Updated Oct 1, 2025 • ~10 min read
James was three weeks old, and Sienna had never been so exhausted in her entire life.
“Is he supposed to eat this much?” she asked at 3 AM, nursing James for what felt like the hundredth time that night.
“According to the book, yes. According to my sanity, absolutely not.” Damon looked as wrecked as she felt—hair disheveled, wearing a t-shirt stained with spit-up, dark circles under his eyes that made him look almost human instead of absurdly perfect.
“We’re disasters,” Sienna said.
“The best kind of disasters.” He kissed the top of her head. “Want me to take him after he’s done? You should sleep.”
“You should sleep.”
“We should both sleep. That’s clearly not happening, so we’ll take turns being conscious adults.”
James finished nursing, looked up at her with those intense eyes—so much like Damon’s it was almost unfair—and promptly spit up all over her.
“I love you so much,” Sienna told her son. “But you’re disgusting.”
Damon took James, patting his back while Sienna changed into her fourth shirt of the night. “You know what we haven’t done in three weeks?”
“Sleep? Shower? Have a conversation that doesn’t involve bodily fluids?”
“Been engaged.”
She stopped mid-shirt-change. “What?”
“We’re engaged. Technically. I gave you a ring, you said yes, and then James decided to make his dramatic entrance.” Damon was rocking James gently. “But we haven’t talked about it. About what comes next.”
“Next is surviving infancy. Then toddlerhood. Then college. Then—”
“Next is getting married. If you still want to.”
“Damon, I’m wearing nursing pads and granny panties. This is not the time for marriage talk.”
“When is the time? When we’re both coherent? That might be eighteen years from now.” He looked at her seriously. “I want to marry you, Sienna. Not because of Eleanor’s trust incentives, not because it looks good, not because James needs legitimate parents. I want to marry you because I love you. Because you’re my partner. Because I can’t imagine doing any of this with anyone else.”
James chose that moment to burp spectacularly, and Sienna laughed despite her exhaustion.
“You’re proposing while our son spits up on you?”
“I proposed once at the wrong time. Might as well keep the tradition going.” But he was smiling. “I’m serious though. Whenever you’re ready—tomorrow, next month, next year—I want to marry you. For real. For us.”
“Ask me again when I’m not a sleep-deprived milk factory.”
“Deal.”
But the real proposal didn’t come when she was well-rested and put-together.
It came on a Tuesday afternoon, six weeks postpartum, when Sienna was wearing yoga pants that hadn’t seen yoga in years and one of Damon’s t-shirts because all her clothes still didn’t fit right.
James was actually sleeping—a miracle that happened approximately twice a day—and Sienna had just finished pumping milk when Damon appeared in the nursery doorway.
“Come with me,” he said.
“I’m covered in breast milk and exhaustion—”
“Perfect. Come on.”
He led her to the living room, where he’d somehow transformed the space while she’d been pumping. Candles everywhere—real ones, not the electronic kind, which was definitely a fire hazard with a newborn in the house. Flowers on every surface. And in the center of it all, a blanket spread on the floor with pillows.
“What is this?” she asked.
“This is me doing it right. Finally.” He took her hands. “Sienna Laurent, I’ve been in love with you since you stole the Meridian account from under my nose three years ago.”
“That’s not romantic.”
“Let me finish. I’ve been in love with you since you challenged me, fought me, refused to back down no matter how much I tried to intimidate you. I loved you when you were my rival. I loved you when you got pregnant. I loved you when you chose safety over chaos—even though that safety was my brother.”
“Damon—”
“I loved you through the scandal, through the lies, through every impossible moment. I loved you when Lucas hated us both. I loved you when you were lying about the timeline. I loved you through the diary leaks and the paternity tests and the public humiliation.” He pulled her closer. “But most of all, I love you now. Right now. Looking exhausted and covered in our son’s various fluids, more beautiful than anyone has a right to be.”
“I look like hell.”
“You look like the woman who gave me everything I didn’t know I wanted.” He got down on one knee—actually knelt on the floor like this was a real proposal, not something they’d already technically done. “This isn’t about Eleanor’s money. This isn’t about legitimizing James. This isn’t about fixing the scandal or repairing my family’s reputation. This is about me asking you to be my wife because I can’t imagine a day without you in it.”
He pulled out a box—different from the first ring box, velvet but worn.
“This was my grandmother’s,” he said, opening it. Inside was a ring that took her breath away—vintage, elegant, a single diamond surrounded by smaller stones. “From her first marriage, before she married into the Cross family. Before the money and the expectations and the dynasty. When she was just Eleanor from Queens, marrying a man she loved.”
“Eleanor gave you her ring?” Sienna could barely breathe.
“She said you reminded her of herself. Scared but brave. Building something real from impossible circumstances.” He took the ring from the box. “She wants you to have it. Wants us to build our own story, not just inherit hers.”
“Damon—”
“Marry me, Sienna. Not because it makes sense. Not because James needs a complete family. Not because the will says so or the lawyers recommend it. Marry me because you love me. Because we’re better together than apart. Because our disaster family is the best thing that ever happened to both of us.”
