54. Helen
HELEN
My head rests on Liam’s pillow. Crisp cotton drapes over my skin, and I’m very aware that I’m wearing nothing at all.
I open my eyes sluggishly.
Morning? No. The light seeping through the curtains isn’t pale. And Liam isn’t beside me. That’s the bigger clue.
Morning had already passed when he made eggs Benedict, then we played with Alaska along the shore. We had mocktails on the terrace while debating Mercer & Paw Studio’s expansion—and, once again, what to do with eighty-three million euros.
Then I dragged him back to bed. Smacked his bum. And we fucked.
Apparently that knocked me out cold.
I stretch, the sheet sliding over my hips, and the bedroom door opens.
My gorgeous, very-much-missed partner finally walks in, crosses the room, and comes to rest beside me.
“Good afternoon,” he says, kissing my lips, then my shoulder, then the curve where my neck meets collarbone.
“Who allowed you to be fully dressed?” I murmur, catching the hem of his polo and tugging him closer. My hand drifts toward the inseam of his shorts.
“Ugh…don’t do that,” he groans. “You know I’m useless when you start going all in on me.”
“You were about to wake me up?”
“No. Just checking on you.”
“What’s for dinner?” I ask. I’m enjoying this too much. Carrying his child has changed the balance in not-so-subtle ways. I can ask for the world and he’d start making calls.
“Are you up for a boat ride?”
I pretend to sulk. Consider. Sulk again.
“That’s a yes,” he says brightly, offering his hand.
I take it, and he pulls me up.
“Damn, Hellion,” he sighs, taking in my naked body. He catches me against him, his hold turning hard for a beat, like he might take me back down. But he groans and stops himself. “Forgive me just this once. We’re not missing the sunset.”
I rub myself against him.
His fingers loosen.
“Huh.” Something is different about him. I can’t place it, and I find I don’t mind not knowing. Not yet.
I layer up for the evening and follow him out.
Alaska is already waiting by the door, vibrating with expectation. We walk down to the pier behind the house. The water is calm, the sky already melting toward gold. He helps me into the boat carefully. Always carefully now.
We pull away from the dock. A breeze carries the scent of fading summer as the shoreline drifts backward.
By the time we reach the quiet stretch near the inlet, the sky is softening into something luminous.
We face the horizon and joke about ridiculous baby names while Alaska patrols the deck, overly invested in seagulls.
Liam turns off the engine.
The boat rocks gently, drifting. The horizon blurs where sky and water lean into each other. The sun lowers, flattening into a molten coin, and the light wraps around us.
He steps behind me and folds his arms around my waist.
For a second, nothing exists beyond the sound of water lapping against the hull and his heartbeat against my back.
Then he lets me go, only to turn me toward him.
He lowers to one knee.
“Liam?” My voice barely holds.
He reaches toward his pocket, hesitates, and instead takes my left hand in both of his.
“Helena, you know what I’ve learned about trust?”
I look at him, waiting.
“It’s never about who shows up first.” His thumb presses into my knuckles, thick and sure. “It’s about who they walk toward.”
His grip firms, a touch that hints at what those hands are capable of.
“You fight for people who don’t even know they’re worth fighting for. You chose me. And I chose you. I haven’t figured out everything. But I’m sure about this—I love you.”
He swallows.
“And I don’t want a life that doesn’t have you in it,” he says, the last words rougher than the rest. “Helena Mercer, will you marry me?”
For half a second I just stare at him.
Then my hand flies to my mouth.
“Yes,” I whisper.
Then louder, through tears and laughter, “Yes.”
I throw my arms around him. He catches me, rising with me, holding me as if I am both fragile and unbreakable. Our foreheads meet. The sky deepens behind him, the last rim of sun slipping beneath the waterline.
“No ring?” I tease.
He tsks. “I thought my eternal devotion would cover it.”
I fold my arms in exaggerated offense.
He turns—and that’s when I notice Alaska planted loyally beside him, her front paws dancing in place, waiting for direction.
Liam kneels again, whispering “still,” then unhooks something from beneath her collar.
A velvet box.
He opens it.
An emerald-cut diamond framed with deep rubies. The fading sun strikes the facets, and for a moment the ring seems to hold the last of the day inside it.
My hands tremble as he takes it out.
“You thought I’d forget?” he says.
I shake my head, laughing through tears. He slides it onto my finger. It fits perfectly.
“I love you, Liam Hunt,” I say.
We kiss as the sun disappears, and whatever it leaves behind feels trapped in his hands on my waist.
I glance at his shirt pocket. “Did you have something prepared?”
“What? No.”
I reach in and fish out the folded paper.
“Helena, no—” He makes a half-hearted grab for it but doesn’t truly stop me.
I unfold it and read the lines. I smile, then laugh, a rush of tenderness so sudden it humbles me. Because the words on paper are lovely, but the man kneeling in the fading light, choosing me without rehearsal, is everything.
A faint flush touches Liam’s cheeks when I tuck the paper back into his pocket. I kiss him without a word, and he seems too eager to make me forget about it. His arms circle my waist again as Alaska barks at a passing gull.
“You trusted her with the ring?” I ask.
“Good engineering,” he says, showing the secure hook on the box, “and a dependable test subject.”
Alaska wags, pleased with her contribution.
I let myself fall against him, his solid frame closing around me like a cocoon.
I once believed a heart belonged to whoever had been there the longest. Time, I thought, was proof.
But life, with all its tests and changes, doesn’t work that way.
In the end, time decides nothing, and what matters is who stands beside you inside it.
A heart belongs to the person who becomes impossible to replace.
Now I know who the person is.