“Nothing.” I take a deep breath. “Nothing is wrong. I just—” I force myself to open my palm to her, heart still pounding. “I really hope you like it.”
She smiles as she takes the box. “I’m sure I’m going to love it.”
“It’s okay if you don’t. You don’t have to love it. If you hate it I can always get you something else—”
“You know, I’m not used to seeing you nervous like this.” She tilts her head at me. “It’s kind of adorable.”
“I feel like an idiot,” I say, trying and failing to smile. “Though I’m glad you find it entertaining.”
She opens the box as I say this, giving me no time to brace myself before she gasps, her eyes widening in astonishment. She covers her mouth with one hand, her emotions so unrestrained I can hardly read them. There’s too much all at once: shock, happiness, confusion—
The effort to say nothing nearly costs me my sanity.
“Where did you get this?” she says, finally dropping her hand away from her face. Carefully, she tugs the engagement ring free from its setting, examining it closely before staring up at me. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“I had it made,” I manage to say, my body still so tense it’s difficult to speak. She hasn’t said whether she likes it, which means the vise around my chest refuses to disengage.
Still, I force myself to retrieve the glittering piece from her, taking her left hand in mine with great care. My own hands are miraculously steady as I slide the ring into place on her fourth finger.
The fit, as I knew it would be, is perfect.
I took the necessary measurements while she was heavily asleep, still recovering in the medical tent.
“You had it made?” Ella is staring at her hand, the ring refracting the light, shattering color everywhere. The center stone is large, but not garishly so, and suits her beautifully.
I think so, anyway.
I watch her as she studies the ring, turning her hand left and right. “How did you get it made?” she asks. “When? I thought there’d be a simple wedding band inside, I didn’t think—”
“There is a wedding band inside. There are two rings.” She looks up at me then, and I see, for the first time, that her eyes are bright with tears. The sight cuts me straight through the heart but brings with it the hope of relief. It might be the only time in my life I’ve ever been happy to see her cry.
With great trepidation, Ella reopens the velvet box, slowly retrieving from its depths the wedding band.
She holds it up to the sky with a trembling hand, staring at its detail. The brushed gold band resembles a twig, so delicate it looks almost as if it were forged from thread. It glints in the sun, the two emerald leaves bright against the infinite branch.
She slips it onto her finger, gasping softly when it settles into place. It was designed to fit perfectly against the engagement ring.
“The leaves—are supposed to be—like us,” I say, hearing how stupid it sounds when I say it out loud. How perfectly pedestrian.
I suddenly hate myself.
Still, Ella says nothing, and I can’t hold the question in any longer. “Do you like it? If you don’t like it I can always—”
She snaps the box shut and throws her arms around my neck, hugging me so tight I feel the damp press of her cheek against my jaw. She pulls back to pepper my face with kisses, half laughing as she does, swiping at her tears with shaking hands.
“How can you even ask me that?” she says. “I’ve never owned anything so beautiful in my whole life. I love these rings. I love them so much. And I know you probably didn’t think about this when you had them made—because you wouldn’t—but the emeralds remind me of your eyes. They’re stunning.”
I blink at that, surprised. “My eyes?”
“Yes,” she says quietly, her expression softening. “And you’re right. They are like us. We’ve been growing toward each other from the opposite sides of the same path since the beginning, haven’t we?”
Relief hits me like an opiate.
I pull her into my arms, burying my face in her neck before I kiss her—softly at first—and our slow, searing touches quickly change into something else altogether. Ella is drawing her hand under my shirt again, my skin heating under her touch.
“I love you,” she whispers, kissing my throat, my jaw, my chin, my lips. “And I never want to take these off.” Her words are accompanied by a passion so profound I can hardly breathe around it. I close my eyes as the sensations build and spiral; the cold graze of her rings against my chest striking my skin like a match.
Desire soon shuts down my mind.
When we break apart I’m breathing hard, molten heat coursing through my veins. I’m imagining scenarios far too impractical to execute. Being with Ella this morning was like breaking a dam; I’d been so afraid to touch her while she was in recovery, and then terrified to overwhelm her in the days after. I’d wanted to make sure she was okay, that she took her time getting back to normal, at her own pace, without anyone crowding her personal space.
But now—
Now that she’s ready—now that my body remembers this—it’s suddenly impossible to get enough.
“I’m so glad you like the rings, love,” I whisper against her mouth. “But I’m going to need to take back the band.”
“What?” she says, pulling away. She stares at her hand, heartbroken in an instant. “Why?”
“Those are the rules.” I’m still smiling when I touch her face, grazing her cheek with my knuckles. “I promise, after I give this ring to you today, I’ll never ask for it back.”
When still she makes no move, I reach, without looking, for the box clenched in her right fist.
She relinquishes the item with great reluctance, sighing as she steps back to slip the wedding band off her finger. I open the recovered box, presenting it to her, and after she settles the ring back into its nest I snap the lid shut, tucking the object safely back into my pocket.
My heart has grown ten sizes in the last several minutes.
“We should probably get going if you want to get this back,” I say, touching her waist, then tugging her close. My lips are at her ear when I whisper: “I’m going to marry you today. And then I’m going to make love to you until you can’t remember your name.”
Ella makes a startled, breathless sound, her hands tightening in my shirt. She pulls me closer and kisses me, nipping my bottom lip before claiming my mouth, touching me now with a new desperation; a hunger still unmet. She presses her body against me, hard and soft soldered together, and I lose myself in it, in the intoxication of knowing just how much she wants this.
Me.
Her mouth is hot and sweet, her limbs heavy with pleasure. She drags her hand down the front of my pants and I make an anguished sound somewhere deep in my chest. I take her face in my hands as she touches me, kissing her deeper, harder, still unable to find relief. She seems to be torturing me on purpose—torturing both of us—knowing there’s nothing we can do here, knowing there are people waiting for us—
“Ella,” I gasp, the word practically a plea as I break away, trying and failing to cool my head, my thoughts. I can’t walk back into a crowd right now, looking like this. I can’t even think straight.
My thoughts are wild.
I want nothing more than to strip her bare. I want to fall to my knees and taste her, make her lose her mind with pleasure. I want her to beg before I make her come, right here, in the middle of nowhere.
“I really don’t think you understand what you do to me, love,” I say, trying to steady myself. “You have no idea how badly I want you. You have no idea what I want to do to you right now.”
My words do not have the intended effect. Ella is not deterred.
Her desire seems to intensify, more in every second. That she could ever want me like this—that I could ever inspire in her the kind of need she inspires in me—
It still seems impossible.
And it’s addicting.