Page 85 of Simply Yours

And that was him.

Her safe place.

I’m simply yours,she thought, succumbing to the exhaustion clawing at her.

Sixteen

JASON

Jason had never known fear like this.

Not when he’d lost his mother.

Not even when he’d found his father.

This was something else. Something raw and consuming that gnawed at his insides and left him breathless. The moment Caitlin crumpled in his arms, pale and shaking, whispering those three words with a desperate, fevered urgency, something inside him shattered.

It was like watching a piece of himself slip through his fingers, powerless to hold on.

He had known for a long time that he loved her—so much so that it was woven into the fabric of his very being. But to hear it from her lips in that moment, when she was barely holding on, was unbearable. Those words weren’t just an admission. They were a goodbye. And he couldn’t take that.

He wouldn't.

Everything had blurred into chaos after that. The race to the hospital, the nurses swarming her, the demand that he step outside while they worked on her. He had argued and nearly shouted, but in the end, they had forced him out of the room. And now, he was trapped in the sterile, too-bright hallway, feeling like he was going to come undone at the seams.

His family had come running at a single text message.

A rattler got Caitlin – on my way to ER.

They had dropped everything, converging on him like a shield, their presence grounding him even as he spiraled.

Toni cupped his face, her own tear-streaked eyes frantic as she whispered fiercely, “You have to be strong. You hear me? She needs you to be strong.” But she was shaking just as hard as he was, barely holding it together for his sake.

Derek was beside him, speaking in that calm, measured way of his. “She’s in the best place she could be. They’re doing everything they can. You got her here in time, Jason.”

At the nurses’ desk, Luke and Matthew were working the system, firing off questions, demanding answers, trying to find out exactly what they were up against. Jason barely heard them over the roaring in his ears.

Two hours later, Becca showed up, a bag slung over her shoulder. “I figured you wouldn’t be leaving her,” she said, pressing a change of clothes into his hands.

And she was right.

He wasn’t leaving.

The thought of going home without Caitlin and walking into that house without her beside him was unthinkable.

He didn’t care about the logistics—her house, his house, none of it mattered. What mattered was that she was coming home with him. Tonight. Tomorrow. Forever. Because life was too fragile to wait for the perfect moment, the perfect proposal, the perfect anything.

He had been planning to ask her under the stars, maybe after a quiet dinner, something romantic and unforgettable. But fate had nearly stolen that chance from him.

Maybe life wasn’t about the careful plans or the grand gestures. Maybe it was aboutnow. Right now. Holding on to the people you love before they’re gone.

He exhaled sharply, finally looking up at the faces surrounding him. His family—his lifeline. They were watching him with quiet understanding, their presence a silent promise that whatever happened, they were here.

His voice was thick when he finally spoke.

“I was gonna ask her to marry me tonight.”

Toni gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth as her eyes welled up again.

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