I blink. No. Surely no.
I stare at him to make sure the sleep deprivation hasn’t finally snapped the last thread of my mind.
He is completely serious.
I let out one small, disbelieving laugh. “What?”
“Marry me,” he repeats. Like saying it twice makes it less insane.
I look around the nursery as if maybe there’s another woman in here he could possibly be talking to. “Aleksei.”
He takes a step closer. He looks tired. More tired than I’ve ever seen him. There are shadows under his eyes, his shirt is wrinkled, and he has a line between his brows that only appearswhen he is trying very hard not to force the world into doing what he wants.
Which means he has thought about this. That is somehow worse.
“I know the timing is bad,” he says.
I almost laugh again because that is the understatement of the century. The timing isn’t bad. The timing is deranged. We have just brought home a newborn. I still walk like I lost an argument with a truck. His mother tried to kill me. The city is probably still bleeding around whatever war he’s fighting.
And he wants to propose now.
“Bad?” I whisper. “That’s the word you picked?”
The corner of his mouth almost moves. “I’m trying to stay calm.”
That helps and does not help.
He reaches into his pocket.
My stomach drops. The ring.
He doesn’t get on one knee. Thank God, because if he did, I might actually leave my body from the sheer overload of it. He just opens the box and holds it there between us.
My chest tightens.
“I brought this once before,” he says.
I know.
“I shouldn’t have waited.”
“Aleksei…”
“I love you.” His voice stays level, but there’s too much in it to mistake. “I love our son. I want this made formal, protected, unquestionable. I want you under my name where no one gets to treat you like a mistake.”
God.That goes straight through me.
Because that’s the thing. It isn’t just a proposal. Not for him. It’s love, yes, but it’s also safety. Legitimacy. A shield. A promise. A claim. Everything he knows how to give all tied together in one unbearable offer.
And some huge, aching part of me wants to say yes.
Wants it so badly it almost hurts. But wanting is not the same as being ready.
I look at him. At the ring. At his face. At the man who would absolutely build a fortress around me if I let him and call it devotion. And I know, with painful clarity, that if I say yes right now, I will never know whether I chose it freely or because I’m too exhausted and scared and in love to separate those things.
So I shake my head.
His whole body stills.
