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Angela had been out of the loop on Tim and Lucy for a long time. She always had an inkling something like was going on (and she made sure they both knew that many times), but she’d gotten promoted to detective right before all the shooting range bets, rookie-year-end closure checklists, and new-rookie jealousy had started. Hell, her man of honor hadn’t even bothered to tell her that all he wanted after working tirelessly to give her a decent wedding was a dance with Lucy.
Once the two got their heads out of their asses, Angela seemed to make it a mission to make up for the lost time. Lucy had been told how Angela made it her personal responsibility to make sure Tim didn’t screw up their budding relationship, even though by the time they got together, Lucy was in so deep, the only way she would’ve gone anywhere might’ve been if he killed someone. Even then, she might have assumed he had his reasons.
It didn’t even take long for the nagging to start. It started with Angela asking them to pick up diapers on the way to her house, then informing them that the brand she’d had them buy was the best of the best.
“Thanks, Ange, but we don’t need diaper recommendations,” Lucy had said.
Angela had scoffed. “Not yet.”
Then the mani-pedis started. Angela had started taking Lucy for breakfasts and nail salon visits.
“We spend all day using our hands,” Angela had cited during their first manicure. “Driving, holding guns, doing mountains of paperwork. I say our hands deserve some pampering.”
Lucy couldn’t argue, but at first, she wondered if maybe this manicure had some ulterior motive. She’d told Tim the connotations behind a manicure, and Tim and Angela were best friends, so she wondered if maybe they had planned something. It was definitely too soon in the relationship for Tim to propose, but they’d been on the same page about getting there one day. But Tim had taken her to dinner the next night, and she went home without a ring on her finger.
The mani-pedi breakfasts continued. Sometimes, Nyla would join them, and the three of them would just chat about life, making sure work stayed far from the conversation. Nyla and Angela would talk about the babies, and Lucy would look forward to the day she could join in on this topic. Most of the time, though, it was just Angela and Lucy, and despite not being close with the woman for the first couple of years they knew each other, Lucy found being close with Angela quite enjoyable. Sometimes they’d chat and laugh so hard, they got judgy looks from other salon customers. Other times, they’d just relax and sit in comfortable silence, only speaking to get the other’s opinion on a certain nail color. Lucy got the impression Angela really appreciated the time away for herself, away from her family, and as much as Lucy loved Tim, she could relate. She spent pretty much all of her off-duty time with Tim, and she couldn’t get enough of him, but the value of a girls’ outing with women her own age made itself apparent every time she got to do it.
However, the thing about these girls’ outings was Angela’s nagging continued. Sometimes she’d go a day without making an expectant comment, but she seemed to get a kick out of Charles Boyle-ing Lucy and Tim’s relationship whenever she found an opportunity.
“That color looks really good! You know, in case you need to take pictures of your hand anytime soon.”
“Oh, the bridal store I got my dress at is near here! Maybe we can pop by for a look after this?”
“I don’t know what kind of cake to make for Jack’s first birthday. You like lemon, right? Oo, but Tim likes chocolate… maybe I’ll make a cake with both and see how the guests like it!”
Lucy would have asked Angela to stop if the comments bothered her, but the thing was, they didn’t. Lucy knew she and Tim were on their way to a life together, and chatting about the future with Angela let her pretend it wasn’t as far away as it probably was.
Since Angela and Wesley’s wedding got thwarted, their marriage officiated months later at the courthouse, they made it a habit to go all out for anniversary parties. Or, rather, they let Patrice go all out for their anniversary parties, but Patrice was busy today, so it was up to them to check out the venue for this year’s. Somewhere familiar, but they still wanted to bring Tim and Lucy along for a second opinion.
“We’re definitely keeping the little seashell globe things,” Angela said. “Maybe we’ll put some lights in them and string them up instead of the colored lanterns? We don’t wanna do it exactly like Nyla’s reception.”
The four of them stood on the rooftop where Angela had thrown together a last-minute wedding reception for Nyla and James a couple of years ago. Which was why now, Tim was dragging Lucy by the hand a few feet in front of a row of trees, to a patch of grass where a dance floor had once been.
“Mm,” he hummed, wrapping one of Lucy’s hands in his and laying the other on her waist, holding her close. “Do you remember this spot?”
Lucy laid her other hand on his shoulder and her head on his chest, swaying to the sounds of the birds and trees rustling around them. “I don’t know, did something important happen here?”
“Eh, not really.”
“Yeah, you’re right. People dance every day. They usually don’t take a full year after the original offer, though.”
“There were… complications that first time.”
As if on cue, the complication piped up from near the bar. “Get a room, you two!” Angela yelled.
“We have one!” Tim shouted back, still swaying with Lucy. “You dragged us out of it!”
After a few more moments of Wesley and Angela strategizing decorations and Tim and Lucy off in their own world, the former pair started walking toward the stairs that led to the lower levels of the building’s interior.
