Page 142 of Luck of the Draw

What were her reasons again?

Originally, the reason had been that she couldn’t stay in New Orleans because Jesse and the others were out there waiting to snatch her up and drag her back to hell. But now they were all sitting in county jail waiting to go to trial, and there was plenty of evidence to convict them of crimes that would put them away in prison for at least a decade if not more.

Now the reason was that the specialized program would help Skye be less fucked-up so she could be a functional, stable adult who could make a new life for herself. It was clear how thoroughly fucked-up she still was given that it took Brennan walking into a mother-fuckingfiring squadfor her to realize she loved him. But now that she knew, she wondered if it were possible to make herself stable on her own while staying here.

And beyond all that, if sprinting across the country to make herself stable and functional meant leaving the one person who’d ever truly loved her in a life that was chock-full of people who had done nothing but use and abuse her, she suddenly questioned if it was worth it. He loved her despite her fucked-up state. Maybe that was enough.

But it wasn’t. She recognized her own faulty reasoning. It would be the infinitely better version of throwing away her well-being for a man, but it was still throwing away her well-being for a man.

All of that proved to Skye that she simply had to go, that this was the best thing for her, that she had a long way to go, and that she was going to have to leave the safe, loving embrace that had come to mean everything to her.

“I don’t want to do this,” she abruptly wailed. Brennan stopped rubbing her back as if he’d frozen solid. She lifted her head, saw the tears streaming down his face, and she cried harder. “I love you, and you love me, and I don’t want to do this.”

“Oh honey.” He placed his hand on the side of her face, wiping her tears with his thumb before he pressed a kiss to her mouth. “I don’t want to do this either, but it’s going to be so good for you. This program is exactly what you need. I looked, and I looked, and I looked, and there’s not another one like it that can help you heal in the way you need to. The women who will be working with you know exactly what you’ve—”

There was a crack in his voice, and his words screeched to a halt. He wrapped his good arm tightly around her, pulling her flush against him and resting his cheek on top of her head. “I love you so much, and I love you enough to let you go so you can do what’s best for you.”

Skye sobbed so hard she could barely pull words together and only managed to eke out, “I don’t want you to let me go. I don’t want you to let me go, Brennan. I want you to hold on to me forever.”

He fell silent for several beats as he rubbed her back and held her close. He pulled away, lifted her chin, and looked at her through eyes overflowing with tears and love.

“Then come back when you’re done and marry me.”

She blinked. “What?”

“Go to Las Vegas, do the program, focus on healing all your hurt and broken things, and I’ll wait for you. When you’re done, come back home, and let’s get married.” He wiped his eyes dry and hitched his good shoulder. “Or hell, I’ll come there, and we can have Elvis do the honors.”

Skye squinted as she sniffled away the remnants of her tears. “Are you serious?”

“As a friggin’ heart attack.”

“But…but…” Her gaze shifted all over the place. “What?”

Brennan cupped her chin. “Marry me, Skye. I’ll wait for you, and then I’ll go wherever you want to.”

She drew in a shaky breath. “You want to marry me?”

“Skye.” He drew in a deep inhale and exhaled through a puff of air. “I want to spend the rest of my life loving you. I know you’re about to start working on making an amazing life for yourself, and I want to be part of that. I’ve been coasting up ‘til this point, and I want something to live for. So I want us to make an amazing life together. I want to do all of that with you and way, way more.” He paused to smile in a way that pushed another tear out of his eye. “I love you. So yeah, I want to marry you.”

Brennan let go of her and began patting the pockets of his slacks and jacket until he reached into one. A second later, he pulled out a ring with a colossal diamond that was so sparkly it nearly blinded her with the sunlight.

“I’m doing this all wrong, but I have no idea if this is something you actually want.” He held up the ring between them, turning it slightly and causing it to catch the light again. “This was my grandmother’s. When my grandfather left me the house and everything else, he left this to me, too. He expected that I was going to be normal and just find someone to settle down with a long time ago. But he had no idea what kinds of things I was going to deal with. He had no idea how those things were going to keep me from being able to do what everyone expected me to do. I never expected to pull out this ring for anyone. But I want it to be yours, and I want to help you make a life that’s better than anything you’ve ever imagined.”

Skye looked at his face and back at the ring. There weren’t even words for this ring. This ring was like a black hole for words. It was the biggest stone she’d ever seen in real life or in movies. The mere sight of it was a preview of the extravagant life that would be in store for her if she said yes. And the idea of that in the aftermath of twenty-seven years spent in a life that was the polar opposite threatened to suffocate her.

“Brennan…” She looked up with him, jaw still hanging open. “How am I ever going to be able to believe that I deserve a life like the one I know you’re going to give me?”

“First of all,” he said, cocking his head in a saucy manner and displaying the sexy smirk she’d come to know and love, “I’m not just going to give you a life. We’re going to create one. It’ll be exactly what we both want, and it won’t be confined to expectations based on anything we’ve ever done. Second…”

He paused and kissed her. “Do any of us deserve anything we have? I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth. I didn’t deserve that. You were born into abuse and exploitation. You didn’t deserve that. Life isn’t about what we deserve. It’s about what we do with the cards we’ve been dealt. And in fact.” He held up the ring, looping it around his index finger and posturing like he was about to make a grand declaration. “I think life is a lot like poker. Poker is just luck and skill. You can’t control your luck, and skill is just figuring out how to make the best of what you get dealt.” He tilted the ring toward her. “You’ve never had the freedom to choose how you make the best out of it. Now you do. You get to choose whatever life you want, Skye. That’s not going away if you marry me. But at the same time, it’s still your choice.” He shrugged his good shoulder. “But I really hope you choose me.”

She stared at him as she rolled his words over in her mind, and he did have a very good point. Still, the entire spur-of-the-moment proposal stretched the limits of her ability to comprehend. “You really want to marry me?”

He gave a misty-eyed smile. “More than anything in the wide world.”

A spontaneous laugh burst out of her, and she covered her face as it gave way to more tears—tears of joy this time.

“What’s so funny, baby girl?” The smile in Brennan’s voice was audible.

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