Chapter 7 - The Midnight Proposal
The master suite fell into dead silence. Outside, the blizzard howled against the heavy windowpanes, rattling the glass, but inside, the air was suffocatingly warm.
Clara stood up so fast she nearly knocked the bedside chair over.
“Lady Eleanor... no! Please!” Clara gasped, her face burning with shock and embarrassment. “I could never! I am an orphan. My father was a mechanic. I have no dowry, no family name, no political influence! The other mafia families would laugh at Mr. Hale! They would see it as a disgrace!”
“Let them laugh,” Vincent’s voice cut through the room like thunder.
Clara turned to him, her eyes wide with shock.
Vincent had not looked away from her. His dark eyes burned with an intensity that made her knees tremble. Slowly, deliberately, he reached out and took the mahogany box from his mother’s hands.
“Vincent...” Clara whispered, terrified of the sudden shift in reality. “You can’t be serious. You are the Don of Chicago. You must marry an heiress—”
“I don't need an heiress’s money,” Vincent said, taking a step toward her. “I have more wealth than I can spend in ten lifetimes. I don't need an alliance with corrupt families who will poison my food the moment my back is turned.”
He took another step, closing the distance between them until Clara was backed against the edge of the fireplace mantle.
“What I need,” Vincent continued, his voice dropping into a low, passionate cadence that vibrated directly against Clara’s soul, “is a woman I can trust with my mother’s life. A woman who will throw herself in front of bullets to shield my son. A woman who looks at me not with greed, but with truth.”
Vincent sank onto one knee before her.
Clara gasped, covering her mouth with trembling hands. The almighty Vincent Hale—a man who bowed to no god, no government, and no king—was on his knee on the carpet before a scullery maid.
He popped the box open, revealing the magnificent blue diamond.
“Clara Ellis,” Vincent said, his eyes locking onto hers with unwavering certainty. “I spent the last two years living in an illusion, blind to the snake in my bed. But tonight, you walked through fire to save my family. You gave me back my mother. You protected my son.”
He reached out, taking her trembling left hand in his large, warm palm.
“I cannot offer you a peaceful life,” Vincent confessed, his voice laced with raw honesty. “My world is violent, dark, and dangerous. But I can offer you my absolute fidelity, my eternal protection, and every drop of blood in my body. Marry me. Become my wife. Rule this city by my side, and let no man ever make you feel small again.”
Tears spilled over Clara’s eyelashes, tracking down her cheeks. Her heart was beating so violently she could barely draw breath. She had secretly loved Vincent from afar for years—watching him from the shadows, admiring his quiet strength, mourning his loneliness after his first wife passed away. But she had never, in her wildest dreams, believed she was worthy of him.
“Vincent...” she choked out. “Are you certain? There is no going back from this. Your enemies will target me.”
Vincent gripped her hand tightly, his thumb stroking her ring finger.
“Let them try,” Vincent vowed with a lethal smirk. “They will find that my wife is the most guarded treasure on earth. Say yes, Clara.”
Eleanor smiled serenely from the bed, watching with glistening eyes.
Clara looked into Vincent’s intense, beautiful gaze, seeing not the cold mob boss the world feared, but the devoted man who had held her against his chest in the middle of a gunfight.
“Yes,” Clara whispered, her voice trembling with emotion. “Yes, Vincent. I will marry you.”
A look of pure triumph washed over Vincent’s rugged features. He slid the heavy blue diamond ring onto her slender finger. It was a perfect fit.
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Vincent rose to his feet, swept his arm around Clara’s waist, and lifted her off her feet, pressing his lips to hers in a fierce, breathless kiss that sealed their fates forever.
***