“Beatrice.”
“Yes?”
“There’s something we never settled.”
Her stomach tightened.
“What?”
“Our marriage.”
She became very still.
Caleb saw.
“We married because Marcus forced circumstances.”
“He forced yours.”
“And threatened yours.”
“Yes.”
“The bargain is gone.”
Her face closed.
Caleb immediately realized he was failing again.
“I am terrible at beginnings.”
“Yes.”
He crossed the room.
Stopped before her.
“What I mean is…”
He removed something from his pocket.
Not a ring.
The torn pieces of the old five-hundred-dollar debt note.
He had kept them.
Beatrice stared.
Caleb placed them in the fire.
The paper curled.
Blackened.
Disappeared.
“No debt.”
She watched.
“No Marcus.”
The flames consumed the last signature.
Caleb turned.
“No reason you must remain Mrs. Mercer.”
Her eyes filled.
He continued.
“So I’m asking properly.”
Beatrice’s heart pounded.
Caleb took both her hands.
“Will you stay married to me?”
She laughed through tears.
“That is your proposal?”
“I’m inexperienced.”
“You’ve already married me.”
“Practice did not help.”
Beatrice shook her head.
Caleb smiled nervously.
“I love you.”
The room became silent.
He had not said it before.
Not once.
Beatrice stared.
Caleb continued.
“I love that you argue with doctors.”
A tear slipped down her cheek.
“I love that you can read medical books I can barely understand.”
Another.
“I love the way you pretend not to want the last biscuit.”
She laughed.
“I love that you are large and warm and strong enough to nearly crush my fingers when you’re angry.”
“That happened once.”
“Three times.”
“Continue.”
Caleb smiled.
“I love your body.”
Her expression changed.
He did not look away.
“All of it.”
Beatrice’s breathing became uneven.
“I love how you take up space in a room people spent years telling you to disappear from.”
She covered her mouth.
“I love that when I look at my cabin now, I think of where your books should go.”
Caleb’s voice broke slightly.
“And when I imagine old age, you’re irritating me in it.”
Beatrice laughed through tears.
“That is awful.”
“It’s the best I have.”
He squeezed her hands.
“Stay.”
She looked at him.
Not because she needed protection.
Not because the mine needed management.
Not because a contract said wife.
Not because the church had pronounced anything.
Choice.
Finally.
“Yes.”
Caleb closed his eyes.
Relief.
Then Beatrice added, “But I want a better proposal someday.”
He opened them.
“What?”
“For anniversaries.”
“You’re impossible.”
“You married me twice.”
He kissed her.
That night, they stopped sleeping with distance between them.
Not because a minister had made intimacy lawful months earlier.
Because trust had finally made closeness safe.
The cabin was warm.
Snow pressed against the shutters.
Caleb touched her as though asking questions with every movement.
Beatrice answered without shame.
Years of jokes had taught her to expect desire to arrive disguised as mockery or bargain.
Caleb offered neither.
He did not pretend she was smaller than she was.
Did not praise her “despite” anything.
Did not treat her body as a test of his generosity.