“What about you?” I ask. “Are you sure about this? About us? Your carefully crafted independence, your aversion to commitment…”
“Not so careful anymore,” she admits with a small laugh. “You kind of dismantled all my defenses when I wasn’t looking.”
“Professional hazard,” I tease. “PR guy, remember?”
She rolls her eyes, but her smile remains. “I’m sure, Lucas. I’ve never been more sure of anything. I want this. I want us. Not because it’s easy or because it makes sense on paper, but because loving you feels more right than anything ever has.”
I pull her closer, and our foreheads touch. “Nothing about this has been easy,” I murmur, “but it’s been worth every complicated, messy, beautiful moment.”
“We’re not perfect,” she whispers, echoing her words from the interview.
“But we are real,” I finish before closing the distance between us.
Her lips meet mine with six months of history and weeks of longing behind them. It feels like coming home and setting out on a new adventure all at once.
When we finally break apart, both breathless, I brush a strand of hair from her face. “So, Mrs. Carmichael, what happens now?”
She laughs at the formality. “Now we figure out whatour relationship looks like when it’s not for the cameras. When it’s just for us.”
“I think we’ve got a pretty good start,” I tell her, unable to keep the grin from my face. “Want to stay for dinner? I seem to recall promising you pasta.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” she says firmly. “Not tonight. Not tomorrow. Not ever.”
“Good.” I pull her close again, marveling at the fact that I can, that this is real, that the woman who challenged and frustrated and fascinated me from the beginning is choosing to stay. “Because I’m not letting you go again.”
We’ll still have to figure it out—what this looks like in the real world when the pressure’s off, when it’s just two people building something without a script or a contract or cameras. There will be hard conversations and compromises, and probably some spectacular arguments.
But as I hold her in my arms, I know we can handle whatever comes our way. We’re not here to fix each other or change each other. We’re here to choose each other. Not because it’s easy.
But because it’s worth it.
forty-three
. . .
Jess
The first timeI walked into Lucas’s apartment, I had no intention of staying. I brought one box of props. I had one foot out the door even as I stood in the middle of his pristine kitchen, silently judging his Disney decor.
Now, as I step inside again, everything feels different. The space hasn’t changed, but there’s something new underneath it: a warmth that I’ve grown used to, a pull that feels like coming home.
Lucas drops his keys in the little dish by the front door, and I smile. I toe off my boots and wander toward the living room. The lighting is soft, and the city hums beyond the windows. He comes up behind me and wraps his arms around my waist.
It’s been a week since the doc wrapped and Lucas and I were finally honest with each other.
“It feels good to be home,” I say as I turn my head to look up at him.
“You sure?”
“About being here?” I ask, arching an eyebrow.
“About everything.”
I turn in his arms and slide my hands up his chest, my fingers brushing against the open collar of his shirt. “I’m not interested in going backward. Or starting over.”
His expression becomes serious as his gaze locks on me. “What are you suggesting?”
“I think we just stay married.”
