Page 159 of The Midnight Defensive
Vivian covers her mouth again as I carefully slide the ring from the box so we can look at it together.
One step at a time.
Her entire face crumples. because she knows. She knows what those words mean.
To her. To me. To us. The late-night conversations. The healing.
Her mother slowly rebuilding trust letter by letter, visit by visit. The way Vivian learned that love wasn’t supposed to feel earned through exhaustion.
The way I learned being vulnerable didn’t make me weak. That letting someone in also doesn’t make me a liability. It simply makes me a human having a human experience.
One step at a time.
“I love you,” I say, my voice rough now. “I love your giant heart and your terrifying organizational skills and the way you somehow turned my teammates into a crafting group.” She laughs through tears. “I love that you believe people can heal. I love that you stayed in the beginning when I made it hard. And I swear to God, Viv, there has never been a single day with you that hasn’t made my life better.”
I swallow hard.
“You’re my favorite person. My home. My peace.” I shake my head slightly. “And I don’t want to do another season or another holiday or another ordinary Tuesday without you beside me.”
Her eyes close briefly. Then open again, shining, blinking back tears.
“So…” I say carefully, because suddenly breathing feels difficult. “Will you marry me?”
“Yes.” Her words are immediate before she says it again, laughing and crying at the same time. “Yes. Oh my gosh, yes.”
Relief slams into me so hard I nearly fall over. She drops to her knees in front of me just as I slide the ring onto her finger, and the second it’s there, she throws herself at me.
I catch her easily,laughing against her mouth as she kisses me hard enough to nearly knock me backward onto the sidewalk.
Somewhere nearby, people start clapping. Neither of us cares.
“I can’t believe you did this here,” she says against my lips.
“Well technically I tried to do it in the alley.”
She laughs loudly. “But the gate was locked.”
“So I dropped to my knees.” I shrug. “Pivot, right?”
She pushes my hair back and kisses my lips. “You are so dramatic.”
“You love it.”
“I do.”
We dissolve into laughter before I pull her to me, holding her close underneath the evening sky. The city keeps moving, hockey season starts soon, and I get to start planning a wedding. With her. With Vivian. My love.
And somewhere between the laughter and the tears and the feeling of her body next to mine, one thing becomes crystal clear:
Every single road in my life was always leading me here.
To this place.
To this moment.
To Vivian.
And I wouldn’t change a single thing.
