Page 64 of The Jorogumo

"I'm happy too. I love our life," he said, then rapped his knuckles on the wooden counter.

"What was that for?"

"I didn't want to jinx myself," he said with a shrug, making me chuckle. "Hey! I've seen way too many things in the past few months to think there's not at least a chance that it'll work."

"I understand, trust me. Honestly, you've dealt with all of this very well. I was afraid you'd freak out when I first revealed myself to you."

Liam snickered, a fond look on his face as he remembered the day I'd saved him from falling. "Ah, I very nearly did. I think I was just too surprised. And once you explained things, well." He shrugged, then smiled sheepishly. "I did have a mini-meltdown later, and almost convinced myself I must've fallen asleep and made up the whole thing."

My eyes widened in surprise, and Liam nodded with a laugh.

"Exactly. But I'm still glad I found out the way I did. If the way you asked me to move in is anything to go by, you'd have just made me freak out for a different reason if you tried telling me after we'd started dating."

I flushed, still a little sad about making Liam panic. "Iamsorry about that, you know. I didn't mean to scare you."

"I know, babe, you don't have to keep apologizing," he said with a sweet smile, and then got a look on his face that was pure mischief. "Just make sure to do better when you ask me to marry you."

Did Liam want to get married?As if he'd just realized what he'd said, Liam shot to his feet, comic book in hand.

"Uh, I should—I gotta check something."

Liam escaped into the shelves, and I watched him go, still too surprised to react.

I'd never given much thought to marriage. It was a human concept, at its core. For supernaturals, nothing was stronger than a mate bond, and a marriage was just a piece of paper.

But if Liam wanted to get married, then we'd get married.

I would need Dustin and Touya's help to organize things, but I wasn't going to repeat my mistake.

After the moving-in thing, I'd realized my mate had a tendency to get anxious when he thought something was wrong, or when he thought—for some reason only he could see the logic in—I might change my mind about our relationship.

If I could've gotten away with it, I'd have told him a mate bond was unbreakable simply so he'd stop being afraid of something that would never happen, but that was a big thing to lie about.

Maybe being married would give him the assurance he needed to know that I would never, ever leave him.

I found him hiding between some of the back shelves, staring unseeingly at the comics in front of him.

"Liam?"

He jumped, turning to look at me with flushed cheeks. "Hey."

Walking closer, I wrapped my arms around him until we were eye to eye. Peering into his deep brown eyes, I waited until I had all his attention before speaking. "I will propose to you, sometime soon. I need to make a plan, and do something special before I ask. But I will ask, Liam, and I hope that when I do, you'll say yes."

Liam blinked at me, though why he was surprised by my claim, I didn't know. Maybe I needed to be better about showing him how much I loved him.

He opened his mouth, and I covered it with my palm before he could speak. "Don't tell me yet. Tell me when I ask you."

Liam

Haruto had this way of saying the most unexpected things at the most unexpected times, and I couldn't figure out how I'd ended up from knocking on wood to practically agreeing to say yes when he asked to marry me.

I spent the few hours until closing time in something of a brain fog, and when we got back to the Sanctuary, Haruto pressed a kiss to my cheek and told me he'd be back in a bit because he 'wanted to discuss something important with Dustin.'

Needing some help of my own, I hunted down my own confidant, Silas. The two of us had grown closer since I moved to the Sanctuary because we could relate to each other. People found us both intimidating at first glance, and it'd built a camaraderie of sorts between us. We also had mates who were on the introvert side, which was another thing that bonded us.

Silas was where I usually found him, taking a nap under a tree. When Touya was off working and he was free, this was usually what he did.

He peeked one eye open when I approached, and his lips curved as he sat up, the small tusks on either side twitching with his smile.

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