Page 53 of One More Baby for the Boss

“She sure does.” He went over to the sink and found a spoon. “Maybe we should let her go back to eating with her fingers. She doesn’t throw them on the floor, at least.”

“Oh, yeah, okay, and then are you going to be the one to clean up after she finger-paints everything she touches with applesauce?”

Elijah laughed. “Fair enough, I see your point. Okay, we’ll stick with the spoons.” He finished washing the one in his hand, brought it over, and handed it to Lee, who promptly threw it on the floor.

Alex groaned. “Fine,” she said. “I give up. She can eat with her fingers. We’ll just have to give her a bath when she’s finished. I didn’t have that much going on today anyway.”

“I was hoping we might spend some time together today,” Elijah said. “But we can spend that time giving Lee a bath.”

Alex had to laugh. “That’s one way to plan a romantic day with my boyfriend,” she said. “Bathing a baby.”

“I don’t know,” Elijah countered. “It’s the kind of thing I never would have thought of as romantic, but now that the two of us are here, now that we have her — thereissomething kind of special about it, isn’t there? Taking care of our daughter together?” He hesitated. “I never had these moments with Jack’s mom when she was alive,” he said. “I didn’t realize what I was missing. I was working all the time, and it never occurred to me that I was sacrificing moments I wouldn’t get back. I was just grateful that I didn’t have to help with baby chores. If I had those years over again, I would do so many things differently.”

Alex went to him, put her arms around his waist, and leaned her head against his chest. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I know that’s hard.”

“I feel bad, talking to you about this.”

“No. Never feel bad about that,” she said. “It’s such an important part of your life, and that matters to me. I don’t want you to feel like you have to keep your past and your present separated. That’s never something I need from you.”

He nodded and kissed her forehead. “I don’t know how I got so lucky as to have you in my life.”

“Luck had nothing to do with it.”

“Oh, that’s right, I forgot — you don’t believe in luck.”

“Not anymore,” she said. “I’ve spent too long running from bad luck. I’ve spent too many years telling myself that I was born under a bad sign. I don’t think luck has anything to do with the good things that have happened in my life. It’s just that, when something good did come along, I was smart enough to grab it. We both were.”

Elijah smiled at her. “I like that,” he said. “And I wonder if you’d let me do that again?”

“What do you mean?”

He dropped to one knee in the middle of the kitchen floor.

She stared at him. “Elijah… what are you doing?”

“I want you to marry me,” he said. “I’m asking you to marry me, Alex.”

“Just— just like that? Just in the middle of the kitchen on a Tuesday morning? Because I told you I believed in making your own luck?”

He laughed. “That’s not the only reason. And no, I’m not asking you this on a whim. I’ve been thinking about it for quite a while.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, square box. Alex recognized what it was before he opened it, and her heart beat double-time.

She’d never believed this would happen to her. After losing her parents and her siblings, she had resigned herself to the belief that she wasn’t going to have a family. She hadn’t felt that she would ever be able to settle down and give her heart to anyone again.

That had changed when she’d met Elijah. She had found a home and a family here after all, in spite of everything. But even as she had begun to settle into this new life, she hadn’t been able to let herself believe in the fullness of it. Having Lee meant that her place here was permanent, and yet there was still a part of her that had felt like she was playing house — like there was a chance that it would all eventually be taken away from her.

She looked down at the beautiful pear-cut diamond in the box that Elijah held.

It wasn’t as if the ring would make things any more real. Things had been real between the two of them for a long time, and nothing could make that more true than Lee already had. But seeing it was a sign, a tangible sign, that Elijah wanted this every bit as badly as she did.

And for the first time, she thought to herself —nothing is going to take this away from me.

For the first time, her happiness felt permanent and untouchable.

“Will you marry me, Alex?” he asked.

She beamed. “Of course I will.”

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