She gave me a wan smile.
“I love the kids and enjoy being with them, but sometimes I’m tired, and holy hell, they still need attention.”
She laughed at that. “It’s strange how such small people can have so much energy.”
“The fact is, it’s both our faults that we lost each other. I’m here now where we said our vows, to love and honor each other in sickness and in health forever, to tell you I still want that. And I hope to hell you do too.”
Her head bobbed up and down. “I do.” She wrapped her arms around me. “I do Brayden. I always have. I’m just an idiot sometimes.”
I held her close, lifting my head because if I didn’t kiss her soon, I might die. I stared down into her pretty green eyes.
I started to dip my head to taste her, when she said, “I love you, Brayden.”
My heart soared, and my lips consumed hers like a starving man having his first morsel after a famine. When her fingers clutched my shirt, gripping at me like she’d never let me go, the final bit of tightness in my chest released.
“I’m sorry, Brayden, I’m so sorry…” she murmured against my lips over and over.
“Me too, baby. Me too.” I lifted my head. “Promise me, here where we made our first promise, that when I fuck up, which I’ll probably do, you won’t leave. Even when I seem hard headed or unchanging, don’t leave.”
“I promise.”
“And I promise you, my beautiful Terra, that I’m going to be there. For you and the kids. Whatever you need.”
She pressed her hand to my face. “I can’t let you give the business away—”
“You’re not forcing me. And did you see the zeros? I’m not giving it away. I’m getting us more time.” I didn’t say it, but I had to be realistic that if her cancer treatments didn’t take, our happily ever after could be over sooner rather than later. “All I’ve ever wanted was to give you the world Terra. I thought all this work to provide for you and kids was doing that. I was wrong.”
“I don’t have a grand gesture for you and I feel like I need to give one more than you do.”
“Your promise to not toss me aside is all I need.” I pushed a tendril of her hair back, glad that while it had thinned some, she hadn’t lost it. At least not during this round of treatment. “I do have to confess that I’ll need to go in to the office on Monday and after that, be available, hopefully by phone and video conference just during the transition. But that’s it.”
“Do you want this? I worry you’ll resent me.”
I shook my head. “I resented the work when it threatened to cost me you and the kids.”
“Won’t you get bored?”
I laughed. “Are you trying to tell me you’re boring?”
She gave me a smile that lit up my insides. “No. But still…”
“We’ll cross that bridge if and when we get to it. Like I said, we could start a foundation. Or we can set up a consulting business. Just you and me from home. Or we can focus on you and me and the kids. Maybe even have more.”
She looked down before I could realize my mistake. “I might not be able to have more.”
“I’m sorry. I just meant that we’ll be able to do whatever we want if we get bored.”
“Do you want more kids?”
Mentally I kicked myself for not remembering that her treatment could cause infertility. “Terra. What I want is you and Lanie and Noah. If that’s all I ever had in this world, I’d be perfectly content. That’s what you’ve taught me. I won’t take you for granted. All I want now is to dedicate myself to making you well and happy. Selling the business gives us the time and money to do that.”
She nodded. “Yes. Okay. I want that. I want you.”
“So, you’ll sign it?”
“Yes.”
I kissed her again, feeling elated. Like I’d finally achieved a dream. I’d thought my dream was financial security, and while I had achieved that, it turned out my dream was Terra, and building a family and life with her.
“I’d like to stay here and kiss you some more…well actually, I’d like to take you home and make love—”
“We can’t?” She looked up at me with disappointment in her expression.
“Emma and the kids should be showing up shortly.”
“It was nice of her to help with your grand gesture.” Terra leaned against me. It was unbelievable how good it felt to have her reaching to me for once.
“I worried she might not. I wasn’t sure what you might have told her. I was afraid she’d hate me.”
“I did talk to her about some things. Interestingly enough, she seemed to side with you. Maybe that’s why the kids wonder if you’ll marry her if I die.”
I jerked, not sure how to respond to that crazy statement. “Ah…”
She laughed softly. “Kids really do say the darndest things.”
“Why would they even say that?”
“I told them I had to have surgery. They put together that I had what my mom had and it didn’t go well for her. I tried to reassure them without lying, but...They worried about who’d take care of them.” She looked up at me with apologetic eyes. “They thought you worked too much to—”
“I know.”
“Anyway, I told them Emma and others would always be there and that’s when they asked if you’d marry her.”
“There’s only you for me, Terra. Whatever happens.”
Her eyes watered again. “I know it might not seem like it, but I do want you to be happy. If I did die—”
“Don’t. Don’t talk like that.” I gave her little shake because I couldn’t bear thinking about it.
“I’d want you to be happy. Maybe not with Emma because that would be weird.” She paused. “Then again, I
