Chapter 37 #2
We sat in the silence for a beat, heavy with everything we hadn’t said for over a decade while I worked up the courage to come clean. “I didn’t trust you,” I said softly. “When I got the Seattle offer. I didn’t tell you because I was afraid you’d step back and let me go without a word.”
“Because that’s what I did once before.”
“That’s the past. We were babies.” I paused. “Maybe we’ve grown up enough to get it right this time. To not be scared.”
His mouth quirked. “You think so?”
“I do. Because when I watched you run into that fire to save my dad, I knew.”
“Knew what?”
Everything inside me shifted. Softened. Realigned. “That I’m not scared anymore.”
His hand brushed a loose curl behind my ear. Soft. Intentional. Dangerous in the way only he could be.
The space between us wasn’t empty anymore. It was electric.
I’d once waited for him, and he hadn’t come.
But now…he was the one who waited. Who stayed.
Who gave me space not to leave but to choose.
“I know you’ve been the one always holding the line.
The protector. But I want to be that for you.
” I looked deep into his eyes. “I choose you, Tucker Colburn. Every day. Even when you hog the covers and leave your boots in the middle of the room for me to trip over on my way to the bathroom in the middle of the night.”
“And you love me,” he murmured, sounding marveled.
I smiled through the sting in my eyes. “With every busted piece of me. And you should probably do a full inspection, because there are a lot.”
His mouth curved, the storm in his eyes clearing as he stepped into me, brushing a hand down my cheek, his voice thick.
“I don’t have a history of good things staying good, but this—us—isn’t going anywhere.
It can’t, because my heart beats only if it’s holding yours.
You’re a part of me, Haze, the very best part of me, as important and basic as breathing.
I feel things for you that I can’t even name. ”
For so long, I’d fortified myself with walls of wit, deflection, and the sharp edges I wielded to protect myself. But those walls crumbled now, coming down piece by piece.
He kissed me, soft and sure, then pulled back, his eyes softening on me as he let his emotions rise to the surface, no longer guarding himself from their weight.
I realized I could do the same. “God, I love you.”
“Then it’s a good thing I love you too.” He kissed me, then nipped at my bottom lip, giving it a little tug. “But you’re still banned from flammable materials.”
I grinned. “Says the guy who nearly set his turnout pants on fire that time I said I wasn’t wearing underwear.”
His eyes darkened. “You weren’t.”
“And whose fault was that?”
He didn’t answer. Just backed me to the wall and kissed me like we’d been apart for years.
Which, in a way, we had.
When I could think again, his hands were on my hips, his breath warm at my ear. “Just so we’re clear,” he whispered, “you’re mine now.”
“Always have been,” I whispered, sliding my hand up his chest. “And you’re mine.” My heart was full to bursting. “So…what happens next?”
“We stop making this so hard,” he said. “You stay here in Star Falls, or you go to Seattle—it doesn’t matter, we will make it work.”
I paused, thinking of Seattle, of what I’d wanted so badly to outrun.
“I want to stay in Star Falls,” I said, the truth unfolding as I said it.
“I want to work with Colburn Restorations. Get closer to my dad. Be with my friends. Mostly, I want to build something here, with you. I love you. I think I always have.”
He kissed me again, and against my lips, he whispered, “We start right now, together. No rearview mirror.”
“Yeah?” I asked on a growing smile. “Who’s driving?”
He was still laughing when he cupped the back of my neck and kissed me again, slow, reverent, like he was memorizing me cell by cell. We kissed until the hoodie I’d borrowed/stolen was officially optional and sex against the wall became a perfectly reasonable life decision.
Then he pulled back just enough to whisper, “Say it again.”
I cupped his stubbly jaw. “I love you.”
“Nice,” he said, voice husky. “But I meant the part where you’re not wearing underwear.”
I grinned, and he kissed me again, then pulled back, serious, voice husky. “There’s something I didn’t get the chance to tell you,” he said. “In that fire tonight…” He shook his head. “I realized I no longer wanted to wait.”
My heart took off again. “Wait?”
He held my gaze captive. “If I’d known about the pregnancy back then, I would’ve been there, Hazel.
I would’ve asked you to marry me, and regardless of your answer, I’d have raised our baby with you and never let you feel alone again.
I feel the same way now. From the day I met you, my goal was to be yours forever. ”
He would’ve stayed. Not out of guilt or duty—but because he loved me. Even back then, when I hadn’t known how to let myself be chosen. He pulled something from his pocket. “I’m not missing another chance.” Then he dropped to a knee, that little black box in hand.
I stared at it, then him, my brain short-circuiting. Wait—was he doing what I thought he was doing? “Are you—are you asking me to marry you?”
“Yes.”
My breath left my body. Maybe my soul too. “How did you even get a ring so fast?”
“I’ve had it since that night you left, so it’s not going to be all that impressive,” he warned. “But say yes, and I’ll take you to pick out any ring you want.” He flicked the box open, revealing a diamond ring—simple, beautiful, and very me.
I dropped to my knees in front of Tucker, reaching for him with shaking fingers. “I don’t need another ring. I just need this one, and you.”
“Is that a yes?”
My laugh cracked on a sob as I threw my arms around his neck. “Yes!”
He scooped me up all romantic-like, then tossed me to his bed like I weighed nothing at all. I was still laughing as I bounced, but it caught in my throat when he crawled up my body, looking at me like I was the most important thing in the world to him. And I knew.
We weren’t starting over. We were building something from the ashes—something messy and real and ours.
He brushed his mouth over mine, whispering, “Just so we’re clear—if you try to run again, I’m bolting myself to your bumper.”
I grinned, breath catching. “So…a healthy relationship built on mutual love and mild stalking?”
“Only if it starts right here. Just you and me. And eventually…not even this hoodie.”