"Official?"
"I choose you, Caleb Hart. Publicly, privately, completely." I lean forward, voice steady as bedrock. "And I want the moon to see it."
40
CALEB
I’m using my hands, but it’s all muscle memory. My mind is wandering as I stare out the kitchen window measuring coffee grounds. I lean against the counter, close enough that I brush Ellie’s shoulder when I reach for the sugar. Three months ago, this proximity would have sent me retreating behind professional distance. Now I simply… stay.
“Town council meeting tonight,” I mention, scrolling through messages on my phone. “The mayor wants to discuss the tourism proposal again.”
“The one where he suggests we market ourselves as ‘mysteriously charming’?” Ellie pours water into the machine, grinning no doubt at the memory of that particularly awkward presentation.
“That’s the one.” My thumb caresses her wrist as she sets the pot down. “He’s convinced we can capitalize on the ‘recent events’ without actually mentioning what those events were.”
The casual touch is addictive because it’s so utterly natural. No calculation behind it, no weighing of who might see or what it might cost. Just touching her because I’m here and I want to.
“You’re staring,” she observes, not moving his hand.
“I’m processing.”
“Processing what?”
I turn to face her fully, studying the man who once flinched away from accidental contact. “You just touched me without checking the exits first.”
Her eyebrows lift. “Should I have checked the exits?”
“No.” I catch Ellie’s free hand, threading our fingers together. “It’s just… remember when you used to say you weren’t leaving when really all you wanted to do was escape? I don’t see clocking exit signs anymore.”
“That wasn’t about escape routes.”
“What was it about?”
She considers this as my thumb continues to trace her pulse point. “Contingencies. If someone behaved too badly… embarrassed me publicly… if I needed to…”
“Control the situation.”
“Protect myself.”
“Same thing, back then.”
I go quiet for a moment, and I watch something shift in her expression. Not the careful blankness I once mistook for indifference, but actual thought. Consideration.
“I stopped calculating,” she says finally.
“When?”
“When I realized the math was wrong.” Her other hand comes up to cup my face, and there’s no hesitation in the gesture. “When I saw you release all of your own contingencies based on love being a problem to solve instead of just… this.”
“This?”
“Standing in your kitchen with you, arguing about politics and journalism and giving the town a public makeover, touching just you because I want to.” Her smile carries something I’ve never seen before—lightness. “No exit strategy required.”
The coffee maker gurgles to life behind us, but neither of us moves.
“Town council meeting,” I repeat. “You’ll sit beside me?”
“Where else would I sit?”