arch—”
“I’m in love with you. I’ve been in love with you for fifteen years, and I wasted most of them, and I’m not wasting any more.” His hand comes up to my jaw, his thumb brushing along my cheekbone. “Be my wife, honey.”
My eyes are stinging. I press my palm against his bare chest, feeling his heart racing—fast, faster than his face shows. He’s nervous. Archer Lockwood, starting goalie, who once stopped a one-timer with his shoulder in overtime and then joked about it on camera, is standing in our kitchen at 8 AM with a heart rate that says otherwise.
