Hurting for him, for whatever was holding him back from fully embracing his son in his life, she looked for something worthwhile to say to him but couldn’t find it. And maybe she was taking a step back herself, because she knew it wasn’t her place to help Wood find himself.
“The reason I made such a big deal of the educational differences between us, of my lack of education when we first met, is because I’ve felt like I’m lacking for so much of my life.”
The words were raw. Bald. Laying there in the near dark.
She felt like he’d volleyed her a live mine.
“If I’ve ever made you feel insignificant, or lacking in any way, Wood, I truly apologize. I hold you in the highest regard. And have the utmost respect for you. I might have given you the wrong idea about my father, but believe me, I didn’t think it was possible for any man to ever measure up to him in my eyes, but you do. Why do you think I wanted you to be Alan’s father after birth, not just during conception? It wasn’t because of how I thought I felt about you, but because of what I saw in you that he needed.”
She couldn’t make out his expression in the shadows, and that frustrated her. Only the baby’s weight against her held her in place. And calmed her, too.
“I haven’t felt like myself since I met you,” he said, as though nothing she’d said had had any effect at all. “I’ve been uncomfortable. Not just with you, but within myself.”
Unsure where this was going, but sensing that what was happening was hugely important, she watched him, knowing she had to hear him out, no matter how much it hurt.
“I’ve been slowly realizing this for a while, but today...hearing you scream...when I thought I was going to lose you... I couldn’t doubt what was real. And then, Elaina...she called me on it...
“Meeting you showed me that the life I had wasn’t enough. That there was so much living to do of which I was unaware. Mostly, it showed me that I didn’t ask enough out of life for myself. Meeting you kicked my ass out of the safe zone I’d somehow slipped into. I will always be a worthy servant to those I love, but I can still have dreams of my own.”
Wow. If meeting her had shown him that, then she was very, very glad to carry the burden of her unrequited love for him. He’d given her Alan, and she’d given him back his ability to dream bigger. To want, not just do.
As her mom had said, it
was all meant to be.
He stood. Came over to sit beside her, one arm around her pillow again. They’d had a baby together that day and yet, other than a couple of hand-holding incidents, and some hugs, and knee touches, they still hadn’t been physically intimate.
“So now I’m asking, Cassie.” His free hand reached out to her, handing her something. She took it with her free hand and then saw what she was holding.
A small jewelry box. Ring size.
But it had to be earrings. A thank-you for having his child. It used to be a thing, men buying gifts for the mother of the child on the day of birth, and Wood was traditional like that.
Her free hand was holding their son’s bottom. She couldn’t get the box open.
“What are you asking?” She was staring at the box. She couldn’t help it. She’d made a deal that day, a life-and-death deal, and already, she was wanting more than she could have.
What was the matter with her?
“I’m asking for my own dream, Cassie. I’m asking you to marry me.” He flipped open the lid of the box that was still in her hand, exposing the biggest solitaire diamond she’d ever seen in real life. Bigger even than her mother’s, which she’d always thought huge. “Or rather, telling you that I believe I’m enough to make you happy, and hoping that you’ll marry me.”
Cassie held their son, aware of his warmth against her, needing it, and still holding the box, too. “But...my emotions are all in such a mess right now. I’m not going to take a chance on using you, Wood, on trapping you in a relationship that you’ll later wish you didn’t have...”
“Yet you’ll trust your son to love me.”
“I know he will.”
She had no doubt about that. None.
“What if I tell you I trust you to love me?”
She stared at him. Frightened all of a sudden. Her heart started pounding.
She’d made a deal with God.
And a promise to herself, too. She hadn’t thought about it in a long, long time, but sitting there, feeling completely trapped suddenly by all the things she needed so badly, just hours after she’d almost lost everything, she remembered the girl who’d sat alone at the cemetery the night they’d buried her father. Her mom and Richard had been at her dad’s house, cleaning out his stuff, and she’d taken the car...
She’d promised herself that she’d never, ever let herself fall so deeply in love with anyone that she couldn’t get over the relationship if it ended. As much as she loved her dad, she couldn’t be like him. Couldn’t spend her whole life pining for someone who’d chosen to leave.