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“If you were going to succumb to a woman—” Chase nodded his head in greeting when Pen turned to look at them “—that’d be the one to lie down for.”
“I’ve tried,” Zach mumbled through numb lips. She was the one ending it. He was the one who wanted to keep her close.
“Try harder.” One more cocky tilt of his lips and Chase was gone.
Rather than make another excuse that he had tried, Zach considered that maybe he hadn’t. That maybe a fake engagement wasn’t enough for the woman who spelled out future with a capital F.
Like the F dangling from the bracelet on her wrist.
His. Pen was still his. She needed to know that the engagement he’d thrown out as a distraction had become real for him. That was what Chase had meant when he’d told Zach to try harder.
Decisively, and damn that felt better than uncertainty, Zach slid the balcony door aside and stepped out into the heated air with his fiancée.
“Is it time?” Her tone was neutral, her body held in check. She was ready to unravel everything at that microphone, and Zach had about two minutes to stop her from doing it.
“We have to talk.”
Her fair eyebrows lifted. “Didn’t I get in trouble for saying something similar to you before?”
He didn’t break stride, reaching her in a few steps and cradling her elbow. The deep hues of a purple-and-pink sky had given way to ink-blue.
“We have to talk about the announcement,” he said, throat tight, sweat beading on his forehead, and not from the summer temperatures. He wasn’t at the mercy of his nerves—not ever. Not when he proposed to Lonna years ago, or when he proposed to his ex-wife in Vegas, but now that he was faced with proposing to Penelope, there was no other word for it.
He was nervous.
Not only did he have no idea if she’d say yes, but he was almost positive she’d say no.
He needed her not to say no.
Not just for him. For herself—for their daughter. For all of them.
“Penelope Brand.” He cleared his throat, the seriousness in his tone causing her lips to softly part. He lifted her left hand and thumbed the engagement ring he’d placed there on a whim. Or some kind of mental dare. Now that he knew her inside and out, and knowing she’d bear his first child, he knew better.
It might have started out as a whim, but now? He meant it.
“I know what we have started out as fake, but over the past several months, having you at my side, being with you day in and day out... The announcement that you were pregnant, learning we’re expecting a daughter...” He trailed off, the magnitude of what they’d shared stealing his breath. “The reality is, Penelope—” he locked his gaze on her startled one “—this isn’t fake. Not anymore.”
“Zach...”
“Let me finish.”
His eyebrows closed over his nose in concentration as the second hand rapidly ticked away precious minutes. Quickly, he reordered his thoughts. Now to deliver them in the most genuine, efficient way possible.
“We’re good together,” he told her. “Not only in the bedroom. As a unit. We’re learning our way, and I probably have further to go than you do, but we’re committed to the same important goal. Raising our child surrounded by so much love she’ll never want for anything.”
Pen’s eyes filled and she blinked. In her expression, Zach saw hope—hope that gave him the courage to continue.
“I love our daughter with a fierceness I didn’t know was possible. I care about you, Penelope. I don’t want to end what we have because your PR timeline says we should.”
Her expression blanked. He couldn’t tell if she was shocked or in agreement, or if she felt equal measures of both.
He thumbed her diamond engagement ring so that it was centered on her finger. Then he looked her dead in the eye and forced past his constricting throat, “Will you marry me? For real this time.”
In the space of one heartbeat, then two, Pen only stared. Then her lips firmed, tears streaked down her cheeks and she tugged her hand away from his.
* * *
Pen swiped her tears away almost angrily as the city melted in her watery vision. She sucked in a gulp of air, calling upon her very strong constitution for assistance. Her heart was cracked when she’d arrived.
