Lysander's POV
Caroline wipes her eyes with the back of her hand, takes a breath that shudders through her whole body, and says the last thing I expect to hear from a woman who was crying about negative pregnancy tests thirty seconds ago.
"Marry me."
The kitchen goes still. A wolf with a plate of toast freezes in the doorway, glances at us, and retreats.
"I’m sorry, what?"
"Marry me, Lysander. Not someday, not after we defeat the vampires or secure the pack or reach some benchmark of safety that may never come."
She takes my hands, fingers still damp with tears, eyes red-rimmed but ferociously clear.
"Marry me now, while we're still standing. While we can still choose something joyful in the middle of all this wreckage."
"Caroline, five minutes ago you were grieving—"
"I was terrified our future might be limited, and that's exactly why I'm asking." She squeezes my hands. "We've been fighting so hard to survive that we forgot to plan for actually living."
"You're proposing to me in a kitchen that smells like burnt toast."
"It’s the only home I have left, surrounded by the only family that still claims me. If the setting isn't romantic enough, we can pretend I did it somewhere with candles."
"I don't need candles." My voice comes out rough. "Are you sure this isn't grief talking? That you're not reaching for commitment because the tests made you feel like something's slipping away."
She holds my gaze with the intensity she brings to closing arguments.
"I've been disowned by my family, hunted by my clan, and told my body might not cooperate with the one future I was imagining. I've lost everything I was born with. The only thing I get to choose is what I build next, and I want to build it with you."
"Tomorrow."
"What?"
"I'll marry you tomorrow if I can find someone to officiate. Today if we can't wait." I pull her against me, her tear-streaked face pressed to my chest. "I would marry you right now in this kitchen, with burnt toast as witnesses and that terrible coffee as champagne."
"That's disgustingly romantic."
"You proposed first, and I'm just matching my energy." I press my lips to her hair. "But I want to do this properly. Not for us—we don't need ceremony to know what we are. For the pack who's watched you sacrifice everything and still question whether you belong."
"A public wedding would make a statement."
"It makes a declaration. The Alpha's brother claiming a human mate in front of the entire pack, with the Luna's blessing. It says Silvermoon doesn't just tolerate your presence—it celebrates it."
"Thalia's blessing," Caroline pulls back to look at me. "That carries real weight, doesn't it? If the Luna endorses this publicly, it shifts the political ground."
"It shifts everything. Thalia broke a council tie to keep you here. She approved my mate claim. She built her defensive strategy around your intelligence. If she stands between us at a ceremony and sanctions this union, it tells the pack that their Luna considers you family."
"Do you think she would?"
"I think she's been waiting for me to stop being cautious and commit to what my wolf decided months ago."
I cup her face, thumbs resting on her cheekbones.
"Thalia understands what we are. She watched her own marriage survive the destruction of the mate bond, so she knows better than anyone that love built on choice can be just as real as one built on destiny."
"Then ask her. Today, before either of us finds a reason to be practical about timing."
"There will be political questions. She'll need to consider what a human-wolf marriage means for pack dynamics, for wolves who view integration as a threat to supernatural survival."
"I'll answer every question she needs to ask. I've already faced a council vote—a conversation about whether I deserve to marry the man I love should be manageable by comparison."
"You deserve everything, Caroline. That was never the question."
"Then what is?"
"Whether I can make you happy. After everything— Whether the man standing in front of you is someone worthy of what you're offering."
"You want to talk about worthiness? You showed me your wolf, stood in front of your pack, and claimed me publicly when silence would have been safer."
Her hands grip the front of my shirt.
"You are the most worthy man I have ever known, Lysander Fenris, and if you make me argue this point any longer, I'm going to rescind my proposal and let you do it instead."
"Don't you dare rescind anything. That proposal is mine now."
"Then stop questioning your worthiness and go talk to your Luna before I lose my nerve and we end up eloping to a courthouse like boring humans."
I laugh—genuine, startled, the kind of sound that shouldn't exist in a kitchen during wartime but stubbornly persists because Caroline Montgomery refuses to let circumstances dictate her capacity for joy.
She proposed marriage while crying, argued for my worthiness while insulting my self-doubt, and threatened to elope in the same breath she demanded a proper pack ceremony.
She is chaos and clarity and the most magnificent contradiction I've ever loved.
"I'll go now," I tell her. "Before you change your mind about wanting a ceremony."
"I won't change it about anything. I'm a lawyer—once I've made my closing argument, the verdict stands."
"The verdict being that you're stuck with me."
"It being that I chose you."
She stands on her toes and kisses me—brief, fierce, tasting like tears and terrible coffee.
"Now go get your Luna's blessing so I can spend the rest of my life being your wife instead of your controversial house guest."
I leave the kitchen with her taste on my lips and purpose in my stride. The war isn't over. The vampires are watching from the tree line. My brother still can't shift, and the children's gifts are still stabilizing…
Every rational calculation says this is the wrong time for a wedding.
But sometimes the bravest thing two people can do is celebrate love when everything around them suggests they should be preparing for death. The world doesn't pause for joy—you have to carve space for it yourself, with stubborn hands and a refusal to let fear dictate the shape of your future.
Thalia's blessing would make this real in the eyes of the pack—transforming a personal commitment into a political declaration that shifts the ground beneath every wolf who's questioned whether a human belongs here.
I'm going to ask for it. Whatever questions she raises, whatever concerns she needs addressed—I'll answer every one, because the woman in that kitchen offered me a future I didn't think I deserved, and I intend to be worthy of it.