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“Oh my God,” she says. “Ryland, really?”
“Rosie Smithson,” I say huskily, reaching into my inside jacket pocket.
I take out the ring box, holding it in my closed fist. A closed fist is fitting because it’s violence and blood and tension that brought me here. But inside my fist is a glittering piece of metal, a piece of heaven that represents what I’m going to build with my mate.
Nobody can ever take this away from us.
“I love you so much,” I say. “I stopped believing I was capable of feeling before we met. But the moment I laid eyes on your photo, I loved you. I needed you. Now I know I could never live without you.”
“Oh, Ryland,” she whimpers, squeezing her hands together.
“I want us to start a family together,” I tell her. “I want to watch you grow your dream into a massive success. I want to give our children a chance at a better profession than mine. I want us to be together, happy, safe, for the rest of my life. Rosie Smithson, will you marry me?”
I open the box, revealing the subtle but sizable diamond, set within a band of icy silver. It’s the perfect blend of elegance and gorgeous size, just like my Rosie.
“Yes,” she cries.
I slide the ring onto her finger, just about able to push it onto her trembling hand.
We magnetize into each other’s arms. Our lips melt into each other burningly, our hands all over each other’s bodies.
“I thought you were going to ask if it was a trick,” I smirk in a break from the kissing.
“I’m done being skeptical,” she breathes, shivering against me.
“You never have to be,” I tell her, kissing the edge of her mouth.
She smiles and turns away from me.
“Still shy?” I tease lightly.
“I’m getting there,” she whispers. “I’ve always been so shy, but with you, Ryland, I feel like I can start becoming somebody else.”
“You don’t need to,” I rumble. “You’re perfect. I want you to be the person you can be, with a little help, with a little less stress… with your man always at your side, ready to kill and die to protect our family.”
“With love,” she moans. “Don’t forget love.”
“Of course, love,” I smile, bringing my lips to hers again, tasting her, needing her. “Always with love, my sweet Rosie.”
She moans through the kiss, the scent of flowers all around us, the sun resting hotly on my neck as she drags her fingernails across my skin.
Epilogue
Three Weeks Later
Rosie
“I feel much better,” Mom says, raising her coffee mug to her mouth and taking a dainty sip.
I giggle, waving a hand over Ryland’s – over our – luxurious estate. I have to keep correcting myself. My instinct is to shy away from any sense of ownership, but Ryland has sternly told me to consider everything he owns mine as well.
“We’re a family,” he snarled last night, his hand smoothing over my sex-sweaty back.
“Duh, you think?” I giggle. “Look at this place. Feel how comfortable these chairs are. Anyone would feel better here.”
She smiles over at me, her face shadowed beneath her wide-brimmed sunhat.
“Okay, smartass,” she laughs. “But it’s the truth. I don’t want to tempt fate, but I think this last bout of chemo, I think it was it, Rosie. Seeing you get engaged, seeing all the happiness between you and Ryland and little Chopper, it’s changed something inside of me.”
“I hope so, Mom,” I whisper, blinking back a tear.
“Hey, none of that,” Mom says.
I giggle, pawing at my cheek.
“It’s not a sad tear.”
“A happy tear, then?”
“Um, maybe,” I say, running my hands up and down my thighs as my eyes flit over the garden, to where Chopper jumps and yaps at the sky, snapping his teeth together like he’s catching butterflies only he can see.
“Maybe?” Mom says fiercely. “Make some sense, girl.”
“I’m pregnant,” I say.
I feel like I’ve dropped a heavy weight when I say the words aloud, as though all my anxiety has been storing in my belly, and now it’s finally released.
“Rosie,” Mom whimpers, laying her mug down with a trembling hand. “Is it true? This isn’t some millennial trick, is it?”
We’re so alike in that way, always fearing the tricks. But Ryland is helping me to progress from that, for us to grow and change together.
“No,” I say. “I’ve done four tests. I’m pregnant.”
I stand up, throwing my head back, letting out a crazy laugh.
“I’m pregnant,” I cry, letting my voice carry in the sky.
I’m laughing with relief.
I’ve kept this to myself for a day, but it feels like a year.
“I’m pregnant, I’m pregnant.”
Mom loops her arms around me, pulling me into a hug.
I cradle her close to me, holding her softly. She cries quietly into my chest, barely moving at all with each sob, and then leans back and wipes tears from her eyes.
