Page 45 of Love.V2 (Occupational Hazards #2)

Tess

One week later

Botto was ours. It had taken days’ worth of negotiations and another presentation to Botto’s CEO, but we did it.

When we’d gotten the email approving the contract, the entire Jinx office had erupted in cheers, and Eric had shut everything down early to celebrate.

I’d popped into Willy’s for a few sips of a watered down cocktail, but had hightailed it out of there as soon as was socially acceptable.

Only this time, it wasn’t because I wanted to go home and wallow in my sad solitude.

I practically flew up my stairs, thinking how nice it was to come home to someone.

I grinned, wondering if we should get that cat after all.

I wasn’t ready for a baby—yet. Besides, it looked like Dylan would split his time between Nashville and Chicago for the next few months while Danny got his feet under him and Eric officially retired from Jinx.

And then…We’d be here. In Chicago. Together.

I couldn’t wait.

I’d only been in Nashville for a day before I’d had to head back. There were a lot of forts to hold down, and things to put in order, and Dylan had been needed at Worther. I’d missed him so much it was like an ache.

My keys rattled in the lock, and then Dylan was there, shoving the door aside to sweep me into his arms. We kissed like it had been six months, not six days, since we’d last seen each other.

It was a little ridiculous to feel such a strong surge of rightness and love and affection for this man. But I couldn’t help it.

We’d turned a corner together. We’d gotten through everything and now that we were on the other side, I just wanted to hold him.

“I missed you,” he growled into my mouth. I swallowed the sound down, yanking him closer and wrapping a leg around his hips. He boosted me up easily.

“You two gonna put on another show?” Mrs. Ramirez drawled from across the landing.

I went rigid in Dylan’s arms. He pulled back, coughing, though he didn’t put me down. I’d finally plucked up the courage last week to re-introduce myself to my neighbor, and now she was smirking at us.

“You saw that? Ma’am?” He gave her his best sheepish, southern-boy smile, enhanced by the touch of pink across his cheekbones.

“Just the first bit. You two sure were making a lot of noise.” She winked, her little dog prancing around her ankles. “I shut the peephole before I could get too much of an eyeful. I’m a classy lady, you know.” She patted her curlers and pulled her mumu closer around her.

“I can see that, yes, ma’am. We appreciate that. We’ll…try to keep the…shows to a minimum.”

“Or not.” Her smirk turned wicked. “Nice to spice things up now and again.” With those words of wisdom, she shooed her cockapoo down the stairs and left in a waft of Chanel N o 5.

“I’m never going to be able to look Mrs. Ramirez in the eyes again,” I warned as Dylan backed into the apartment.

He almost knocked over his suitcase where it sat by the door.

His laptop and a few files took up most of the kitchen counter.

We were going to need a bigger place. Worther was still paying for his long-term hotel room, but in a few weeks his work with the mother ship would be done, and he’d need space to put everything he currently had in storage in Nashville.

“I don’t know. She seemed cool. ‘Spice things up’ is pretty great advice, as we know.”

“Yes, we do.” I slid down his body, but kept my arms looped around his neck. “I missed you, too, by the way.”

“Good…that’s good…” He glanced at the coffee table, then back to me. “Tess—”

“How’s Henry?” While we’d been apart, Lainey had reviewed Henry’s files and assured us the situation was severe, but not dire. He’d woken up two days later, and the first thing he’d asked for had been his wife, Beth.

“Good. I saw him before I left. He’s got a long road to recovery, but they’re hopeful he’ll be back on his feet soon. The doctor said Lainey is brilliant and competent and a pain in their asses.”

I snorted. “Sounds about right. She’s a force of nature.”

Dylan stepped back, rubbing his neck. “Yeah. I’m glad she’s in Henry’s corner. Listen, Tess—”

“And your dad?” I toed my shoes off. I wanted to curl up on the couch and talk with him forever. I wanted to rip his clothes off. I wanted to snuggle up and sleep. It had been a long week.

“Fine, hey, we need to talk,” he rushed out, running his fingers through his hair the wrong way, making it stick up everywhere. I stilled where I was pouring a glass of water.

“What’s wrong?” For the first time, I realized he looked stressed. Harried, maybe. Or nervous? “Is it something at work?”

A laugh blasted out of him, taking me off guard. “No, Angel, this isn’t about work. Come sit with me.”

“You’re freaking me out,” I warned. So simple, those words. Last year, maybe I would have kept my mouth shut, stewed in my uncomfortable feelings alone. Now, though, I trusted him. The same way he trusted me.

