Chapter 26 #2
Her fingers tightened in mine, lacing fully, gripping with a kind of quiet insistence that didn’t match the way her chest rose too fast, too shallow, betraying her.
Tears gathered before she could stop them. Just there—filling her eyes, spilling over without permission, tracking warm down her cheeks in a way that would have mortified her in any other room, in any other moment.
She didn’t wipe them away.
Didn’t seem to realize they were there.
Her entire world had narrowed to a single, fixed point.
Me.
“I believe you.” The words barely existed outside of her mouth—soft enough that they might have been swallowed entirely if I hadn’t been watching for them, if I hadn’t been close enough to feel them more than hear them.
I held her gaze for one second longer, then I turned back to the room. The sound rushed in a fraction—just enough to reestablish the space, the weight of it, the expectation waiting to be filled.
I cleared my throat, the motion sharp, grounding. “I love Beatriz Ribeiro,” I said, my voice steady again, carrying cleanly across the microphones and into the silence that followed. “She frustrates me to all hell.”
A faint ripple moved through the room—uncertain, caught between reaction and restraint.
I let the smallest edge of something lighter touch the words before it settled again.
“But I truly do love her,” I continued, more deliberate now, each word placed exactly where it needed to land. “And our relationship is absolutely real.”
The shift was immediate.
The room inhaled.
And then—“Alois,” someone called, pushing forward, voice sharper now, cutting through what little calm had settled. “You’ve said things like that before. How do we know this isn’t just more of the same?”
The question hit.
Hung there.
I didn’t answer it.
Didn’t look at them.
Because there was nothing I could say that would matter more than what came next.
Actions always spoke louder.
I stepped away from the podium.
The movement pulled the room with it—cameras adjusting, bodies leaning forward, attention snapping tight as the center shifted again.
Toward her.
Bea didn’t move.
Didn’t step back.
Didn’t break.
She held her ground, her breath catching once more as I stopped in front of her, close enough now that everything else—the lights, the voices, the pressure of the room—fell away at the edges.
Blurred.
Irrelevant.
The noise didn’t matter.
The room didn’t matter.
None of it did.
Not anymore.
“I don’t have a ring,” I sighed, not meant for the room but carrying anyway because nothing in this space stayed contained. “That part will be handled.”
A flicker—shock, disbelief, something breaking clean through the control she’d been holding together since she walked into this building.
Good.
Let it.
I held her gaze, steady, unwavering.
“Mais il n’y a aucune raison d’attendre,” I continued, the French slipping into place without effort, natural, deliberate, because there’s no reason to wait.
Her breath hitched.
Not subtle.
“Veux-tu m’épouser?” I asked. Will you marry me?
For a second—just one—the world tilted.
Not around me.
Around her.
I saw it happen in real time.
The fracture.
Her eyes filled immediately, tears slipping free before she could stop them, tracking warm and unguarded down her cheeks.
She didn’t wipe them away.
Her first breath came uneven, catching halfway through like her body didn’t know what to do with it.
Everything this could cost her.
Everything she had built.
Everything that could still fall apart.
And then—something else. Stronger.
She stepped forward. Closing the gap between us on her own terms, her hand lifting to my chest, fingers curling into the fabric of my jacket like she needed something solid to ground herself against.
Her voice, when it came, wasn’t steady.
But it was clear.
“Je t’aime,” she cooed, the French soft but certain, her gaze locked on mine in a way that didn’t allow for anything else to exist. I love you.
The room shifted again—sound pressing back in at the edges, cameras catching up, voices rising—she didn’t look away.
Didn’t let go.
Her other hand came up, framing my face, pulling me down just enough that the space between us disappeared entirely as her mouth met mine.
It wasn’t careful.
It wasn’t restrained.
It was everything she’d been holding back breaking loose in one clean, undeniable moment.
The room detonated.
Voices rose—questions, shouting, movement—cameras flashing in rapid succession, the sharp bursts of light cutting through the space in staccato bursts that should have pulled us back into it.
They didn’t.
She pulled back just enough to breathe, her forehead brushing mine, her eyes still bright, still wet, still completely, devastatingly focused.
“Yes,” she sang, the word landing between us in English now, deliberate, unmistakable. “I’ll marry you.”
The rest of the room disappeared.
Her hand slid down to mine, fingers threading through mine with a certainty that settled something deep and solid in my chest.
Around us, the noise surged—questions thrown over one another, names called, flashes going off in rapid succession.
None of it touched us.
I leaned in, pressing my forehead to hers, closing the last fraction of distance until the only thing I could feel was her breath against mine, the warmth of her skin, the steady, undeniable presence of her right there.
In front of me.
Choosing me.
Out loud.
For all of them to hear.
For all of it to see.
“Stay with me,” she murmured, the words soft, almost lost beneath the surge of voices rising around us, but I felt them anyway—felt them in the way her fingers tightened in mine, in the way her forehead pressed just a fraction closer, like she needed to be certain I was still there.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I said.
The truth of it settled between us immediately—quiet, solid, unshakable.
Not this time.
Not ever.
Her breath stuttered once, then steadied, syncing with mine in a way that felt less like coincidence and more like something finally falling into place.
The tension that had been riding her since the moment she walked into this building—tight, contained, relentless—eased just enough that I felt it leave her in a slow exhale against my mouth.
Around us, the room surged. Questions collided into one another, voices rising, bodies shifting, cameras flashing in sharp bursts of white that cut across the space like lightning.
The world we existed in—the one built on headlines and narratives and carefully controlled versions of the truth—scrambled to catch up, to reframe, to take what had just happened and turn it into something they could own.
We didn’t move.
Didn’t separate.
Didn’t give them anything they could use to pull us apart again.
Her hand stayed locked in mine, her grip firm, deliberate—not clinging, not uncertain, but chosen. Her other hand slid up along my jaw, steadying me just as much as I was steadying her, her thumb brushing once beneath my eye like she was mapping something she intended to keep.
I let my forehead rest fully against hers, closing the last fraction of space until there was nothing left between us but shared breath and the quiet, undeniable presence of her.
For the first time, there was no calculation in it.
No adjustment.
No waiting for the moment to turn.
Just her.
Just us.
Chosen out loud.
Chosen without condition.
The noise pressed in harder, the room trying again to reclaim us, to drag us back into something louder, sharper, easier to break apart.
It didn’t reach.
Not here.
Not anymore.
Because this—this wasn’t something they had built.
It wasn’t something they could take.
It wasn’t something either of us was going to let go of just because the world demanded it.
Her fingers tightened once more in mine, grounding, certain.
And I held on.
Not because I needed to prove anything.
Not because anyone was watching.
But because for the first time in my life, I didn’t have to brace for the moment it would be taken away.
I could just stay.
With her.
And that—that was everything.