A little publicity was an understatement.
Every day of the week we’re in the hospital, the TV is clogged with reports on the “takedown of the Russian assassin ring” as well as the “death of a gunrunning legend.”
Several of the gawkers in the restaurant took footage of the fall on their phones. Actually watching the fall—which felt endless but in reality only lasted a few short seconds—made me physically sick. To see Damon launch himself over the railing almost at the exact moment he lost my hand, seeing our bodies plummet . . . I had to stop watching.
Besides, the images of us being fished out unconscious, bleeding, and sopping wet were just plain humiliating. Drowned cat is not a good look for anyone.
Pretty soon I was too busy getting reamed by everyone in my life to watch TV. When Mom and Dad arrived, they each hugged me, crying, for about five minutes apiece. Then they proceeded to lecture me on the rashness of my actions for the next three days. If we’d been back in Utah, fully grown adult or not, they’d have sent me to my old room in total seriousness. And I probably would’ve gone.
I really do feel guilty. That’s what I’ve been saying over and over again. To Mom and Dad. To every one of my brothers and sisters on the phone—they scolded quite a bit too. Bridget did a lot of crying as well as lecturing. She also vowed to send me the bill to her therapist this month.
When McNair stopped by to check on us—bringing a nice bunch of tulips and “regards” from the rest of the agents—he said that the FBI was in my debt. I told him that if the FBI wanted to pay me back they could get my family and friends to stop yelling at me.
But I know it comes from a place of love. Mom did take a break from remonstration to sneak me an In-N-Out burger, and Dad has brought a new bouquet of flowers every single day.
Damon too has been overly affectionate. Since he’s more mobile than I am, he creeps in from his room every day to sit with me and watch TV. After awhile his nurses just started coming here to check on him instead of bothering with his room first.
He’s also told me that he loves me roughly every five minutes.
The one thing we haven’t discussed is that other thing, the thing he said right before I fell.
I haven’t brought it up because, well, we both thought I was about to die, right? People say crazy things when someone’s about to die. I really can’t hold him to that. Besides, I was pretty delirious at that moment, so it’s possible he didn’t even say it. I could’ve imagined it. He’s made it clear that he loves me, so if he had actually said it, there would be no reason not to bring it up now, right? So clearly he must not have really said it . . .
I’m obsessing.
The night I woke up and we were both okay, I was just so relieved that I didn’t even think to bring it up. The second my eyes opened the next morning, I sat up and started shouting to the hospital room, “Damon propo—!” But then I reined it in. He hadn’t brought it up the whole night before, even though he stayed beside my bed all night long. Maybe he was just relieved too.
Or maybe he remembered but purposefully hadn’t brought it up.
So maybe he would bring it up when they wheeled him to my room for breakfast . . .
I may or may not have begged the nurse for a disposable razor and shaved the tiny hairs off the ring finger of my left hand just in case.
But breakfast came and went, and he didn’t mention it (and my stupid hairless ring finger mocked me). And again, he’s not denying loving me, so if the other thing had really happened, then he would definitely bring it up, right?
I’m obsessing again.
It’s fine. He loves me, and that’s plenty for now.
If it took him eight months to say he loved me, maybe it will just take him a while to get back around to . . . that other thing. I’ll just have to be patient and hope it doesn’t take eight more months.
Eight months. Oy.
It’s fine. The guy has almost died for me twice now, so I need to cut him some slack.
Miriam and Sabrina have come to visit every day too. They did their fair share of crying and hugging. When his mom first got a hold of him, she told Damon, “You’ve got to knock this stuff off!” I’d never before appreciated how hard it must have been for them with him on active duty all those years, watching stuff like this happen to him.
I’m not sure if I’m strong enough to be a federal agent’s wife. That is, if we ever get back to . . . you know.
The FBI recovered all that poker money I won from the Solokovs’ safe, and there was a debate about what exactly to do with it. Considering it was earned during an official investigation, it’s technically the property of the FBI. That suits me just fine since I couldn’t have accepted it anyway. But I did request that at least some of it be given to the family of Agent Farris—the dealer who disappeared during the investigation. McNair promises he’ll do his best.
