“Oh yeah?” I took a step back, guiding us back to the couch. “What perks are those?”

“Well, you do my laundry,” she replied with a cheeky smile and a glance down at the T-shirt that barely covered her panties. Then she patted my chest. “And you’re working out an obsessive amount. You’re such a pretty house ghost.”

I frowned in thought, dragging her over to the leather couch. “I’m sorry—are you saying you like being my sugar mama while I wait at home and make myself pretty for you?”

“And make me food, yes,” she said with mock sincerity.

“I’m practically your housewife,” I replied lightly, pushing her legs against the couch. “You should probably just marry me.”

Mattie’s smile tightened wryly. “Oh, is that how that works?”

I nodded, bending down to kiss the delicate skin just under her jaw. “It is. I don’t make the rules. I just follow them.”

Mattie spun the princess-cut diamond ring on her left finger, eying it as she rested her hand on my shoulder. “I don’t know. That’s a big ask, Mr. Specter.”

I hummed in thought with my lips on her skin, moving slowly toward her mouth. “Don’t think too long. I’m getting impatient. How does December first work for you?”

“In three days?” she laughed.

“Mhm.” I kissed the corner of her mouth, remembering how many bruises had marred her skin last year, and how hideously angry they had made me as I’d watched them heal. I might have left my guns and butterfly knives in my past, but keeping her safe would always be a constant.

“Well, let’s see,” she mused, angling her face away to hook my gaze with her faux-serious one. “What was that word you liked so much?”

“Ah, that word,” I let my knuckles skim up the sides of her waist through the soft jersey fabric of the T-shirt. “You want me to beg you, Bunny?”

Mirth shimmered in her brown sugar eyes. “Oh, yes. I’d love that.”

I kissed her, slanting a slow, teasing caress over her full lips. My hands dug into her hips, fitting her to the front of me, and my tongue traced a delicious line along her bottom lip. Bubblegum. She always tasted like bubblegum, and it was fast becoming my favorite flavor. When I pulled away, her eyelids had fallen to half mast, and she puffed a little breath through her kiss-pinkened lips.

Holding her half-lidded, dazed stare, I slowly lowered myself to my knees. Bracing her hips between my hands, I kissed her stomach through her shirt. “Please, Mattie? Will you stop putting off our wedding and marry me?”

Her fingers tangled in my hair. “You’re not playing fair.”

I peeked up through my eyelashes, holding her warm gaze. My hands dipped under the T-shirt, gliding up her smooth thighs before hooking under the thin strip of lace on her panties. “Please.”

She groaned, tightening her hold on my hair. “Kael.”

I lifted the shirt, slowly revealing the triangle of black material and letting my fingers trace the waistband. “Please, Matilda Almost-Specter.”

“Kael.” My name on her lips that time sounded more like a plea, and she angled her hips into me. “Who would we even invite? It’s stupid.”

“I’ll invite your parents. Oh, wait—”

She let out a strangled laugh.

“Too soon?” I grinned up at her. She knew as well as I did that they were in prison for a litany of federal crimes. Good riddance.

Mattie stroked my cheek, and I closed my eyes momentarily, overcome by bliss. Her nails scraped along my five o’clock shadow. “Fine. I guess we could… I don’t know. Have a winter wedding or something.”

I leaned forward, and wrapping my arms around her waist and hips, I tackled her to the couch. She fell back, already laughing as I pinned her body beneath mine. I stretched my body over hers, trapping her legs between mine and circling her wrists in the manacles of my hands. “I told you I’d get you.”

“Yes, but you don’t play fair,” she pointed out with a breathless smile.

“I never have,” I murmured, lowering my lips to whisper against hers. “And I never will.”

Mattie kissed me softly before quirking a brow and asking, “So, who won then? Last I checked, I was beating you.” She wrote in the air with her finger like she had on the pantry door so long ago. “Bunny: Three. Ghost: Zero.”

“Hm,” I hummed, thinking. I thought about the way Mattie slept with one leg and one arm draped over me every night. I thought about the ghost keychain she’d gotten me for our first Christmas together, and the way she had launched herself into my arms when she’d gotten her residency acceptance letter from the University of Montana Hospital. I thought about the shine in her eyes when we’d found this ranch, and the gentle kindness she’d shown my mother when we’d brought her to live here with us. I thought about the way snow dusted her light hair like a halo, about the bubblegum flavor on her lips, and the laugh lines in the creases of her autumn eyes.

I thought about the way she filled every hollow crevice in my soul, and I knew without a doubt that one of us had definitely come out on top here. Because no matter what she said about needing me, about loving me, about wilting when she had to spend five days away from me at the hospital each week, I knew better. I knew she would shine brightly with or without me. No matter what she said, I was the one who had gotten lucky here.

I shook my head, smiling against her soft lips. “You’re mine, Bunny. I win.”

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