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My throat tightens.

“Not because I merely want to survive what life throws at us,” he murmurs, noticing me reading. “Because every day with you is an experience I will never take for granted.”

I press my lips together.

“I want you with me always,” he finishes.

I never thought much about a ceremony, but the idea of marrying him feels so damn right.

He’s still larger than life, but maybe I am too. And it’s the quiet moments with him I love the most—the teasing, the appreciating where we’ve come from, what we’ve been through together. When he tugs me against him at night.

“Well?” he prompts, looking agitated.

I take a breath. “Yes.”

His grin flashes in the dark before he rises, towering over me again in a heartbeat. I’m already overwhelmed before he slips the ring on my finger, the cool metal feeling strange against my skin.

He pulls my lips up to his and kisses me with so much devotion and love and happiness that I’m speechless when he pulls back.

A noise has me looking up.

“Did it work?” Annie’s head sticks up from the stairs that go belowdecks.

My jaw drops. “You were in on this?”

She tries to look innocent and fails.

“The best birthday gift,” Harrison calls, loud enough for her to hear.

“You didn’t like the bookcase?” I protest lightly, and he winks at me.

“It was stunning”—I had the custom furniture made to display his books in our place at the Wynn—“but this is even more beautiful and rare. And while that was something I didn’t know I needed, you are quite simply someone I cannot live without.”

Damn.

Suddenly our friends pour out of the stairway, surrounding us with love and congratulations. Elle carries a tray of bubbling champagne flutes while Ash claps his brother on the back and messes up my hair with a grin.

My heart is so full I can barely breathe.

“How are you guys going to do this?” Beck demands.

“Huge wedding,” Harrison murmurs, wrapping an arm around me.

“Hell no,” I retort, even as I rub my thumb over the inside of my ring to get used to the feel of it.

“We’ll sell rights to People magazine,” Beck promises.

“I’ll sell your balls to them first.” My eyes narrow. “If this is all some trick to get me to agree to honor and obey you?—“

“I don’t need that.”

“Because I love you?”

He strokes a thumb along my jaw, reverent and possessive.

“That. And I still have a favor.”