She was crying now, ugly crying, the kind of crying that came with postpartum hormones and sleep deprivation and overwhelming love.
“Yes,” she said through the tears. “Yes, I’ll marry you. For all the right reasons and none of the wrong ones. Because I love you. Because you’ve earned this. Because I choose you.”
He slid the ring on her finger—it fit perfectly, like Eleanor had known—and kissed her with the kind of tenderness that made her forget she was exhausted and overwhelmed and still healing from childbirth.
“We’re engaged,” he said. “Again. For real this time.”
“The first time was real too—”
“The first time was me panicking and trying to claim you before you changed your mind. This time is me knowing exactly what I’m asking for and wanting it anyway.” He pulled her down to the blanket, held her close. “You, me, and James. Our perfectly imperfect family.”
“And Lucas,” she added quietly. “Somewhere out there, healing. Being part of this in his own way.”
“And Lucas,” Damon agreed. “Uncle Lucas, who sends presents but keeps his distance. Who’s learning to be happy for us even though it kills him.”
James started crying from the nursery—impeccable timing, as always.
“I’ll get him,” Damon said, starting to stand.
“Wait.” Sienna pulled him back down. “One more minute. Just us. Before we go back to being parents instead of just—us.”
So they stayed on the blanket, surrounded by candles and flowers and the sound of their son demanding attention, and Sienna looked at the ring on her finger—Eleanor’s ring, a piece of history, a promise of the future.
“When do you want to get married?” Damon asked.
“I don’t know. Soon? After I can fit into something that isn’t yoga pants?”
“I’d marry you in yoga pants tomorrow.”
“Eleanor would have a heart attack. We should probably give her time to plan something appropriately excessive.”
“Or we could elope. Go somewhere quiet, just us and James, make it simple.”
“You want simple? After everything?”
“I want real. Simple is just a bonus.” He stood, pulled her up. “Come on. Our son is staging a coup in the nursery.”
They got James—who calmed immediately once Sienna picked him up, proving once again that she was his favorite person—and settled on the couch with candles still burning and flowers still blooming and the ring still perfect on her finger.
“Thank you,” Sienna said.
“For what?”
“For doing it right. The proposal, I mean. For making it about us instead of everything else.”
“I should have done it right the first time.”
“The first time was exactly what we needed. Messy and imperfect and completely us.” She adjusted James, who was already falling back asleep. “This was just—confirmation.”
Her phone buzzed. A text from Eleanor:
I assume the ring fit? Excellent. Let me know when you’ve set a date. I have a venue list prepared. —E
Another text: Also, James needs a trust fund. We’ll discuss at next family dinner. Which is now mandatory monthly instead of weekly, given your new parental obligations.
“Your grandmother is already planning our wedding,” Sienna said, showing Damon the messages.
“Of course she is. Did you expect anything less?”
A third text from Eleanor: And Sienna? Welcome to the family. Officially. Though you’ve been part of it since the moment you refused to back down from my grandson. —E
Sienna’s throat tightened. “She welcomed me to the family.”
“You’ve been family for months. She’s just making it official.” Damon kissed her forehead. “My grandmother loves you. My mother is learning to tolerate you. Lucas is trying to be happy for us. And I—” He looked at her with such love it made her chest ache. “I’m just grateful you said yes.”
“Both times.”
“Both times,” he agreed.
That night, after James was finally, blessedly asleep in his bassinet, after the candles were blown out and the flowers arranged in vases, after the chaos of new parenthood settled into temporary quiet, Sienna lay in bed and studied the ring on her finger.
Eleanor’s ring. A piece of Cross family history that predated the dynasty, the scandal, the weight of the name.
Just a woman from Queens marrying a man she loved.
Sienna thought about her own journey—from rival to accidental lover to pregnant disaster to fiancée to mother to bride-to-be. None of it had been planned. All of it had been earned.
“What are you thinking about?” Damon asked, pulling her close.
“How far we’ve come. From enemies to—this.”
“This being engaged parents sleeping in two-hour increments?”
“This being happy. Despite everything. Maybe because of everything.” She turned to face him. “I love you. Not because you gave me a ring or claimed me publicly or fought for us. I love you because when I look at our life—messy and complicated and nothing like I planned—I can’t imagine it any other way.”
“That’s the most romantic thing you’ve ever said to me.”
“Must be the sleep deprivation talking.”
“Or the love. Probably the love.” He kissed her, soft and sweet and full of promise. “Get some sleep. James will be up in an hour demanding food.”
“Forty-five minutes, if we’re lucky.”
“Then we have forty-five minutes to sleep like regular humans. Let’s not waste it.”
But neither of them slept. They just lay there in the dark, hands joined, rings touching, listening to their son breathe in the bassinet beside them.
This was what they’d fought for. This quiet moment. This simple happiness. This family built from disaster and stubbornness and love that refused to be convenient.
Sienna says yes through tears, hand over her heart and his, and finally—finally—everything felt right.
Not perfect. They’d never be perfect.
But right. Real. Theirs.
And that was enough.
More than enough.
It was everything.
Reader Reactions