He loved her for her confidence. And she loved him for so many reasons she couldn't begin to list. He had given her something she didn't know she'd ever been capable of. A love so unlike what she'd thought it was. She'd thought what she'd felt for Marius was love. But now she understood it as obsession. As a desire to escape from her life and become something better. He had been in her mind everything she could have wanted. But then she'd come here, and realised true love had been under her nose all along. The brave leader of the revolution. The one they'd said would never find love because he already had love for his nation. The one more enamoured of a flag than any woman. She'd never have imagined that it would be him that would be proposing to her, but now she knew she'd not have had it any other way.
"So do you, you do know that? You deserve to love and be loved and to have the world witness that I will be that for you forever. Your wife." And he was of course willing to wait, for everything to be perfect. For Rose to be there with her. He was a good man, the best of men, and he was hers.
"If I am going to be a beautiful bride it is only because I will have you. Because you truly are the best a woman could hope for in a husband." Part of her still couldn't believe it. Couldn't fathom that this was her life. That perfect wedding they were talking about was hers and that the perfect man was hers.
Eponine wanted to shout it from the rooftops.
But there would be time for all that, when her friend was returned. When things found a semblance of normal again.
"I love you. More than I know how to say. And I can't wait to be your wife. Forever."