Epilogue #3
“What?” he says, standing up.
“That’s what they always call you and Chase. He shocks people with his passes, and you awe them with your aerobatic catches.”
“Thus the name of one of our brands.” He studies me. “I just asked you to marry me. You haven’t answered.”
“I know. And I’m just saying that you awed me. All by yourself.”
“Not exactly all by himself,” I hear yelled out from the darkness below the balcony.
“What the—”
Suddenly, the backyard lights up with a million fairy lights, making it look like an enchanted forest.
And below are our family and friends.
“So, what’s it gonna be, Ainsley?” Chase says. “You gonna make us say aww by agreeing to marry this guy?”
It’s at this point that Damon pulls out a ring box and flips the lid open.
And if I wasn’t awed before, I am now.
Shocked and awed.
Damon
I’m still standing here, holding the ring. Wondering what is going through her head. Why she hasn’t said yes yet. I expected a few tears—everyone had told me to expect them—but it feels like it’s been an hour since I asked.
Actually, it feels like a lifetime of me waiting.
Of me knowing in my soul when she stepped foot into my life that she was it.
I mumble her name, almost in prayer, praying she will say the words I want to hear.
Finally, she turns to me.
Wraps her arms around my neck.
Smiles through the tears.
“This is overwhelming,” she says.
I can’t even reply. I just look into her eyes and wonder if I screwed this all up. If it is too much, if I’m too much. If I should have done what my sister suggested and just sat her down in front of a roaring fire and asked her.
But I wanted to do it up big. I want to give her everything she’s ever dreamed of. Because she makes me happy. So stupidly, incredibly happy.
I lean back and hold the ring up. “And this?”
“Oh yeah, that. That’s a big, fat, shocked-and-awed yes.”
I put the ring on her finger as everyone below cheers.
Then I kiss her.
I look at the charms on the bracelet that I gave her, touching the butterfly, and repeat the words I said then, the same ones I said after we fell in love in less than two weeks.
“This is the most important one. Because you’re my butterfly. My soulmate. And you always will be. I don’t care where we live. What we do in life. You. Will. Always. Be. My. Butterfly. And I love you.”
“I love you too,” she says, giving me a big kiss before yelling out to the crowd, “Does anyone have a pregnancy test?”
And I can’t help but hope someone does and that it turns positive.