After talking to the police, he drove her back to her house. "Did you call Peyton to tell her what happened?" Brooke asked, looking over at him. They'd been at the police station for what seemed like an eternity. She'd called Victoria to let her know that her attacker had been caught, for the first time in her life knowing that her mother would care.

Lucas shook his head. "Peyton is going to be out of touch for a while," he told her.

After Brooke had rushed out of the house, Peyton had wanted to go after her. "I'll go," Lucas told her. "I need to talk to her anyway."

Peyton had nodded. "Tell her I love her, okay? And that I'm not mad at her." She laughed a little, still wiping the tears from her face. "I know she'll feel guilty and I don't want her to." She looked into his eyes. "I just want you to be happy, Luke. Both of you."

Lucas hugged her. "You need to be happy too, Peyton."

"I will be," she said, smiling. "I know I will. I just have to find out who I am now."

Lucas pushed her hair back from her face. "Whoever she is, I know she's amazing," he told her.

Peyton nodded. "I'm not like Brooke," she said after a moment. "I can't just suck things up and put on a smile…this may take me a while to get over." She frowned. "I may be gone for a while."

"Peyton," Lucas started.

Peyton held up her hand, cutting him off. "It's okay," she told him, smiling. "You know how I am. We're both moody and broody. That's actually what Brooke calls us."

Lucas nodded, smiling. "I've heard that a time or two," he said.

"And you're Broody and Cheery," Peyton said. "She's the perfect person to be your other half."

Lucas watched her, knowing she was hurting. "Peyton…"

"I really am happy for you," she told him. "That's the funny thing. I expected to be devastated- and it does hurt. But I'm so happy for you both; I know you'll be amazing together."

"If she'll have me," Lucas said.

"Oh, she'll have you," Peyton told him. "You've always fought for her, and something tells me that this time you won't be giving up."

"I can't," Lucas told her. "She's it for me, Peyton." Peyton winced and Lucas moved closer to her.

"No, no, it's okay," she told him. "But that's why I need to go away for a while. I need to get used to it, and so do you two." She picked her things up and moved towards her room. "I've been hearing some buzz about a band in Tennessee," she told him. "I think I'm going to go check them out." She smiled one last time. "Take care of her for me, Lucas. She's my best friend and I love her."

"I will," he'd promised. When Peyton had gone into her room, he grabbed his keys to go out and look for Brooke. And now here they were, back in her driveway. She'd been attacked again, but she'd proven how strong she was; she'd beaten her attacker. She'd saved herself.

She was looking at him, confused. "What? Why?" she asked him.

He pulled into her driveway and put the car in park. "It's a long story," he told her. "Let's get you out of the storm."

He got out of the car and ran around to her side, opening the door. She got out and held his hand as they raced to the porch. "Lucas," she said, tugging on his hand when they got to the door. "What's going on with you and Peyton?"

She was a mess. She was soaked from their run to the house and her wet hair was plastered to her face…a face that was covered in bruises. He gently put his hands on her neck, tilting her face up to his as he lowered his lips to hers. Brooke caught his wrists, leaning into the kiss. "I always remember you like this," he told her after he'd pulled away. She looked up at him, eyes wide, trying to catch her breath. "When we were apart and I would think about you, I'd remember that night I chased you into the storm and we stood in the street and argued. I thought I'd convinced you that night that we belonged together, Brooke."

"You did," she told him.

"You pushed me away," he reminded her. "You pushed me away and it almost killed me."

"I'm sorry," she told him, shaking her head. "It almost killed me, too."

"I was wrong," he told her. "I shouldn't have settled with Peyton just because everyone thought that's who I should be with. I should have fought for you."

"You did," Brooke told him. "I just wouldn't let you back in."

"We've wasted so much time," he said, his eyes searching hers. "I don't want to waste any more. I love you, Brooke Davis. I always have, and I know that I always will."

"What about Peyton?" she asked him, her heart pounding.