After the first five days, I told Mom and Dad they could go back to Utah, but they insisted on staying until we were discharged so we could all fly back together. They seem convinced I’ll do something stupid on the plane. Apparently they’re going to stay within two feet of me from now until forever.
That’s why I’m surprised when, as we change into street clothes and finally exit the hospital to catch a late flight, my parents are nowhere in sight.
“They’re meeting us at the airport,” Damon explains, holding my door to let me into the cab. “We’re making a quick stop first.”
“Where?” I slide into the backseat and haul my awkward, casted leg in behind me. They gave me crutches, but so far I’ve banged the leg up more trying to use them than not.
He slips in next to me and answers, “You’ll just have to see.”
The taxi works its way up the strip, but partway to wherever, Damon pulls that black scarf out again.
“Oh no,” I say. “Blindfold?”
“It’s a surprise,” he insists.
I narrow my eyes at him. “As good as the last one?”
“Better.” Already he’s looping the silk around my head, securing it over my eyes.
When the taxi stops, Damon comes around to my door and takes my hand to edge me out onto the sidewalk. He’s gentle as he leads me, his peg-legged girlfriend, through what feels like a revolving door and inside a building.
Instantly we’re greeted by the bright symphony of slots and the smells of perfume and cigarette smoke. “It’s a casino,” I say. “Is that the surprise? We’re in another casino?”
“Just be patient,” he says as we continue along.
I can hear people chuckling when they see me blindfolded and hobbling, and I want to ask someone, “Can you tell me where we are? What’s the surprise? Do you see anything with a big bow on it?” But I stay silent.
Eventually we’re going up a short set of stairs and across a long stretch before stopping. I keep thinking that now he’ll remove the blindfold, but we just stand there, Damon’s arm around my waist. Others gather near us, chatting, and after a while I whisper to him, “What are we waiting for?”
“An elevator,” he whispers back.
“We have to wait this long for an elevator?”
Lips against my ear, he says, “Yes,” and that’s all.
Finally this elevator must arrive because then he’s ushering me inside and others press in close.
“Welcome,” someone says—maybe the elevator operator. “We’re now ascending 460 feet.”
Even with the blindfold on, I do a double take. “How many feet? We’re going—we’re going up 460 feet?”
“Yes,” Damon says again.
“Um . . .” Suddenly I’m very grateful to be blindfolded. “Uh, you remember that even before . . . recent experiences . . . I’m not the best with heights?”
“I remember.” His short, cryptic answers are maddening.
“So you’re not, like, taking me up to bungee jump or something? Try to force me to get over my fear?”
He takes a deep breath and answers, “No.”
I make a small noise of exasperation. “Are you ever going to say more than one word?”
Again another breath. I can actually hear him grinning this time when he answers, “Yes.”
The elevator is still going up. They said only 460 feet, right? They couldn’t be accidentally going up too far, could they?
“I’m not going to be scared, am I? Because my nerves are still pretty shot.”
He pulls me in closer to murmur, “I promise the view is worth it. Have a little faith.”
So I finally stay quiet, holding on to him until the elevator finally stops. Damon leads me out, and instantly a strong wind presses against us. They must’ve been serious about those 460 feet.
He sort of shuffles me along, excusing us as we inch around other people standing up here. Finally we’ve come to a stop, and his hands are at the back of the blindfold, untying to knot.
“I told you,” he says as he slips the silk off my eyes. “The view is worth it.”
I gasp as I see all of Las Vegas lit up brilliantly below us. We can literally see across the entire city extending back to the distant, twilit mountains. The strip has always looked dazzling at night, but seeing it from up here, radiating beneath us with millions of lights, is breathtaking.
“I didn’t get to show you nearly as much of Vegas as I wanted to, but this part you just couldn’t miss.”
“Wow,” I whisper, leaning my elbows on the rail. After a moment I instinctively draw back. “We’re not going to . . . tip over, are we?”
Damon chuckles. “No. We’re secure.”
