No Fair Lady

Oliver gives me a dry sidelong look. “It doesn’t matter what anyone calls you. You’ll always be you.”

“You say that like an insult,” I fire back.

Gray gives me a flat stare across the flames, his mouth twitching. “At home, we called you a black cat. We were afraid to say your name lest it summon you like some sort of demon and bring more bad luck.”

“Hey!” I scowl at them. “I wasn’t that bad—all right, I was that bad, but I—”

I break off as it hits me. I have to fight not to blush.

Everyone is smiling.

At me.

And trying not to laugh.

Oh, hell.

They’re teasing me.

After the torture I dragged them through while I was hell-bent on my own ends, after the way I used them, after the pain I helped bring to their town…

They’re here, helping me, teasing me.

Forgiving me.

I have to look away.

I almost can’t—I—it’s too much.

Think I’d rather face down a firing squad—which I have multiple times in the past—than look at those smiling faces and figure out what to do with these emotions building hot and bright in my chest.

Primly, I clear my throat, snapping the folder shut. “I suppose I’ll learn to be Laura. At least it’s an ordinary name no one will notice.”

Not quite as ordinary as Patty Brin, I guess.

But I’ve reinvented myself before.

I can do it again.

This time, I think I know what I want to be.

Someone with the capacity to be happy.

With gentle laughter, the conversation rolls on. I glance over at Oliver and find him watching me, golden flames making sparks against the bourbon of his eye. He holds his hand out to me.

I’m a little uncertain, still, showing affection in front of the others. But after a brief hesitation, I slip my fingers into his palm.

And find something cool and smooth and round resting there.

With a startled sound, I jerk my hand back, staring.

Holy…there’s a ring.

My throat closes. I stare at him, my heart hammering roughly. Everyone around the fire has gone quiet, watching intently.

“Oliver?”

He grins, one-sided and roguish. “Don’t just stare at me. Take it. I had to go through hell to get the damned thing back. Tracked it through almost sixty different pawn shops in eight states after those Galentron bastards ‘robbed’ me. Guess it’s a good thing I love you.”

My breaths catch when I realize what he means.

He bought that ring fifteen years ago.

And he’d meant to—he’d wanted to—

He wanted to marry me. Before dagger fate and conspiring cruelty cut that short and took him out of my life for far too long.

Now we’ve come full circle.

And here he is, looking at me with that devil-may-care smile and the absolute certainty that always made me have so much faith in him.

Even when I didn’t have faith in myself.

Still, I hesitate, biting my lip, even if it smudges my lipstick.

Dear God.

I don’t…I don’t know how to do this. All my life, I’ve been programmed for everything but appropriate emotional responses, and after a long, awkward pause I remember how to speak.

“You…you know we really can’t be—” I stammer out.

“We can be, Fuchsia, if we say we are. It was the same issue we faced years ago,” he murmurs, his wily, strong face so soft with promise. “It’s just a piece of paper. Don’t need that to make it real. I don’t need a fake identity and a fake marriage to make any of this exist. To make us real. As far as I’m concerned…”

He leans in. My face goes so cherry-red hot I’m about to self-combust.

“Patty Brin, Fuchsia Delaney, Laura Wellburton…whatever name you choose, you’ve always been mine. And you always will be, if you’ll have me, wildcat.”

I don’t know what to say.

I don’t know how to say yes.

So I show him.

Tumbling into his chair, practically leaping into his lap, I kiss him with the force of a hydrogen bomb.

Yes, I even freaking kiss him in front of every slack-jawed Heart’s Edge gawker, okay?

Even while he’s fumbling that ring from his palm onto my finger while he clutches me tight.

Everyone around us laughs, murmurs, so warm, as bright and cozy as this strange, strange feeling inside me. I suppose they’ve earned their show.

Hell, I don’t care.

I’m happy.

It feels like for the first time in my life, other people are happy for me, and I almost hate wondering.

Is this what it feels like to have a family?

I think I understand it better now. Why it was wise to leave Mandolin where she is, to wait for someday, when we can ease her into our lives.

Blood doesn’t always make family.

Sometimes, all it takes is love.

She has love for now. Someone else’s.

And there’ll be a time when it’s right to give her ours.

It’s a quiet night, after our hearts fall out on the messy ground in front of everyone. It’s a good thing this is the last time I’m sure I’ll see these people again, or I know I’d never live it down.