"I love Peyton," he told her. "But it's not the same kind of love. She'll always be important to me, but she's not you. She'll never be you. You've always been my happily ever after, Brooke. Everyone else was just a replacement."

"But you asked her to marry you."

"I was confused and afraid that I was going to be alone for the rest of my life. I called you first," he told her, his thumb caressing her cheek. "When I was in the airport, I called you three times and you didn't answer. I thought you didn't want me."

Brooke frowned, shaking her head. "What? You didn't…Oh." Her eyes widened. "Angie's mother called to let me know that Angie had made it home and was okay. I was so upset after I talked to her…" She stopped. "I just couldn't talk to anyone after that."

Lucas closed his eyes, the last sliver of doubt leaving his heart. "I thought you regretted telling me you loved me," he told her, opening them again to look at her. "I thought you were pushing me away again."

"No. No, I wouldn't have pushed you away," she told him, her eyes glistening with tears. "I would have held on to you, Luke. I wouldn't have let you go."

"I love you, Pretty Girl," he told her, kissing her again. "I love you," he whispered against her lips.

"I love you, too," she said, laughing as tears fell down her face.

"If you let me in, I promise you that I'll never let you push me away again. I don't want to live without you," he said, smiling softly. "I don't want to settle. I need the girl that changed my life. I need the girl that makes me laugh. I need the girl behind the red door."

Brooke shook her head. "Losing you before hurt me so much," she told him. "I lost myself for a long time."

"You're not going to lose anything," he promised. "We're going to have it all, together. It's always been you, Brooke. You're the one that's always been there when my dreams came true. It took me a while, but now I realize that it's because you're the dream. You're the only thing I've ever really wanted, the only thing I can't live without."

Brooke closed her eyes, his words healing her broken heart and lightening her soul. "All I need," she told him, looking up at him, "is to hear that every day for the rest of my life."

"I think we can arrange that," he told her, smiling and kissing her on the nose. "I know that things are messed up and that I've made some bad decisions lately, but I don't ever want you to think this is one of them. I need for you to believe that it's you and that it's always been you. I know that I've made things hard between you and Peyton and it kills me. I don't want you to keep worry about me and her."

Brooke bit her lip. "I've just always thought…that it was her."

Lucas shook his head. "I know what you thought, but you were wrong." He moved his thumb across her lower lip. "I would have married Peyton," he told her. She made a face and he smiled a little. "I would have married her, but only because I thought that I could never have you. I would have never been truly happy."

Brooke's eyes searched his for a moment. "Good," she whispered finally.

Lucas laughed and kissed her again. He took both of her hands and lowered himself to one knee. "Brooke Penelope Davis, I don't have a ring or roses or a planned out speech," he told her. "But I do love you. And I promise you that if you agree to marry me I will spend the rest of my life making up for the time we've lost and proving to you, once and for all, that you're the only woman I've ever wanted. Marry me, Brooke."

"You seem to be proposing a lot lately, Lucas Scott," she told him playfully. "How do I know you're not going to leave me tomorrow for some other woman?"

Lucas shook his head, looking at her intently. "She was fiercely independent, Brooke Davis. Brilliant, beautiful and brave." Brooke smiled as she recognized what he'd written about her in his book. "Brooke Davis is going to change the world one day," he continued softly. "My world. If she'll just take a chance on me."

"And Lucas Scott was the one boy I might have lost it for," Brooke murmured, knowing that what she'd told her mother so many years ago was true. She wasn't going to let the chance to have the only man she'd ever loved pass by again. "I'm tired of wasting time," she told him. "Yes, Luke. I'll marry you."

Lucas closed his eyes, smiling. He started to say something but lightning split open the sky and thunder shook the porch. "I think we should take this inside," she told him, taking his hand and backing towards the door. "Besides, you were right; we have a lot of time to make up for."

Lucas followed her into the house, happier than he could ever remember being. Brooke Davis was going to be his wife, and that's all that had ever really mattered. How did he get so lucky?