Page 234 of What We Become

I press my hand against my mouth because if I take it away I’m going to start squeaking.

Holden moves in next, wincing from the movement, and he meets my eyes with that ice-blue focus that once made me feel hunted and now makes me feel found.

“I’ve spent my entire career reading people. Building cases. Analyzing evidence.” His jaw works. “And you are the only person I’ve ever met where every piece of evidence points to the same conclusion—that my life doesn’t make sense without you in it. Love you, wildcat.”

I smile at that, and he presses a kiss to my hand before releasing it.

Eli is next. He looks at me the way he looked at me the first time. The way he looked at me at three in the morning when I told him I had a monster inside me too. The cracked-open way that means every wall he’s built is down and he’s standing in the rubble knowing I stand with him.

“I have loved you since that first night on the beach,” he murmurs. “And I pushed you away because I thought my darkness would swallow you whole.” He swallows. “Instead, you walked into it and lit a match. You didn’t fix me, Sage. You just made the broken parts feel like they belonged somewhere.” His voice drops. “I want them to belong to you. For the rest of my life. Every locked room. Every monster. Yours.”

I’m crying. I don’t care anymore. There is not a force on this planet that could stop the tears running down my face right now.

Milo is last. He looks at me, and for once he doesn’t deflect. Doesn’t pivot to a joke. Doesn’t build a wall out of comedy and hide behind it.

“I knew,” he says. “As soon as you grabbed Knox’s knife under that jetty. I knew. It was like you also grabbed onto my heart. And with each slash and stab you made, you burrowed in deeper and the only word I knew in that moment was ‘ours.’ Kitten, you were put on this earth to be the center of us.”

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small box.

When he opens it, my breath catches. The ring is simple and elegant. A thin gold band with a single stone—an alexandrite—green in daylight, purplish red under warm lamplight. Here, it glows red. The color of blood. The color of us.

“I bought this two days after we met,” Milo says. “Held on to it for months. Milo Hart does not do anything by halves, Sage Adams. I knew you were ours the second you went stab happy. I knew we were yours the second you stayed.” His voice cracks on the last word and he blinks hard. “You are the best thing that has ever happened to all of us. And I would very much like to spend the rest of my life making you laugh and driving you insane and loving you so loud the whole world has to deal with it.”

The kitchen is silent except for my labored breathing.

Eli looks around the table. Then back at me.

“Sage Adams,” he says. “Will you marry us?”

I look at them. One at a time. Eli’s amber eyes, steady and certain. Micah’s gray-blue, soft with a love so deep it has no floor. Milo’s brown, shining, the ring box trembling slightly in his hand. Holden’s ice blue, sharp and warm at the same time. And Knox’s—dark, quiet, molten.

“Yes,” I say.

The word comes out broken. I try again.

“Yes. Obviously. Yes.”

Milo’s face crumbles. He slides the ring onto my finger next to Knox’s band—gold beside dark metal, two rings that shouldn’t match and do, the way none of us should work and all of us do.

Then he falls over.

Not metaphorically. His knee gives out and he tips sideways and Micah catches him and they both end up on the kitchen floor laughing, and then Knox lowers himself back into his chair and draws me onto his lap—carefully, because of the splint, because of everything—and Eli’s hand is on the back of my neck and Holden is standing behind me with his forehead against my hair and Micah is trying to help Milo up while Milo ragdolls and says, “She said yes, she said yes, she said YES,” to nobody and everybody.

I’m laughing. I’m crying. And I have never, in all my broken, beautiful, blood-soaked days, been this happy.

“I love you,” I say to all of them. “Every one of you. Every version. Every monster and every morning after.”

Knox’s arm tightens around me.

Eli presses his lips to my temple.

Micah gives up trying to help Milo and smiles.

Holden says, “Good. Because there’s no return policy on the choker—and I have the key.”

And Milo, still on the floor, raises one fist in the air and says, “Best. Merry. Un-Birthday. Ever!”

FIFTY-SIX