“We decided we like it,” Wesley informed, passing them. “We’re gonna go find Eliza to let her know.”
“We’ll be back in a few, but you two look around the rooftop!” Angela called over her shoulder. “It was good for one reception, it can be good for another!”
“ Bye, Angela!” Tim turned back to Lucy with an eye roll, and when the shutting of a door attested they were alone, he picked his arm up to twirl her before pulling her back for a sweet kiss.
They did what Angela asked, touring the rooftop hand in hand to discover all the areas they hadn’t explored the first time they were up here because they’d been too glued to each other’s sides.
Tim’s phone buzzed, and when he checked it, he breathed out a sigh. “Lopez is gonna be back in a few minutes.”
“Probably to give us more quips about where to have wedding showers, and baby showers, and anniversary parties, and blah, blah, blah.”
“Does that stuff bother you at all?” he asked, uncertainty in his voice.
She squeezed his hand. “No, not at all. I know she means well, and someday, she’ll be right about all that, right?”
“Yeah,” he agreed, letting go of her hand to put his arm around her shoulder. “Someday.”
They walked to the center of the rooftop, and Lucy breathed in the clean air around her.
“I mean, Angela probably should get a little better at minding her business, right?”
Lucy looked up at Tim from under his arm, waiting for elaboration.
“I mean, she’s gonna be bugging us about the next thing in our relationship for the rest of our lives unless we stop her.”
Lucy could hear the mischief in his voice, and she prepared herself for shenanigans. “What did you have in mind?”
He leaned down to whisper in her ear, “What do you do when there’s a woman in your life who won’t stop nagging you about a proposal?”
She moved in front of him so she could look him in the face and see if he was serious. “I know you’re not suggesting what I think you’re suggesting.”
“What?” he protested, chuckling. “It was a good prank!”
“It was a terrible prank!”
“It only went bad because you were secretly in love with me. It’s safe to say we don’t have that problem this time.”
He had a point, but Lucy still hesitated.
“She’s gonna see me proposing to you, get all happy for us, then we tell her it’s not real and that’s what she gets for not letting us go at our own pace. That’s what was supposed to happen the first time, but you know…”
“ Tim… I can’t-...” Her sentence trailed off.
His face fell for a moment and he searched her eyes. “You can’t what?”
She couldn’t fake being proposed to by him without wanting it to be real. She couldn’t see him on one knee before her without wishing he’d actually be slipping a ring on her hand afterward. She didn’t know how Ashley could’ve gotten through that prank without it being painful, but she couldn’t.
He seemed to hear everything she couldn’t say, and he took a hand in hers, brushing his thumb over her knuckles. “You trust me, right?”
“Of course,” she replied without hesitation.
“And you know I’d never hurt you.” She quirked an eyebrow, and he rolled his eyes. “On purpose.”
She nodded.
“So trust me on this. I think it’s gonna be a good time, but if it sucks, just tell me to stop and I will. Okay?”
She summoned her undercover expertise to detach herself from imagining this was real life. “Okay, let’s do this.”
As soon as she agreed, she heard the faint sound of a large door opening behind some trees. “They’re here,” Tim announced. “Let me see your surprised face.”
Lucy bugged out her eyes as exaggerated as she could and dropped her jaw, feeling it wobble from how far it was stretched.
“Perfect. You ready?”
She nodded, getting into character.
Her attempt at detachment was screwed the moment he took her hands in his and dropped to one knee. “Lucy Chen,” he began in a silly, dramatic voice.
She giggled, and his face softened like it did every time he saw her laugh.
“You’re the love of my life,” he said, more serious this time, and Lucy had to squeeze his hands to keep herself tethered. “I thought I knew love before I met you. I thought love was a destination. Once you had it, you’d achieved your goal, and now you could just enjoy it. But love with you is a journey.”
Her breath hitched as she took a tiny, barely perceptible step toward him. “Every day, I fall more in love with you. Every day, I learn something new about you, even when I’m dumb enough to think I’ve seen everything you can throw at me. You love me how I am, while still pushing me to be better. You catch me when I fall, but still challenge me to get back up.”
Lucy’s legs felt a little like jello. Tim had confessed his love to her many times since they’d been together, in many different ways. In bed, over lunch, before work, after work, in the middle of a movie when he just felt like saying it, but never had he ever said this much at once. The idea that these words were just floating around in his head, waiting to be released for an impromptu prank was staggering to her.
“You know me better than anyone, and I know you the same. I know when you’re happy, when you’re sad. I know you’re angry even when you don’t wanna tell me. I love that I know your fake, ‘playing dumb’ confusion from your real confusion, which is all over your face right now.”
