AFTER

"Oooh there she is," Lanie squealed in such a tone that Kate couldn't help but laugh.

"Are you going to do that every time you see me now?"

"For a little while, yeah. Let me see the ring again!"

Kate shook her head. "I'm not wearing it."

Lanie's jaw dropped. "Why not?!"

"Because I'm at a morgue…about to examine a dead body… diamonds and bodily fluids don't generally mix well together."

"You'd be wearing gloves."

Kate pressed her lips together and then confessed, "I can't really get the gloves on over it."

"Of course, you can't! It's a massive rock!"

"Lanie!" she half groaned, despite knowing her friend's assessment was quite accurate, and her brain had thought something very similar when Rick presented her with the engagement ring—after the shock of the proposal itself wore off, of course.

"I'm just saying—apparently the love matching business is booming."

Though Kate knew this to be an incorrect statement—her fiancé did not make nearly as much from his love match business as he did with his best-selling novels—she didn't feel it was an appropriate correction to make, so she merely moved past the subject. "I'm going to wear it on a chain around my neck while I'm working, but right now it's being resized; it was just a little too big."

"Ah well it's still super exciting. Did you guys pick a date yet?"

"No," Kate said firmly. "We're going to wait a few months before we talk about anything wedding-related; we're just going to enjoy being engaged."

For Kate, just the fact that she was engaged was taking a fair amount of getting used to. She wasn't yet ready to process getting married. Not that she was unhappy. Quite the opposite in fact. She was the happiest she had ever been and knew Rick was the man she'd spend her life with, but before meeting him she had never once had that thought before, so she wanted to give herself time to settle in to the idea and make sure they were doing things right. She owed that to both of them after the crazy few months they'd had.

Kate, Rick, and their team had hoped they would be able to solve the Love Match killings case after the second couple was brutally murdered, but that was unfortunately not the case. The looked into every possible lead they had, but there was simply not enough evidence to follow and soon the case went glacially cold.

After there had been no movement for almost three months, the killer struck again, only that time the male victim was left alive and he was able to give them a vague description of the assailant. Using that, and the surveillance camera footage Rick had installed all over his shop, they were able to create what they felt was a pretty good sketch of their person of interest and ran that image on the local news outlets. A few days later, a tip was called in from a neighbor and they were able to arrest Chip Orenstein for the five homicides plus one attempted. Chip, as it seemed, had a vendetta against love in general after his girlfriend of ten years left him for another man, and thus he'd chosen to use Rick's shop as a method to funnel his rage; it had absolutely nothing to do with Rick himself. Despite this, Rick did feel a small amount of guilt that hung over him in the weeks after Chip's arrest.

Kate did her best to reassure her boyfriend that he was a wonderful man who would never cause harm to anyone, but she could see he struggled. It wasn't until she, his daughter, and mother sat him down for an intervention of sorts, because they were concerned about how sad and frustrated he seemed. Once he saw their outpouring of love and how much they cared for him, Rick made a steady turnaround and was soon back to his jovial self. He later confessed to her that the family meeting she called was the main catalyst for him wanting to propose to her sooner than later. Kate, on the other hand, had been utterly floored when after what seemed like a run-of-the-mill dinner they shared he returned from the kitchen with a single rose and jewelry box and dropped to one knee before her.

Though Kate was shocked, at no point did she think about turning down his proposal. Though she didn't consciously think about it, she knew the night of their discussion about his business and subsequent emotional confessions was the one she realized she was with the man she'd marry. After all, that night's talk did elude to the fact that he was the man who would love her the best, though because of how his gift worked they could never have any official confirmation. That was okay with her, too, because as much as she'd grown to respect Rick's talent, nothing could convince her more than the fluttering of her own heart every time he smiled at her. Looking back, she realized she knew there was something special about him from the moment that they met, but her eyes hadn't been open to it then. Now that they were, she was all too happy to consider herself part of his family, and him to be part of hers.

"Ah well, fair enough. I'm really, really glad you're so happy, Kate," Lanie said, giving her friend a warm smile.

Kate nodded. "Yeah. Me too."

A/N - thank you all so much for reading!

Starting in Just about a week I will begin posting my holiday stories - yes stories as in more than one! :)