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After pulling on his boxers and digging through his drawers for a moment, he returns to my side, but this time, he lowers to one knee.
“I don’t know else to show you how serious I am. How certain I am. How much you have me like no one else ever could. I think about the future,” he whispers, the words coming out in a rush, “and there’s no version without you in it that I want. And not just as my Marionette. I want you as my friend, my wife. I don’t want you standing behind me in that throne room. I want you sitting at my side.”
Tears stream down my cheeks.
“I want to get a house somewhere. Anywhere you want. Maybe on a hill with a view.But somewhere close enough to a city so you can join an orchestra and play your violin, if you want to. That way, we won’t have to be at the estate all of the time. And if we have kids”—his voice breaks—“we can raise them far away from all of this. We can do better than our parents did. Wewilldo better. I’m sure of that.” He gives me a small, rueful smile. “I’m hoping for at least two, but I’ll take as many as you’ll give me.”
“Reid,” I say, my voice sounding more like a choked sob.
“I’m so sorry for how everything has turned out. I’m so sorry for hurting you. And I’m sorry for not doing this the moment she showed up here. But please let me spend the rest of my life trying to make it up to you.”
He flips open the small black box in his hands, and my breath catches at the ring waiting inside.
“Is that a…?”
I run my finger along the side of the ring, and sure enough, a small blade springs free.
“I know it’s a bit much,” he says hurriedly. “And if you’d rather have something simpler, I can—”
A small, delighted laugh breaks free, and the worry in Reid’s face eases.
“I was hoping if you liked it, you might let me have this one back.” He trails his fingers over the ring currently on my hand, then loosens the empty chain hanging around his neck, the one he’d used for my ring to keep it safe while I was gone.
“I’ve decided, so no matter what your answer is, I’m going to call it off tomorrow. There’s a much better chance for negotiations with Anya now that her dad is gone. And this is my decision and mine alone. You will carry none of the burden, you hear me? I know there are a million things left for us to work out, but let me worry about them. I don’t want you to think about anything other than if you want to spend the rest of your life with me. For you. And you alone.”
There’s no way he happened upon a ring like that. It must have been custom designed. How did he…?Whendid he…?
I realize upon closer inspection that amid the cluster of diamonds are a few other stones—a perfect match to the ones in his new crown.
“Valerie Josephine Darkmore.” He pauses and smiles, like he likes the way my name sounds in the silence of the room. His eyes search my face, taking in every detail. “I am helplessly, endlessly, eternally in love with you, in this life and whatever others we may get. And there is no one but you I’d want by my side through whatever comes. You have my heart, my soul, my mind, my body, and everything I have to give.” He inhales deeply, a flicker of uncertainty crossing the lines of his face. “Will you marry me?”
I press my lips to his before he finishes the question. “Yes,” I breathe against his mouth. “Yes. A million times yes.”
His smile is breathtaking, so wide and pure and genuine, the kind I never see when anyone else is around. He pulls back enough to slide the ring on, then hesitates when he’s done, holding my finger like it’s something breakable.
“Here,” I murmur, reaching up to remove the chain from his neck. I slide off my old ring, loop it through the chain, then secure it around his neck. It falls beneath his collarbones, and I kiss his jaw, his cheek, his forehead, then let out a giggle as he climbs back into the bed beside me.
“What?” he murmurs as I tuck myself into his chest.
“You just proposed to me in your boxers,” I say with another laugh.
He laughs too as he kisses the top of my head and laces his fingers through mine. “It wasn’t exactly what I’d planned. I can do it again.”
“It was perfect,” I whisper. “I promise. I don’t care about any of that stuff. I just want you.”
He pulls me closer, and I close my eyes as we curl around every part of one another, as if having more points of contact will anchor us together.
“At least two kids, huh?” I murmur.
His fingers still in the path they’re tracing against my back. “We can talk about it. If that’s not something you want, I’m fine with that too—”
“I was thinking four. Too many?”
His arm tightens around me as his lips press to the top of my head. “Four sounds perfect,” he breathes, a smile in his voice.
I smile back, tracing the pattern of freckles along his forearm and up his biceps.
His knuckles find my chin and tilt my face up. “I love you,” he murmurs before bringing his lips to mine.
