“Yeah,” he answered tersely. “All that and the conversation I’d have to have with my kids about leavin’ their home and the hit it would be about lettin’ that place go. Not to mention, me talkin’ you into lettin’ your kids hang with their dad so when I worked out my notice with Ralph and before my crew got started on their new jobs, I could give the kids to Rhiannon and take you to the Keys so I’d get a shot at you bein’ in a bikini when I asked you to marry me.”

I took a step back.

His scowl grew dark as it snapped to my feet.

It a flash, it snapped back to me.

“Now what?” he clipped.

“You’ve had a lot on your mind,” I noted.

“Uh…yeah,” he replied sarcastically.

“Why didn’t you share any of it with me?” I asked.

“Like you shared that with me?” He again threw out a hand to the paper from Hillingham.

“Mickey, as dire as it sounded, it didn’t mean anything.”

“Well, you’re fuckin’ tidy,” he shot back strangely. “Had shit to put away in your bathroom and so it wouldn’t crawl up your ass I fucked that up, I opened a drawer, saw that, figured you were hidin’ it from a variety of people, one of them me. And it bein’ worthy of hidin’, I couldn’t know it didn’t mean anything.”

“Well it doesn’t, but you could have shared you found it before you went off and took your inheritance,” I returned. “And in so doing, got stuck in your head about a lot of stuff that was clearly weighing on you that you didn’t share with me.”

“Fucks with the grand announcement I wanted to lay on you when I got it sorted and to a place I could tell you I could take care of you.”

That was sweet but I felt it necessary to reiterate, “You were already taking care of me.”

“In the way you’re used to, Amy,” he returned heatedly.

“Yes, to repeat, you’re already taking care of me in the way I’m used to, Mickey. The only way I need it to be.”

“Right, so that shit happens,” again with flipping his hand to the letter, “and you got a wild hair to buy a Rover and you gotta wait to save for it, if you can get it at all, rather than headin’ out and buyin’ it with cash, that’s not gonna bother you?”

God, why was he not getting this?

“Mickey, I love you!” I was now yelling.

“And I love you,” he ground out. “Since that’s the case, I want you to have it all.”

I threw up my hands. “I have all I need.”

“I want you to have,” he planted his hands on his hips and leaned toward me ominously, “it all.”