He watched her eyes go wide, the answer flit across them, and saw her face break out into the widest smile he’d seen only once before. It was when he’d stopped the bomb and they’d both realized they would live to see another day. It was her smile of life, of knowing that she not only got to keep living, but that there was a new reason to live at all. And his question, one full of promises and a future, had brought that to her face. But what she said next broke him out of that reverie.
“Really?”
Rick chuckled and shook his head. But he needed to be sitting up for this so he pulled her up with him. “Kate. I love you. I’ve loved you for…ever. You captivate me with everything that you are. You’re a brilliant mother to my child. You see me for who I am and love me anyway. We’ve been through life and death together. Our relationship has been a long time coming, and I was willing to wait for as long as you needed for it to begin. And then I knew that it would take a while longer for you to adjust and to open up and share. For that door that you keep everything locked behind to be open to me. For you to trust me with everything. And I knew I would wait for that. Because I love you. And if I couldn’t be with you then I wasn’t going to be with anybody else.
“And it took a while, but we broke down that last wall tonight. And now that it’s all out there, now that I not only know every expression you give and what it means and what you need, but also what drives you, what made you, and why, now I can’t bring myself to wait any longer.”
She had tears in her eyes and confusion written all over her face. “Yes, Kate,” he answered, “I know it all and I still want you. Hell, it’s what makes me want you. I know what you’ve been through, the dark and twisty, the morbid, the crazy, the obsession. And I am so sorry for that. But I also see what’s it’s made you into: the extraordinary woman I see before me today. The woman who not only sympathizes, but empathizes with the victims of her cases, the incredible woman who sees the darkness but stands up to it, faces it, and uses the light to banish it away. You face that which took your mother everyday and you succeed. You’re incredible, you’re beautiful, and I refuse to spend another day without you tethered to me in some way. I want it to be known that despite all reason and unworthiness, you chose me and I get to call you mine. Marry me.”
Kate threw her arms around him and buried her face in his neck, her tears running down and staining the collar of his shirt. “Yes,” she murmured over and over again. “Yes, I’ll marry you. God yes I’ll marry you.”
Giddy with joy and no small amount of relief, Rick jumped up, pulling Kate with him, and spun her around like a scene from a movie.
“We’re getting married. You’re gonna be my wife,” he found himself repeating over and over again. Kate started laughing, her life smile still plastered on her face. And it was in that moment that Rick saw their future before them. And it was incredible. Kids and summers at the Hamptons. Solving her mother’s case. Anniversaries around the world, most of them spent in bed. Rick would take time from writing to be home with their children. Kate would make Captain and would ease his mind by staying off the streets more. She would hate it at first, but time with their family would make it worth every minute she would have spent pursuing killers. They would attend Epso and Lanie’s wedding, dance to every slow song, bring life to the dance floor when the pace kicked back up. They would laugh and tease and love and even fight a little. But through it all, one word would remain.
Rick looked down at Kate and found her already studying him. “Did you see it, too?” She asked.
Rick nodded his head and felt her wipe away a tear that had escaped his eye. “It’s beautiful,” he whispered. He didn’t tell her this, but he didn’t need to. This hadn’t happened with Meredith and Gina. So he wasn’t really surprised when their marriages ended. The way they ended, sure, but he knew in his heart that neither of them would last. But with Kate, even in the beginning, he saw his future with her on every page. It just hadn’t been this photographic before.
