Silence stretches for a heartbeat, two.Then his thumb strokes the inside of my wrist, slow and deliberate, the same way he has touched me a hundred times in the dark.“I won’t live without, wife.”His voice is quieter now, but every word is carved from stone.“I have loved you for longer than I knew how to admit.Even when I was dragging you out of that Dallas bar, even when I was telling myself it was only strategy, something in me already knew you were mine.Not just my wife.My heart.My future.”
Fresh tears slip free, but these are different—lighter, mixed with a joy so bright it almost hurts.
I lift my head and meet his gaze, letting him see everything I feel.
Relief crashes through me again, wave after wave, until my shoulders tremble with it.He is here.He is breathing.He is looking at me like I am the only thing in his universe.
He turns his head just enough to press a kiss to my knuckles, the gesture so gentle it undoes me all over again.“The doctors told me you were calm and competent.I’m proud of you, my wife.So damn proud.”
The praise settles warm in my chest, but it also stirs the darker thoughts that have been circling since the doctor left the waiting room.
I glance toward the window where the Austin skyline glimmers against the night, distant and indifferent.
We’re at war now.And no doubt my family will be joining in.
“Things won’t be easy.”
They are already hard.
His fingers squeeze mine again, steadier this time.“But we will face the future together.You and me.”
I nod, but my mind drifts to Gina—Dante’s mother—sitting so composed in the waiting room earlier, her spine straight even though her son was fighting for his life.
I remember the quiet strength in her eyes when she cupped my cheek and told me Dante knew how much I cared.
How many nights has she sat in rooms just like this one, waiting, praying, holding the family together while the men bled?
And how can I be that strong?
The thought of carrying Dante’s child—our child—sends a flutter of fear through me.Will I be able to smile through the terror, to raise a baby who might one day wear the same bruises and scars?
The question lingers, but I don’t voice it.
Tonight is for healing, not borrowing tomorrow’s worries.This is the life I live, with the man whose side I will stand at.
I lean closer, resting my cheek against his uninjured shoulder, breathing in the faint trace of his cologne beneath the hospital soap.
He shifts his arm, careful and slow, until his hand rests at the small of my back.
The touch is possessive even now, even weakened, and it grounds me.
“I was so scared,” I admit against his skin.“When the shots started and you covered me…” When I felt his blood… When I thought that was it.“I was afraid I’d never get to tell you how much you mean to me.”
“You’re telling me now.”His voice rumbles beneath my ear, warm and sure.“And you stayed.You chose us.”
“I choose you, Dante.”
We stay like that for long minutes, the machines keeping time, the city lights flickering beyond the glass.
Tears come again, but this time, they are from relief and joy and the quiet, overwhelming knowledge that we love each other.
Eventually his breathing evens into something deeper as the pain medication pulls him under again.
I don’t move.Instead I stay, listening to the steady beep of his heart.
Outside, war has started.
Enemies are closing in.
