Chapter 15 #2
Normally, Aidan, Savvie, and Third went to the Daniels’ for the 24th. But this year, Dagger was on his farewell tour before retiring.
Allegedly.
He’d already retired four times. But he and Camden were doing a special gig or something. The farewell to end all farewells.
I snagged one of the paper plates Aoife had dropped on the coffee table before taking a seat beside Finn and Jake.
Picking up a couple slices, I watched as Aidan commandeered my TV and set up the movie.
I sometimes wondered how we’d reached this space in our lives where we watched kids movies and ate pizza and had built-in traditions that meant I could never escape my fucking family for more than two minutes over the holidays.
Then I’d stop thinking about it because living it was bad enough.
When that weird fucking skeleton darted around Christmas Town like Jake on too many Skittles, I muttered, “Why is it always this movie?”
“Tradition.”
I tipped my head back. “I hate tradition.”
“You love it.”
“I hate it.’
“You love it. You like being around your family—”
Ha!
“At their places!”
“You’re the one who insists they come here.” Her lips curved when I grunted. “The truth hurts, Grinch.”
“I’m not green.”
“That’s the only argument you have?”
“My heart doesn’t grow.”
“So you know the story.”
I sniffed. “I overheard Finn reading it to Jake one year.”
“Your heart grows.”
“Nah.”
“Grew for me. And other parts of you triple in size when I’m around.”
I chortled. “You’re not wrong, babe.”
“Anyway, not long until Die Hard starts.”
“It is a Christmas movie.”
“If you say so,” she sang, then glanced over her shoulder when the puzzle they were working on triggered an argument between Kat and Shay.
All while Kat intermittently conspired with Troy.
The true nightmare before Christmas. “Star told me Kat’s been on edge since she and Conor began looking into her family history. ”
“Is that the project we’re not allowed to talk about?”
“Yup.”
“So why are we talking about it?”
She clucked her tongue. “Man, you really did wake up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.”
“I think you’ll find I woke up on the right side of the bed because you were on my side and I was inside you. Plus, our apartment was empty.”
Color burnished her cheeks and she hastened to change the direction of our conversation: “Are you sure Victoria’s okay? It doesn’t feel right, her not being here.”
I patted her arm. “She’s fine. She said she’d be with us tomorrow.”
Finn, with his gaze locked on the screen, casually commented, “If you need some space, I’ll cover for you.”
Because that was our cue, I rumbled, “Yeah. I’ll just grab some snacks. Thanks, bro,” and slid out from the sofa and slunk over to the kitchen and then into my bedroom.
I didn’t have long because she was my radar and that meant she’d find me out. She always did. Even when I flipped back on myself and used goddamn skills that had cost multiple governments millions of dollars in training—Inessa knew where I was. Without Conor’s help.
For one night only, I wouldn’t begrudge that skill and would be grateful for it.
Pulling open the bottom drawer in my dresser in our walk-in closet, I retrieved the box and I hustled into our bedroom.
“In the future, don’t make plans on Christmas Eve because they turn you into a gnarly fucker,” I chided myself as I shifted ass around the bedroom, well aware that time ticked down.
I made it—barely.
When soft footsteps padded through this section of the apartment, I flicked off the switch and let darkness and the city’s ghostly lights illuminate the space.
Then, I waited.
The door popped open and I saw her peer through the gap. Even saw her surprise when darkness faced her.
“Eoghan?!” she demanded, pushing the door wider. “Where the hell are you? What does Finn need to cover for you?” She flicked the switch then jumped when she noticed me. “What are you doing?!”
I shot her a winsome smile. “What do you think?”
She blinked a few times. “You’re surrounded by rose petals and are on one knee. But I’m offended you don’t remember the whole ‘us at the church’ thing.” Still, her smile lit up her eyes as she slipped deeper into the bedroom, clearly curious, after closing the door behind her.
“Oh, I remember. And I remember how I was a jerk before—”
“You’re always a jerk,” she dismissed cheerily. “It’s kinda nice you being down there. I don’t have to strain my neck. Well? What’s going on?”
I proffered the small box to her. “You’re my wife, Inessa. You put up with too much of my bullshit—”
“You’re not supposed to swear when you’re proposing!” she reprimanded, but she laughed as she accepted the box without opening it. “Carry on!”
“You put up with my moods and my stalking and my incessant need to protect you, and I never really expected this Russian brat my da tied me to to be any of those things. I thought you’d be the millstone around my neck—”
“Charming!”
“Instead, I’m that for you.”
Her lips rounded and any amusement wiped from her expression. “You take that back!”
I jolted in surprise at her hissed demand. “What?”
“Take it back. Eoghan, you are not a millstone around my neck. You accept me. Don’t you see that? My god, you give me freedom when it pains you to do so, but you still do it. I have so much more freedom than I ever expected to have.
