“Ducane, how do you say yes to getting married when you’re already married?”
“I don’t know.” I held her gaze with steady eyes. “It’s a ring saying whatever you need it to say. I want to give this another shot for real. I think we can make it Skye.”
Her eyes went glassy. She blinked it back fast, chin up.
“You deserve the ring. You deserved it the day we stood in that courthouse with ring pops and an old couple you charmed off the street. I owe you that.”
I stood and kneeled beside her with her hands in mine.
“You want me to be your wife for real?”
“Yes. More than anything in the world. I need you back in my life, Skye. I want you. I never stopped wanting to be your everything. Come home.”
“Oh, Ducane, I need to tel?—”
“Shh, nah. You said no clearing shit up tonight. We can do that tomorrow. We got forever.”
I kissed her lips softly, and she moaned into my mouth.
“I love you, Ducane.”
“I love you too, Skye. Is that another yes?”
“Yes.”
I slid the ring on her finger and reached back into my pocket.
“I got one for me too,” I said, holding out the band. “If I’m doing this, I’m doing it all the way. Put it on me.”
“See, this is how you got the name, Sugar Cane. You are so romantic.” Her voice cracked, and her hands shook as she reached for it. Skye Campbell was rarely rattled. I had her completely undone. Watching her hands shake over a ring feltlike winning the biggest case of my life, except this one I actually cared about.
She slid the ring onto my finger.
“I’ll always be sweet to you, Skye.”
Then I reached into my wallet and pulled out the one thing I’d kept close. The little strip of photos from homecoming, the two of us crammed in, young and stupid and happy. The edges were worn from handling.
“I haven’t looked at this once since I found you on that plane,” I said, putting it in her hand. “First time I didn’t need to. Because I had the real thing.” I closed her fingers around it. “I never lost you, Skye. Not for one day.”
She cried in my arms.
And just like that, I was twenty-two again.
I’d left the November dinner in pieces, fuming at my father, who was never fucking satisfied. I understood exactly what Upland was the second he laid it out. Not a promotion. A longer chain. Four hours of distance between me and the only thing I’d ever picked for myself.
Her heels clicked behind me. I couldn’t get us out of Sasha Roe quick enough.
Skye caught up to me on the sidewalk, breathless, trying to read my face while I told her that I’d handed my father back the car, the apartment, the whole gilded leash.
Fuck all that shit.
I should’ve been scared. I wasn’t. I’d never been more sure of anything.
“Marry me.”
Skye laughed in my face, searching for something in her clutch. “You’re high.”
“I’m serious. Right now. Today.”