“Okay.” Despite his words, I’m still a little leery as I place my hands on the rail. This is high up. Despite the firm metal beneath our feet and the grid-work cage extending all the way over our heads, I feel unsteady. I’m thinking about creeping backward—it might be sturdier back against the elevator in the center. There’s an urge in my gut to hug the inner wall until the elevator returns.
But at the rail, Damon hugs me from behind. And though this momentarily gives me a panic that our combined weight will definitely tip the tower, I feel safer with him snugged against me.
“It’s beautiful,” I say, marveling at the luminous cityscape. Directly below us the Bellagio pool glimmers with a reflected moon.
“Beautiful view for a beautiful girl.” Damon’s arms are around my waist, his chin resting on my shoulder as we look out. “I know it’s not really the Eiffel Tower.”
“It’s a start.”
“A start,” he agrees. “I’d like to take you to Paris.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Maybe. It’s a good option.”
“Option?” I ask. “For what?”
“For the honeymoon.”
My pulse kick-starts in my throat. I fight that compulsion to clamp my mouth shut and faintly ask, “The, uh, the what?”
He doesn’t answer right away but sighs and says, “You know, I’m a little upset with you.”
“With me? Why?”
“Because you answered my question and then acted like it never happened.”
“What, uh, what question was that?”
“You know. What I asked you when you were dangling from the railing—about to fall and take my whole world with you.”
My hands are starting to shake, but I force myself to stay calm. “I was pretty preoccupied with the whole falling-to-my-death thing. So you’ll have to be more specific.”
Damon turns me to him, looping his arms around my waist. “I asked you if you would help me.”
“Help you?”
“Yes.”
“How so?”
“Fulfill my dream.”
I can’t breathe. “What dream is that?”
Damon smiles his half smile, his eyes full of that thing I now recognize as love. “To make you my wife.”
He glances at his watch, and on cue, music rises upward from the speakers at the Bellagio as the waters spring into their harmonized dance. Even from this distance we can hear the song, a familiar tune:
“The first time ever I saw your face . . .”
I can’t respond, and after a moment he sinks down onto one knee.
He’s down on his knee.
He’s down on his knee!
Don’t squeal—you’ll ruin it!
Damon is grinning up at me and pulling something from his pant pocket. It’s a tiny black box, velvet, and from inside he’s drawing a ring. A round, yellow stone is cushioned in a nest of silver branches. My breath catches. It’s exactly what I wanted without knowing it.
“Jack,” he says, and I instantly start crying. Damon laughs and chides, “You didn’t let me finish!”
“I’m sorry,” I blubber.
His grin is bigger than I’ve ever seen. “Are you gonna be able to get through this?”
“Possibly,” I manage, hiccupping.
“Are these happy tears?”
“Yes. Just . . .” I laugh. “Just promise me you’re not about to say you love yodeling.”
He laughs so fully, so warmly. I’ve never heard him laugh like that. “I promise,” he says, that grin in place.
“Okay.” I take a stuttery breath. “Then I can handle it. I’m ready now.”
Damon takes a breath as well and begins again. “Jacklyn Wyatt, I have loved you almost since the moment I saw you. You weren’t supposed to mean anything to me, but soon you meant everything. I’ve had my head turned by women before, but you stopped me dead in my tracks.
“For years, my life was everything below us—traffic, noise, confusion, even darkness. Loving you has been this.” He motions around at the view. “You’ve uplifted me, brought me above to where everything is clearer, where I can breathe easier, where I’m closer to God.” His voice catches a little as he adds, “And I want to take you to the temple and love you for all the eternity I can give you.”
I haven’t kept my promise. I’m crying openly again as he lifts the ring toward me. “Will you marry me?” he asks again.
And this time when I whisper, “Yes,” I don’t fall away from him. This time, the moment the word passes my lips, he’s gathering me to him, kissing me.
When at last he lets me go, breathless, he’s grinning. “Well?” he asks. “What do you think? About the honeymoon?”
“I’ll go anywhere you want,” I say. “As long as I get to go as your wife.”
“Deal,” he grins.
To the distant music and the applause of those watching, he kisses me again.