Page 79 of Freak
His smile deepening, Mel lifted the ring from its satin bed. “I got some help with a jeweler. I told her about you, and she showed me this. It’s made by somebody local. The little stones are diamonds, but this here is ... shit, some kind of agate, but I don’t remember which one. I’ll call her.”
“Moss agate,” Abigail said, recognizing it as soon as he said ‘agate.’
“That’s it, yeah. If it’s not a good enough stone for this kind of ring, I get it. I’ll buy you anything you want. I just ... I saw it and it said ‘Abigail’ to me.”
He knew her well. “It’s perfect, hon. It couldn’t be more perfect.”
Relief shone from his face, and he picked up her left hand.
Abigail pulled it back. He’d said a lot, so many beautiful words, but he hadn’t said the most important part. “But what’s it for?” she asked.
His eyes popped wide. “Shit! Sorry! Wanna marry me?”
From poetry to prose. Under a burst of delighted laughter, Abigail offered him her hand. Mel wrapped his strong, work-rasped fingers around it.
“You know,” she began, feeling for the right words as she spoke, words that could carry the weight of this moment, “I’ve never thought of love or taking care of people as a burden, it’s something that fills me up. But I feel the same. Even though I wasn’t avoiding it, I didn’t think I’d have love in my life, and I didn’t think it mattered. But you matter to me, Mel. Youarethe best thing I see, anytime I look. Loving you has pushed open a big barn door and set me free. You’ve given me a family, and friends, and even parts of myself I’d forgotten. Loving you, I feel a peace that’s deeper than any I knew on my own. A peace so deep even trouble can’t reach it.” She pressed her free hand to her bosom. “Taking care of you since you were hurt—no, since before that, since this summer—has made me feel something good here. More than anything in my life, I want to marry you, Mel.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Mel slipped the ringon Abigail’s finger. “I used to say since I didn’t want kids, there was no reason to want marriage. But I get it now. Marriage isn’t just paperwork. It’s a promise.”
With that, he stood, pulling her to her feet with him so he could get his arms around her and kiss her properly.
Last year’s version of Melvin Dennis Lind III would drop his jaw to see today’s version drop to one knee and propose to any woman, but last year’s Mel had known Abigail Freeman only as a nice woman who ran a brush herd and made great pie. Today’s version was so fucking in love with her he felt disoriented when he got too far away.
When he finally eased back and gave her her lips back, she gazed foggily up at him, her color high and her breath quick.
He’d been with plenty of women, and he’d made a potent impression on a fair number. But only Abigail seemed absolutely bowled over, each and every time, by the way he could make her feel.
They’d had only one night together when he could really show her all the ways he knew to make her feel. The very next day, he’d had his guts scrambled.
Leaning close again to nibble lightly at her lips, he pitched his voice low and murmured, “Let’s go upstairs. I want to celebrate the right way.”
She blinked and turned his head, finding his eyes. “Are you healthy enough?”
“Clean bill of health, baby,” he answered with a grin. He still had some things to be careful about and wouldn’t be truly done with healing for a while, but he’d gotten cleared enough to take his woman to bed.