“I know. Just…let me get through this, please.” He reached into his carry-on backpack while I sat, pulling out a shoebox.

It was blue, with worn corners. I had vague memories of seeing it stuffed in a closet somewhere in our condo. “I got this from my lockbox back in Nashville. There’s one thing we never fully put to rest between us.”

I frowned, more jittery by the minute, especially when he pulled the lid off with a quiet reverence usually reserved for priests or the parents of a newborn baby.

What was in that box?

“Last week, you mentioned how I never married you because I was already married to my work.” His throat worked as he produced a small black velvet box and popped it open.

Every atom in my body seized as I stared at the bright gold band, sparkling with a rainbow of tiny gems. It was beautiful.

Colorful and unique. A sob unfurled in my chest as I stared at it.

“I bought this the day we graduated college.”

I blinked at the ring, then him. Then the ring again. The sob turned into a rock lodged in my throat. “What?” He’d been holding onto this thing for eight years? “ What?” I repeated, because it seemed so inconceivable.

He laughed, but it sounded like sandpaper.

He rubbed a shaking palm over his jeans, carefully setting the ring on the table between us.

“You brought so much color into my life, Tess. From the very first moment you tapped that keg, I knew you were the one. But then I got a little up in my head, I guess. We were really young, and I wasn’t sure if you wanted something more traditional, you know? ”

I shook my head. I didn’t know. If there was a ring in the world more perfect than this one, I didn’t know of its existence.

“So then, I saw this one.” He produced another tiny velvet box. Inside was a gorgeous solitaire diamond in a platinum setting with tiny baguette diamonds on either side.

“What?” I gasped. That seemed to be the only word left in my vocabulary. Because really… what?

Dylan set it next to the first. “I had to save for a while to buy it, just out of college. Neither of us was making anything at all, but I thought it would look beautiful on your hand. But then you lost your mom, and I know that was a lot. The last thing I wanted was for you to feel like you couldn’t grieve for her the way you needed. I didn’t want to distract from that. ”

“Okay…” I could understand that. Kind of.

“And I saw this one on a trip to New York, right after I got that first big promotion at Worther.” He placed another ring on the table.

A brilliant sapphire set in gold. It was followed by another—a diamond in rose gold with a gorgeous halo surrounding the cushion cut.

An art déco style emerald, the band studded with rubies.

A hexagonal onyx stone with three diamonds trailing asymmetrically down the side of a glowing, brassy gold band.

I stared at them all, lined up in their multi-hued boxes on my scratched, second-hand coffee table. I wanted to snatch them up and find them somewhere better to sit. They were stunning. Every single one.

“I always thought I had the one. But then things kept changing. The only thing that ever stayed the same was how much I loved you, but I didn’t…feel like I had the right thing to offer yet.”

My lips wobbled, a tear sliding down my cheek.

This was too much. I needed to call Lainey.

A person’s heart wasn’t meant to squeeze and swoop like this.

“Dylan.” My voice came out as a whisper and I had to swallow, reaching out to squeeze his arm to give us both strength.

“You could have given me a paperclip and I would have been the happiest person in the world.”

More tears escaped. Dylan’s face scrunched, too. “I know that now. But you don’t deserve a paperclip, Tess. You deserve it all. All of me. My best and my worst. The good and the bad. Every moment, every phase. I want to be there for it, even if I fall short.”

“You could never. You’re so tall.” My stupid joke was a squeak, because I was actively sobbing now, arms hugging my midsection as Dylan kneeled before me. He laughed, even as he hastily wiped his eyes.

“Theresa Lynn, I have wanted to marry you since the first day I met you. It hasn’t gone away. Not when we were together, and not when we were apart. Please, please tell me you’ll marry me. I know we’re still working through things together, and we don’t have to have the wedding soo-OON!”

I tackled him to the ground, and he caught me before we could both tumble onto the rug. When I grabbed his face, it was sloppy, taking me a few tries to locate his mouth. A breathy sob caught in my throat as I kissed him. “Yes.”

His head jerked off the floor, banging into my face. “Yes? Fuck, sorry. Yes? ”

“Yes!” I laughed, pressing my lips into his again and again as he tried to sit up to examine my nose. “I will marry you tomorrow, or in fifty years. Yes.”

When he finally struggled upright, I sat in his lap, holding his precious head so I could look into his eyes.