“I go to college and you let my sister meddle in our lives and her home is our second house because we spend so much time together—I never expected to have that. You gave me a safe enough space to bring her around. Never mind Victoria.
“If you were anyone else, I don’t know what would have happened to her because fuck, I couldn’t trust anyone in my father’s world with her.” She straightened her shoulders. “But fuck safety. You make me happy!
“You brought me this crazy family that drives me insane and has all these traditions. You never do what I think you will and are apparently going to buddy up with me in my reading nook. You consider me. All the time. Always.
“I’d have borne a battalion of heirs and daughters to marry off to allies by now if you were anyone else. With barely any time in between if you were anything like my father and kept on popping out girls. No freedom, no education, no bodily autonomy, no partnership, no joy.
“You are such a wonderful husband, Eoghan. Don’t you dare say otherwise in my presence.”
A shocked laugh escaped me. But my lips curved in surprised pleasure. “I know I have issues.”
“And I don’t? We get through them together and we’ll carry on doing that.” She shoved the box back at me. “I don’t want this, whatever it is, if you’re questioning the years we’ve spent together and are thinking I want to rewrite any of it.”
My Adam’s apple bobbed when she took a step backward. I surged upward, snagged her in my arms, and held her as close as I could, tucking her face into my chest with my hand cupping the back of her head. All while I rested my chin on her shoulder, encompassing her in me.
“That isn’t what this is about,” I rasped.
“Then what is?”
“You never got this.”
“Got what?”
“The ‘me on my knee’ thing.”
She paused, then released the softest, happiest of laughs. “You’re mad and I’m here for it, don’t get me wrong, but I didn’t need this, Eoghan.”
“All your damn books have these moments!”
“Not all of them.” She wrestled free of my embrace so she could stare back at me. “And they don’t tend to happen in a married couple’s bedroom, though the roses are a nice touch.”
My nose scrunched. “Well, I know you like the family around, but no way in hell was I going to do this in front of them—”
“This is your idea of a compromise, huh?”
“Exactly.” My expression softened. “You make me happy, Inessa. All I want is to make you feel the same.”
Her eyes widened. “You do, Eoghan. Every day.” Then, quick as lightning, she grinned at me as she pressed another soft kiss to my lips. “I have to tell you something.”
I immediately stiffened. “What?”
“I didn’t want to say… not yet. It’s close to the safe period.”
My tone sharpened with urgency, but I couldn’t dampen it. “What?!”
“I’m pregnant.”
The soft smile that curved her lips stole my breath, never mind her words. I stared at her. The glow. The gleam. The fucking joy.
I literally existed in her happiness.
My arms tightened around her. “I want to be there for all the appointments.”
“No way! You’ll have a gun to the doctor’s head—” She broke off. “If you don’t, you’ll be watching from a rooftop, won’t you?”
“Gun trained on the back of that fucker’s head.”
“Eoghan,” she whined, but her smile was gleeful. “You’re a nut.”
“My nut’s in you.”
“I refuse to call our baby ‘Nut.’”
My throat bobbed. “How about… Bump?”
She pulled back ever so slightly and grabbed my hands to rest them on her stomach. “No bump. Yet.”
“Yet.”
That effervescent smile made another appearance. “Yet.”
“I’m glad you didn’t tell Ma.”
She smirked, her angelic features darkening. “Holding my tongue was hard, but I refused for that to be the place I told you our family was growing.”
Passing her the box, I smoothed my fingers over the still-slim expanse of her abdomen. “Thank you, sweetheart.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Okay, so, now I think my Christmas gift sucks.”
“Doubtful.”
Unsure, I hitched a shoulder. “Open the box.”
She pulled back and slipped it open, not complaining when I kept a hold of her waist.
Her brows lifted when she came across a QR code on a piece of paper. Not a ring.
“Do you have your phone?”
“Of course I do,” she scoffed, slipping it from one of those magical spots on her person where she’d tucked it away in an outfit free from pockets.
She scanned the QR code and frowned at the image that popped up. “What is this?”
But I just shrugged, still trying to discern the faintest of changes in her. I’d be goddamn checking her out later, mapping every difference until I knew her body better than she did.
Utterly unaware of my intentions, her eyes narrowed as she increased her screen’s brightness and zoomed in on the picture where the damn elf sat that Finn had insisted was a good idea.
It taunted her with a cheery smile and a wave.
She wiggled her head from side to side as she tried to figure out the elf’s location, then stormed off, uncaring that she dislodged my hands.
Because they couldn’t hold her, I shoved them in my pockets and traipsed behind her, a wider smile curving my lips.
Here was me, thinking I still had it in me to keep her on her toes…
Inessa: 1
Eoghan: 0