Lucy’s eyebrows furrowed, her hands loosening, but still staying clasped in his. Wait…
“I love how terrible you are at acting surprised, but I can’t wait to see your actual surprised face when you realize what I’m doing right now.”
She had no idea what her face looked like right now, but she felt all of the color drain from it.
His, however, broke out in an ear-to-ear grin, before he whispered, “There it is.”
“Tim?” she asked, her voice small.
She hadn’t even noticed he’d dropped one of her hands until he was reaching in his jacket pocket before he held a small black velvet box in front of her. She’d stopped breathing some time ago, her hand maintaining a vice grip on his not holding the box.
“Hey,” he said, in that gentle voice that could bring her back from anything. “You still with me?”
She nodded frantically, not trusting herself with words at the moment.
He opened the box with his thumb, revealing an oval-cut emerald ring sitting on a gold band studded with small diamonds. “I love you. With everything in me. And I don’t want to wait another day to start my life with you. Lucy Chen, will you marry me?”
Lucy’s voice was still stuck in her throat when she heard a rustling behind her. By some miracle, she had the capacity to turn to the interruption. The interruption was Wesley, getting his foot out of a bush he seemed to have tripped into, being given the most murderous death glare in history by Angela, who was pointing her phone camera at the two.
“You!” Lucy cried, pointing and marching toward her. “You knew about this!”
Angela laughed, keeping the phone held up. “Sorry to break it to you, Chen, but Tim’s survival instincts are way too strong to play a prank on me.”
Lucy glanced back at Tim, who was now getting off of his knees to follow her. The situation washed over her again, and she put her hand over her mouth. The shine of her blue nails in her vision caught her attention. Nails she’d gotten done with Angela… yesterday. She began wildly pointing between the two best friends. “You two planned this!”
“Been planning it for a while now,” Angela agreed. “But I will say, six months of mani-pedis has been crucial to my sanity.”
Lucy turned back to Tim, taking a step towards his stupidly cute smug smile. “You’ve been planning to propose for six months ?”
“I’ve been planning forever with you since our first date. Wanted it before then.”
Wesley finally piped up. “He’s actually three months ahead of schedule. He couldn’t hold out that long. Frankly, we were shocked he got this far.”
Lucy turned back to laugh, the sound warped by the beginnings of happy tears. “Angela, why are you still recording?!”
With a big smile, she replied, “Because you haven’t given the man an answer yet!”
When she turned, Tim stood slightly closer to her, the ring box open between them. But Lucy didn’t bother giving the ring another look. All she wanted was right here in front of her, hope and excitement flooding his eyes, his smile stretched so wide that it looked like it might break his beautiful face.
Before she could get lost in his blue eyes, distracted yet again, she answered his question. “Yes,” she whispered first, for only him to hear. His smile grew impossibly bigger before he scooped her up in his arms. “Yes!” she repeated, louder, loving how the word sounded in the late-summer air. “Yes, yes, yes!”
When he released her, the tears were flowing down her cheeks now, and he reached out to wipe them. “Yes, Tim Bradford,” she promised. “Yes, I absolutely will marry you.”
He swooped in to give her a long kiss, his arms wrapping around her waist while she held his face in her hands. Neither Wesley nor Angela interrupted them or made any more comments, just allowing the lovebirds their moment.
When they broke apart a few moments later, Lucy had stopped crying, but she almost started again when he took her hand, sliding the ring over her left ring finger. The deep green of the emerald stood out perfectly against her baby blue nails, and she realized Angela must have seen the ring beforehand to suggest this color yesterday.
She turned her head, staying in Tim’s arms, to speak to Angela, no longer recording. “Nice pick on the color.”
“Anytime.”
“This better not mean we’re done with the mani-pedis.”
“Please. If anything, you’ll need them more when you’re married to this guy.”
“Hey!” Tim protested.
“I know we all planned to get lunch after this, but now, I kinda wanna see if I can plan an engagement party in nine hours.”
“She can,” Wesley confirmed. “See you guys in nine and a half hours. She’ll want a dramatic entrance.”
“Can do,” Tim promised, placing a few soft kisses on Lucy’s forehead when the other couple started to walk away. “Ready to go?”
Lucy didn’t want this moment to ever end, except maybe for the day of their wedding, but she did need that lunch Angela just bailed on. She nodded, leaving Tim’s arms to hold his hand once more, following their friends to the exit. “I can’t believe you proposed with a prank.”
He shrugged, that smug look now a permanent fixture on his face. “Nothing else would’ve been right for us. I couldn’t just get on my knees and have you know exactly what was happening, that’d be boring. Plus, I had a whole speech and if you knew it was for real, there’s no way you would’ve listened.”
“I’ll get you back for this someday. I don’t know when or how, but you are not safe.”
He once again put his arm over her shoulder, placing a big kiss on her temple as they walked. “Well, Future Mrs. Bradford, you have the rest of our lives to get your revenge.”