Page 81 of Mate Night Snack
A murmur of approval rippled through the room.
"Three months ago, I came to Hollow Oak looking for answers to an old mystery. I thought I was chasing ghosts, hunting for truth in a place that seemed too good to be real." Her gaze found Emmett's across the table. "What I found instead was home. Not just a place, but people. A family I didn't know I needed, built around love instead of obligation."
"Here, here!" Twyla called out, raising her glass.
"To Hollow Oak," Katniss continued, lifting her own glass. "To second chances and new beginnings. To the kind of love that makes you braver than you thought you could be."
"To Hollow Oak!" the room chorused, glasses clinking in a symphony of crystal and contentment.
Later, after the dishes were cleared and the tables pushed back, someone produced a fiddle and the evening transformed into an impromptu dance. Emmett found himself pressed against the wall, watching Katniss spin between Twyla and Miriam with the kind of unconscious grace that made his chest tight with emotion.
She was glowing. Her laughter filled the room like birdsong, bright and joyful and completely unguarded.
"You going to stand there all night, or are you going to dance with your woman?" Maeve appeared beside him, golden eyes twinkling with mischief.
"I don't dance."
"Course you don't. You brood, you lurk, you occasionally growl at people who get too close to your food. But dancing? That would require showing emotion in public."
"I show emotion."
"Scowling doesn't count."
Before he could argue further, the music slowed and Katniss appeared in front of him, cheeks flushed and eyes bright with happiness.
"Dance with me," she said, holding out her hand.
"I really don't."
"Dance with me," she repeated, and this time it wasn't a request.
He let her pull him onto the makeshift dance floor, acutely aware of every eye in the room watching them. But when her arms went around his neck, when she pressed close enough that he could feel her heartbeat against his chest, the rest of the world faded away.
They swayed together in time with the gentle melody, not really dancing so much as holding each other upright. He felt her contentment, her love, her absolute certainty that this was where she belonged.
"I love you.”
"I love you too."
"Marry me."
The words slipped out before he could stop them, carried by music and moonlight and the overwhelming rightness of having her in his arms. Katniss went still, pulling back to search his face.
"What did you say?"
His heart hammered against his ribs, but he didn't take it back. "Marry me. Make this official. Let me spend the rest of my life proving I'm worthy of what we have."
"Emmett..." Her eyes filled with tears, but she was smiling. "You don't have to prove anything. You already are worthy. You're everything I never knew I wanted."
"Is that a yes?"
"That's a yes." She tilted her head up for a kiss, soft and sweet and full of promises. "Yes to marriage, yes to forever, yes to whatever comes next."
35
KATNISS
Katniss stood near the sacred grove, her hands pressed to her stomach to calm the butterflies that had taken up residence there, watching the town transform the space into something magical.