“I know now; you’ve shown me that we can get through anything together.

And more importantly, I want to get through it with you.

I choose to do all of it with you. The good and the bad. Everything in between.”

“Tuesdays?” he whispered, finally abandoning my nose to skim his thumb across my jaw.

“Every Tuesday we have left, I want to spend it with you.”

He groaned when he captured my mouth with his, our tongues tangling together. He tasted like the salt from our tears and the sweet, heart-wrenching love that filled every inch of my body. “I love you. ”

“I love you, too.”

He cupped my head to draw me closer. Eventually, our frenzied kissing calmed, and he pulled back, placing lingering, gentle pecks onto my nose, eyelids, cheeks, lips, jaw, neck.

“So…”

“So…?” I echoed, eyes fluttering at his attention. I could stay like this, in his arms, forever.

“Which one do you want?”

I blinked my eyes open, staring at him with a hazy smile on my face. “Which one?”

“Which ring, Angel?” He swept my hair back, turning us so I had an unimpeded view of the jewelry on the table. My eyes glanced from box to box.

“ I have to pick?” Impossible. Every one of them was perfect in its own way. A different representation of our relationship— of me —over the years.

“They’re yours.”

“Are they?” I squeaked. The concept was laughable. All these gorgeous, unique declarations of love and adoration? It seemed like too much. Dylan chuckled.

“I didn’t buy them for me.” He toyed with the ends of my hair while I studied them all, looking from one to the other to the other.

“What happens to the ones I don’t choose?”

Dylan shrugged. “We can sell them, probably. Put the money towards a down payment on a place here.”

As much as I enjoyed the idea of living with Dylan again, a violent rejection surged inside me. Someone else? Wear these beautiful pieces of art Dylan had picked out just for me? The thought broke my heart.

“Tess? What are you thinking?”

It was ridiculous and sentimental and stupid, but I felt like they’d all been sitting in a box, stuffed away in the dark for so long. Just like me, they needed to get out in the fresh air. Take a breath and feel the love that surrounded them.

“Tess?”

“They’re all so perfect…” Most girls only got one ring. I should just pick one and be grateful and blissfully in love.

“I’m glad you think so.” Dylan tucked a stray strand of hair back behind my ear.

“Which one, um…which would you pick? If you had to pick now?” I was chickening out, but Dylan’s opinion mattered.

Maybe he had a favorite, and that would be that, and he would sell the rest, and I’d never have to think about how beautiful the onyx was or wonder what the solitaire would look like on my hand.

Dylan frowned as he looked down at them all. “I’m not sure.”

Well, there went that idea. “I just…”

“Talk to me, Angel.” Dylan’s voice contained a hint of a smile, and in that moment, I knew that he knew .

I looked at him through my lashes. “Is it…very extra and high-maintenance if I love all of them?”

He pretended to look shocked. “ All of them?”

I sat up straighter. “Yes! What, you want me to reject the ring you picked out for me first? Or the one when I was going through my art déco phase? You want me to just live my life knowing there’s someone out there wearing the ring you wanted to marry me with?

” I flailed my hands at the gleaming metal on the table.

“It’s not even about the rings, Dylan! This could have been a paperclip!

” I wailed, tilting my head back to the ceiling.

“I know. I’m sorry,” he murmured, cradling my jaw and bringing my gaze back down to his. “It’s not about the rings; it’s about us.”

“Yeah.” I may have been pouting. Uncharacteristic, but if I was going to be spoiled rotten, I might as well act like it.

Dylan heaved a dramatic sigh, glancing at the table one last time. “I guess we’ll have to keep all of them.”

My heart leaped at the thought, but I shook my head. “That’s too much. How will I even wear them?”

“Probably on your fingers,” he teased, grabbing my hand before I could pinch his side. “It’s not too much. They’re yours, Tess. Bought and paid for. Wear a different one whenever you feel like it. Wear two. One on each finger, I don’t care. Just…”

“Just?” I arched my eyebrow, waiting for the catch.

“At least wear your wedding band consistently. That seems like the big one.”

I laughed, tipping my forehead into the cradle of his shoulder. “Deal. As long as it’s a paperclip.”

I felt him shrug, then lean over. He rummaged in his work bag for a few moments before pulling out a paperclip, a triumphant grin on his face. Within minutes, he pushed a too-big, sloppy metal circle onto my finger.

“All of you, Tess. The diamonds and the paperclips. I want it all.”

It was perfect.