“There’s more?” Bethany had no idea what to expect. Hell, she hadn’t expected any of what he’d told her already. She’d been braced to watch him drive away in the morning, and now he was going to be staying. At least for a while. Maybe longer, if he was serious about buying into the bar. It was always hard to tell with Alexei. “What now? A bridge club with mermaids? A pirate-themed fishing tour?”
Alexei perked up. “That last one kind of sounds like fun. But no, that’s not it.” Suddenly he looked almost…nervous. She didn’t think she’d ever seen that expression on his face.
“What?” she asked. Maybe he was going to buy his own place to live once he’d found the treasure. Why wouldn’t he?
“It’s about the guesthouse,” he said.
Damn. She knew it.
“I thought maybe it would be nice to fix that up to be wheelchair accessible. Your father mostly only uses the living room and his bedroom here, and the kitchen to eat whatever you’ve cooked for him. The guesthouse would be a lot easier to redo than the house, which has narrower doorways, and then he’d have more privacy.”
“Uh, yeah, that’s true. But then where would you live?” Bethany suspected her father would actually prefer the smaller, more manageable space of the guesthouse, especially if they could fix it up so it was more accessible. But she’d miss Alexei being right outside her back door.
He flashed her a smile that wobbled around the edges, and cleared his throat. “I, um, I was hoping I’d live here. With you. And Lulu and the puppy. At least one puppy. They’re all really cute.” Bethany couldn’t believe it. He was babbling. But wait, had he just suggested that they live together?
As she watched in disbelief, he slid out of his chair and onto one knee in front of her, then pulled a small leather bag out of his back pocket. He emptied it into his palm, revealing a gold ring in the shape of a dolphin, holding a brilliant and astonishingly large diamond in its mouth.
“This is why I was late,” he said. “I took one of the gold coins to an artisan at court - a dwarf known for his metal work - and had him make it into this ring. The diamond is a gift from the queen, by the way. She was very impressed with everything you’d done, and said you sounded delightfully fierce. She’s looking forward to meeting you some day.”
Bethany opened and closed her mouth, but no words came out.
Alexei grinned up at her. “Want to raise puppies together? I promise to try not to break anything. Much.”
She blinked. “You know that is the least romantic proposal in the history of proposals, right?”
“Oh,” he said, face falling. “Yeah, well, my brother Mikhail is the smooth one. I’m just the muscle.”
“You’re a lot more than that,” she said softly, gazing into his eyes. The truth was, she couldn’t imagine her life without this surprisingly gentle giant, even if that likely meant a future of repairing furniture and cooking meals that should feed an entire pirate crew.
“You’re the man I love. I don’t need smooth. I need someone who loves dogs and can put up with my crabby father and treats me like an equal.” She leaned down and kissed him. “Now, are you going to put that ring on my finger or not?”
His face lit up as he slid the ring onto the finger it had been made for, where it fit perfectly. Magic, no doubt. Then he stood up and pulled her into his strong arms.
“You know, I might occasionally go help Beka or one of the other Baba Yagas out with a problem. It could be dangerous. Would that be okay with you?” He looked into her eyes. “I would like to have an adventure now and again, but I won’t go if you don’t want me to.”
“Life should probably have a little danger and adventure in it,” she said, feeling her lips curve up into a wicked grin. “In fact, if you want to live dangerously, I have an idea.”
“What’s that?” her future husband asked, smiling back down at her.
She reached behind her and shoved the paperwork she’d been fiddling with onto the floor. “How about we see if this old table is sturdy enough to take the weight of an insanely large former Rider and a barmaid-soon-to-be-lawyer?”
“I like the way you think,” Alexei said with a roar of laughter, and they proceeded to find out.
What the heck. It was just one more piece of furniture to mend after all.
About the Author
Deborah Blake is the award-winning author of the Baba Yaga and Broken Rider paranormal romance series and the Veiled Magic urban fantasies from Berkley.
Deborah has also written The Goddess is in the Details, Everyday Witchcraft and numerous other books from Llewellyn, along with a popular tarot deck. She has published articles in Llewellyn annuals, and her ongoing column, “Everyday Witchcraft” is featured in Witches & Pagans Magazine.
Deborah can be found online at Facebook, Twitter, her popular blog (Writing the Witchy Way), and www.deborahblakeauthor.com
When not writing, Deborah runs The Artisans’ Guild, a cooperative shop she founded with a friend in 1999, and also works as a jewelry maker, tarot reader, and energy healer. She lives in a 130 year old farmhouse in rural upstate New York with various cats who supervise all her activities, both magickal and mundane