Relief hits so hard I have to close my eyes. When I open them she’s already moving, launching into me. I catch her—of course I catch her—hands firm under her thighs as she wraps around me like she’s been practicing ten winters for this. I stand with her, lift, and the world narrows to her breath against my mouth, her laughter, the way she whispersyesinto my lips like a vow.
“Let me put it on you,” I manage, voice rough with everything.
She nods, shaking. I slide her down, take her left hand, and push the ring home. It settles like it was waiting. She looks at it, then at me, then back at it like she’s memorizing proof.
“You’re mine,” I say, low and certain.
She drags me in by the collar. “Finally.”
I kiss her. Not gentle. Not careful. Not anymore. Heat smashes through me like a backdraft; she meets it with equal force, a hungry, joyous sound in her throat that ruins me. Snow hisses against the stones around the pit, melting where our bodies throw off heat. Her hands find my jaw, my hair, my shoulders. My palm curves at her spine and tugs her flush until there’s not a breath between us that isn’t shared.
“Axel,” she whispers into my mouth, breathless, reverent, demanding all at once. “Don’t stop.”
“Never,” I say, and it isn’t a promise for the moment; it’s a blueprint.
We come up for air, foreheads pressed, both of us shaking. The river murmurs beyond the trees. The mountain watches, old and patient. The ring glints in the firelight, and my name sits on her tongue like she plans to keep it there.
“Say it again,” I ask, because I want it burned into me.
“Yes,” she whispers, eyes bright. “Forever yes.”
I slide my hands under her thighs and lift her again, because I need to, because the part of me that ran toward her scream in the fire also runs toward her joy now and there isn’t any difference. She clings, laughing, kissing me until the world blurs. I turn, press her gently against the door of my truck and kiss her slower until the urgency turns molten and deep, kiss her like I intend to have another fifty years to practice.
When we finally stop, her breathing steadies. She studies me in that way she has—taking inventory, cataloging, filing away. “You planned this.”
“Since I was sixteen.”
Her thumb strokes the corner of my mouth. “It’s perfect.”
“You’re perfect.”
She rolls her eyes, but her cheeks go soft. “Don’t get mushy, Ramirez.”
“Never,” I say, meaning it, then break the rule to bend and kiss a tear from her cheek—the only sweetness I’ll allow.
We stand with the fire for a while, bodies together, hands linked, ring warm against my palm. She leans into my chest and I memorize the weight, the height, the exact way she fits. When the wind kicks, I shrug out of my jacket and wrap it around her; she steals it without pretending to argue, chin slotted into the collar like she was always meant to wear my warmth.
“Couple of the Year,” she murmurs, amused.
“Year is an insult,” I say. “We’re couple of the next fifty.”
She smiles into my shirt. “Ambitious.”
“I’m a firefighter. We write our own odds.”
She tips back and looks at the ring again, as if it might be a vanishing trick itself. Then she looks at me, and the playfulness dims to something rawer. “I never thought I’d get here,” she admits. “Not just to this property. To this… peace.”
“You built it,” I say. “Brick by brick.”
“You were the foundation.”
I shake my head. “No. I was the idiot who stood at the fence line for a decade and promised I’d hold a light if you ever came home.”
She rises onto her toes and kisses me for that, slow and grateful. “Thank you for not giving up.”
“I did,” I confess, throat tight. “Sometimes. Then I’d wake up and the only thing that made sense was to try again.”
“You’re stubborn.”
