“No. No, of course not.” I couldn’t make him understand. Not when I barely knew what to think of me and Ransom myself. I knew what he meant to me. I’d mourned the loss of what we had for four long years. Now was the time for me to move past it. Saying yes to Ethan tonight may not have been the wisest course of action, but it felt like the surest. During that withheld moment on the stage with Ethan’s hopeful, anxious expression freezing his features and the silent breath still in my lungs, it felt right. ‘Yes’ felt right, just for a few seconds. It felt right until I looked out into the crowd and saw Ransom’s expression. That look broke my heart.
“Ethan, Ransom and I…” We were what? Nothing came to me right away. We were ridiculous. We were too selfish to make things work? We were impossible to explain? Ransom wouldn’t listen. He had singular thoughts about his life. Thoughts that gave no consideration to how I felt, how invisible he made me feel sometimes, how worried his injuries made me and when I asked him to just consider his safety, for our sake, he blew me off, not thinking I was serious.
Ethan didn’t hurry me along, didn’t ask that I explain myself. Just like he had for months, Ethan waited for me. I wondered how long he’d keep that up. “We…were together a long, long time and even though it’s been four years since we broke up, we still care about each other. After all this time, it’s hard to keep that from resonating. But our lives are so different now. He wants things that I won’t…I can’t give him but it’s more than that. His life, mine…modi.”
We’re end game. God, Ransom had said that to me with such conviction the night I left Miami. He’d said it like he’d meant it but I’d allowed myself to stop believing him. I’d stopped believing a long time ago that he was where I’d end up. Then Ethan came along and… me zanmi, I’d agreed to marry him. Logically, I knew that I was too young to be senile, but the night came back to me in an instant, while I sat in that fine car with that finer man patiently waiting for me to explain my relationship with Ransom and what he’d seen when he found us in the dressing room. What I hoped he hadn’t seen was that I’d said yes to him just minutes before and I’d already begun to regret it.
“Look at me.” Ethan’s hands were gentle, a touch that even then relaxed me, had my breath evening out. “Maybe I shouldn’t have asked. Maybe it was too soon, but you know I don’t like to think about things before I do them. I like to be spontaneous because it makes everything I attempt that much sweeter. But you’re not like me.” We sunk deeper into the leather with Ethan pulling me so close that our noses nearly touched. “You like order. You like to know what’s happening next. It’s one of the things I love about you, beautiful.”
He spoke so softly, a gentle tickle of his words easing me, comforting so that I didn’t feel like such an idiot, so that the weight of my guilt didn’t choke me as much.
“It was a rush,” he continued, keep his fingers on my cheeks, ghosting his thumb against my jaw. “This whole proposal thing was another spontaneous thing from me and I know you’re doubting your answer. I’d be a little worried if you weren’t. So how about we take this slow? No wedding planning. No setting any dates. Nothing that’s going to put that look on your face.” He smoothed the muscles across my forehead until the ache there went away. “You were with him for six years. His family is your family. I have no desire to take any of that from you. I just want you, Aly. I want to be with you and if that means I have to wait while you figure things out, I will.”
He was a man I didn’t deserve, but God, I wanted to, so badly. Herein lay the problem. Ethan was good and smart and sweet. He was more beautiful than Lucifer and kinder than a less wicked, more obedient angel. But…and this was the hell of it all…Ethan was not, would never be, Ransom.
“Do you want the ring back?” I asked because it seemed only fair. It seemed to make things less complicated.
“No,” he said, picking up my left hand to kiss my knuckles. “Why would you think that? It looks good where it is.” He wouldn’t let me pull away from him, not just then. Instead, Ethan tugged on my wrist, fingers slipping up my hand, gripping me tight, but gentle. I let him because his touch was warm, because I craved the comfort he offered. “Let’s just take it day by day. Maybe you and Ransom aren’t together anymore, but that doesn’t mean you both aren’t important to each other. That doesn’t mean you can’t be friends. His kid sister adores you, so does his mom. Hell, even Kona dotes on you.”