Emma laughed, absolutely in love with this new silly side. And his hopeful side. And the side of him that looked toward the future—and saw himself there. Really, she just loved all of him.
Some of his newfound—and hard-fought—optimism was having the threat behind them—Caine knew more about it than Emma did. She didn’t want to hide from the truth, but her psyche didn’t need all the disturbing details, either. What she’d been willing to learn was that Wilkerson had targeted her from almost his first day at Frederick Elementary, judging by time stamps on photos and videos they found on his phone. But now that was all over. And Emma had quickly been cleared of any wrongdoing in his death.
Some of it was the way they’d opened up to each other in the wake of nearly losing everything. Shooting Wilkerson was something she’d remember forever. Taking a life wasn’t a memory she liked having, but it also wasn’t something she regretted. Not given the circumstances. And it gave her a whole new understanding of the shooting Caine had described to her. She couldn’t blame him for it, not when Emma would’ve shot her attacker again even after she’d disarmed him. It was a terrible thing to know about herself, but it was true. And they didn’t hide from the truth.
For Caine’s part, opening up had meant that he had to face the trauma he’d endured. He had to walk through the terrible messy pain of it. It’d taken him four introductory appointments before he found someone he thought he could actually talk to, but he had found someone, and he was going to therapy. And that was huge.
“Dude, I’m sorry, but sixty-seven dollars is not enough for all this.” She slipped out of bed and strutted her nakedness to the door. If she didn’t get in the shower soon, she was going to see her kindergartners again smelling like two hours of sex.
“What about this, then?”
The oddness of his voice made her lean back in the doorway. “What?”
Caine was getting on his knees by their bed. Also totally naked. He held a blue velvet box in his hand that he opened while she watched.
“Caine,” she gasped, the room spinning around her.
“Marry me,” he said, those odd, pale eyes nearly glowing. “You’re so fucking perfect for me, and you have been since the first moment we met. You’re already my everything, Emma. So marry me.”
She went to her knees in front of him, and thought it was perfection that they were both bare in this moment. “Anything, Caine. Everything. You know I want it all with you. I’ll marry you. How could I not when I love you so much?”
He slipped the ring on, a commitment to always be there for each other. To always believe. To always try.
A commitment they made every one of the many days, months, and years that followed after that. Years that included Emma finishing her graduate degree, Caine becoming a regular volunteer at the LGBT youth center they’d donated to that first Christmas, and a baby girl with Emma’s blond hair and Caine’s pale eyes. A daughter they named Grace.
* * * *