Chapter 102 Laney
Laney
Istare at my hand for a full minute before I remember how to breathe.
The ring is still there.
It doesn’t disappear if I blink.
It doesn’t turn into something I imagined because I wanted it too much.
It’s real.
Saint is in the nursery with Emmy, talking to her like she’s a tiny adult who just made a very serious life decision. I can hear him through the baby monitor.
“…and you’re going to have to help me keep her from bossing us around. I’m counting on you.”
Emmy answers with a sound that might be a burp.
I laugh into my hand.
Then I do what any woman does when something wonderful and impossible happens.
I need to tell someone.
I grab my phone and hesitate.
My thumb hovers.
Then I hit call.
She answers on the second ring.
“Well, this is a surprise,” she says. “Everything okay?”
I look at my hand again.
Then I start crying.
“Oh no,” she says immediately. “Laney, what’s wrong?”
“I’m not—” I laugh and cry at the same time. “I’m not hurt. The baby’s fine. Everyone’s fine.”
“Then why are you crying?”
“Because Saint asked me to marry him.”
There’s a beat of silence.
Then:
A shriek.
A full, unrestrained, delighted shriek that makes me pull the phone away from my ear.
“He WHAT?!”
“He asked me to marry him,” I repeat, laughing now. “And I said yes.”
“Oh my God. Oh my God. OH MY GOD. I KNEW IT. I KNEW HE WOULD BUT I DIDN’T KNOW WHEN BUT I KNEW—”
I sink onto the couch, smiling so hard my face hurts.
“He did it in the living room,” I say. “Just… him. And me. And Emmy yelling in the background.”
“Of course he did,” she says. “That man would propose like he’s making a vow to the Constitution.”
“He was so nervous,” I say softly. “He tried not to be. But he was.”
“Oh, I love that for you.”
I look toward the nursery.
Saint is sitting in the rocker with Emmy, his big hand wrapped gently around her tiny fingers.
“He looks like he’s afraid the world might take us back if he blinks,” I say.
She softens. “He won’t let it.”
“I know,” I say. “That’s the thing. I finally know.”
“So when’s the wedding?” she asks immediately.
I laugh. “I literally got engaged an hour ago.”
“Doesn’t matter. I’m emotionally six months ahead of you.”
I hold my hand up again and turn it so the light hits the ring.
“I keep thinking I’m going to wake up,” I admit.
“You won’t,” she says. “This is your life now.”
I swallow.
“Yeah,” I say. “It is.”
When I hang up, I just sit there for a minute.
Then Saint appears in the doorway with Emmy.
“You told someone,” he says.
“Was it that obvious?”
He smiles a little. “You’re glowing.”
I stand and walk to him.
Show him my hand.
He takes it like he still can’t believe it’s allowed to be his.
“You okay?” he asks quietly.
“I’ve never been better,” I say.
And I mean it.