Chapter 22: Ask Me Properly

The ring in his hand was the old emerald, and he held it up in his open palm.

A hundred and forty people had stopped breathing.

Somewhere behind me a furnace door clanged, and nobody turned.

"Get up," I said, and my voice came out thin.

"No."

"Rhodri. The floor is concrete."

"I know." His knee was already pale against it. "I'd like to be uncomfortable for this."

Someone near the back whispered, "Oh, thank God," and someone else said "Shh."

He looked up at me.

He was still holding my wrist, the one Chisolm had gripped, and I think he had forgotten it was in his hand.

"A year ago," he said, "I stood in a courthouse with a clerk and a witness and I said I do."

"I said it in a voice I'd use to order lunch."

"I never asked you anything. I signed. You signed. A man read a paragraph."

"I remember."

"I want to ask you now," Rhodri said. "Properly. With nothing riding on it."

"There's no chair. There's no clause. There's no Chisolm."

"My family has a lease on a building you're buying back at your own pace."

"I'd like to be your embarrassing landlord for fourteen years."

A few people laughed.

His voice got steadier as it went.

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