Chapter Twenty-Two #3
“My middle name?” I asked, gaping at him while my brain tried to process the unbelievable information that this was an undiscovered comet. “Don’t you want to use yours? You saw it first.”
“I want to share the discovery with you.” He shrugged, a flush cresting his cheekbones. I couldn’t help the warmth that spread through me. “Mine is étienne, by the way.”
It was such a French name, and I adored the way it rolled off his tongue. “My middle name is Zhenyi, after the Chinese scientist. She was a famous mathematician and astronomer who proved the movement of the equinoxes and wrote about lunar eclipses.”
“I shouldn’t be surprised,” he said. “Very well, we shall name her C/1820 X1 Zhenyi-étienne and send our observations off to the Royal Society.”
I stared at the comet again, noticing that it had moved slightly. Astonishing!
“I have one more surprise,” Tarik said softly.
I straightened with a laugh. “I don’t think I can take much more.”
He pointed to the lower platform, where, to my shock, I saw the telescope I had built resting on its very small frame. I pursed my lips as he led me down to it. “I think gazing through that will be a disappointment after the Great Forty-Foot.”
“It’s yours. You built it. It should never feel less than.”
Such a sweet thing to say, but wrong, nonetheless.
I moved to the eyepiece and maneuvered the tube in the direction of the comet.
I frowned. The focus seemed to be off—the clarity would not be the same as the previous telescope, but since the comet was visible with the naked eye, it should be more than a fuzzy, odd-shaped white blob.
“Something’s wrong,” I began, lifting my head, only to see Tarik standing at the other end of the tube. “What are you doing? You’re blocking my—”
My words cut off abruptly as I noticed what he was holding up in front of the telescope.
A ring…a rose-cut diamond cluster ring.
An engagement ring.
“Tarik?” I wheezed.
His eyes shone with so much emotion that my knees nearly buckled.
“Lady Rosalin, I’m certain you already know that my heart is yours.
We are binary stars, forever destined to be gravitationally bound in orbit around each other.
You are my other half; the girl who makes me feel seen and cherished and present.
” He smiled as tears of joy sprang from my eyes.
“You must know I love you. Would you grace me with the honor of giving me your hand in marriage?”
I couldn’t speak.
“Say yes and put the poor sap out of his misery!” someone shouted from far below us, and I glanced down, sobs clogging my throat at the sight of a small crowd gathered there.
“Blake!” Zia squawked. “Don’t ruin their moment, you brainless clod!”
My parents stood with my baby brother, Bowen.
Then there was Blake, Ansel, Ela and Keston, Zia and Rafi, and even my friends from Trinity, Will, the twins, and Harold.
My faithful lady’s maid and groom, Anna and Henry, grinned up at me.
And Caroline Herschel herself smiled like a tiny benevolent angel.
My eyes tracked back to the boy patiently waiting for my reply, all the love in the universe shining in his gaze. “You planned this.”
“I had help,” he said. “From your mama, your friends, and even the duke, who only reluctantly gave his permission after hours of my groveling and signing a contract in blood stating that I will never let you want for anything or so help me God.” I let out a choked laugh.
“So would you make me the happiest man in the world, Lady Rosalin Zhenyi Chen?”
I stared at the boy I loved most in the entire cosmos.
“Of course I will.” I laughed through my tears as he kissed me. Cheers from below filled the air. “But first, I have a few very vital questions for you that may impact my decision.”
He smirked. “Another examination?”
I nodded solemnly, mentally flying through the specifications of my marriage plan and checking off each one.
Scholarly aptitude and ability to engage in intellectual discourse—check.
Progressive stance on women’s status and rights in the aristocracy—check.
Emotional breadth and depth—check. Political views in favor of changing antiquated laws—check.
Physical compatibility—extra check. I blushed at the last. “Possibly worse than the Tripos,” I told him.
Tarik held me close, wearing that smile I so adored, his bright blue eyes sparkling with challenge. “Do your worst, my lady. I look forward to proving my worth.”
I wanted to tell him he already had, but where was the fun in that?
“Very well,” I said, thinking hard, though it was quite impossible with the smitten way he was staring at me. “How many prime numbers exist between one and one hundred?”
“Too easy.” Grinning, he peppered my brow, cheeks, and lips with kisses instead, and it was only when we had climbed down the tower to my friends and family that I realized he had kissed me exactly twenty-five times…the correct answer to my question.
“Did you answer me in kisses?” I asked as we reached the bottom.
“Impressed yet?”
I pouted. “I should have said between one and one thousand.”
My very creative and clever fiancé winked. “According to the Sieve of Eratosthenes, then I shall owe you one hundred and forty-three more.”
Sieve of Eratosthenes…Be still my beating heart.
It was a simple ancient algorithm from a Greek mathematician in the third century BC that said any multiple of a prime number could not be a prime number. As two was a prime number, then four, six, and eight or any other multiples of two would not be prime numbers, and so forth.
Who said mathematics couldn’t make one swoon?
Because after nearly four interminable seasons, I had truly, finally, found my perfect match.