Chapter 33 – Epilogue Jael
Two Months Later...
“If you don’t get your sticky paws off my cherry pie, I’m going to scream,” my friend Rae Marshall says, her brows shooting so high they practically disappear into her hairline as she glares at her husband, Cash Marshall.
Cash just grins, the kind of shit-eating smirk that tells you this is their love language.
“That’s not what you said last night. If I remember correctly, you were begging me to stuff your pie with my—”
“Cash!” Rae shrieks, cutting him off, though she’s smiling and rolling her eyes like she’s long since given up winning this battle.
Cash’s grin only spreads. He turns to me with a wink. “Nice to see you again, Jael.” He pulls me in for a quick squeeze.
“Good to see you too. Is there somewhere I should set this down?” I lift the dessert I brought for Regan and Hayes’s early Thanksgiving-slash-Community Friendsgiving at Mayberry Manor.
The place is alive tonight. Kids from the Whitewood Creek Community Center dart around the expansive yard.
Marshall babies are passed from lap to lap, siblings and partners fill every corner of the front porch and grass, and locals make themselves comfortable on folding chairs with plates full of food. It feels like the whole town is here.
Rae swoops in and rescues the cupcakes from my arms, cooing at the tiny buttercream turkeys that I designed on top. “These are adorable.”
Before I can answer, Rhett slides in beside me, his arm heavy across my shoulders, pressing a kiss to my hairline.
“Rae would know,” he teases. “She’s the official fall mascot of Whitewood Creek.”
“Did they add that to your mayoral duties?” I joke, throwing Rae a wink.
She laughs. “Someone has to hold the torch for autumn around here. Winter hogs all the attention, but if you ask me, fall is the—”
“—most wonderful time of the year,” her husband interrupts, cutting her off with a kiss that would be borderline rude if it weren’t so obvious how obsessed he is with his wife. Rae melts right into him, and honestly, I can’t even blame her.
“Good job with the cupcakes,” Rhett murmurs against my ear, low enough for only me. “You looked cute making them this morning in nothing but my shirt.”
It doesn’t matter that it’s been almost two months since I officially moved in with him and back to Whitewood Creek. My pulse still sprints at the sound of his voice, at the clean, soapy-sweaty scent of him pressed into my side, and at the way he looks at me like I'm his whole world.
“Thank you.” I tilt my face up, beaming when his brown eyes soften and crinkle at the edges.
“You ready to tell everyone the good news?”
I bite my lip and nod. We’ve kept our engagement a secret these last few weeks, soaking in the intimacy of only us knowing. But tonight feels right. Tonight feels like the moment with all our friends and new family around us.
Rhett doesn’t waste time once I give him permission. “Hey everyone!” he calls, his voice booming over the yard.
The Mayberry Manor is sprawling, tucked right up against North Carolina's stretch of the Blue Ridge Mountains, their peaks glowing orange, gold, and crimson in the last slant of sunset. The whole place is gilded in light, like it’s been waiting for this moment.
“As you all know,” Rhett says, gripping my hand tight and tugging me against his side, “Jael’s back for good now that the Whitewood Creek Community Hospital’s opened its new ICU. She’s the lead nurse there and I couldn't be prouder of her.”
“Woo-hoo!” Cash hollers.
“Atta girl,” Lawson Marshall calls out with a grin, his arm slung around his fiancée, Daniela.
“We’re lucky to have her,” Hayes Walker adds, his doctor title forever banned since I’ve apparently been adopted into their family. His words, not mine.
“Settle down, she’s mine,” Rhett teases, though his eyes soften when they find mine.
A beat later, they grow more serious. “Jael’s the first girl I ever loved, my best friend, and I’m so damn thankful she found her way back to Whitewood Creek.
And now—” he lifts our joined hands high, pride radiating off him, “—we’re getting married. ”
The whole group erupts into cheers. Suddenly we’re swallowed in hugs, congratulations, and well wishes from every direction. For a girl who grew up without a family, without anyone ever really claiming me, this moment stitches together parts of me I hadn’t even realized were broken.
For so long, I told myself I could close that chapter, bury Whitewood Creek and the pain that came with it. But God… if I hadn’t come back? If I’d kept running? I never would have known this kind of love.
I never would have seen Rhett, really seen him, standing right where he’s always been, hoping that I'd notice we were meant to be.
His grin is wide enough to split his face as Lawson claps him on the shoulder and drags him into a rough hug. Meanwhile, the Marshall women surround me, squealing over the emerald-green diamond on my finger, firing off a dozen rapid-fire questions like only girlfriends can.
“So, will you get married in Whitewood Creek?” Regan asks, bouncing her and Hayes’s toddler on her hip.
The little girl is all Regan’s eyes and Hayes’s smoldering grin—a heartbreaker in training.
She’s got a former bull-rider turned small-town doctor for a father and the sweetheart of our small town for a mother.
I nod instantly. “Yes. I can’t imagine marrying anywhere else.”
Her smile softens. “If you’d like, we could host it here at the Manor and have the reception out on the farm. I'd love to put it all together for you. No pressure, though.”
My heart does a little flip. “I would like that so much.”
“And I’ll plan the bachelorette party!” Rae shouts.
Molly groans. “Make sure you know what you're committing to. May I remind you of my baby shower? Halloween-themed, Jael. The baby shower was Halloween-themed.”
“It was Halloween when you had it!” Rae defends, grinning.
“Still.”
I laugh, shaking my head. “It’s fine. You can plan it. I wasn’t really thinking of doing anything.”
“Vegas,” Rae declares, final and dramatic.
“Did someone say Vegas?” Lydia Prescott pops into the circle, her long, blonde hair bouncing.
I don’t know her well yet but the rest of them do.
She’s the only child of Whitewood Creek’s reverend and Regan’s longtime friend, but she also runs the Boys and Girls Club at the Community Center and might be one of the kindest souls in town.
“Rae’s already planning my bachelorette,” I tell her.
“Then whatever you do, don’t let her make it Halloween themed,” Lydia warns, dead serious.
“One event,” Rae mutters. “One. And frankly, it was amazing.”
"It was pretty nice," Molly says with a nudge to her sister-in-law's hip.
“Well, I’m in,” Lydia says, stabbing her finger skyward. “I’ve never gambled in my life but I'm ready to risk it all.”
Regan laughs. "You don't even drink, Lydia."
“I’m not much of a gambler myself,” I admit.
Rae hooks her arm around my waist in a squeeze. “Trust me. This is going to be a blast. All of us together in Vegas.”
“What’s going to be a blast?” Dani asks, poking her head into the circle.
“We’re doing Vegas for Rhett and Jael’s bachelorette!” Rae shrieks just before Cash scoops her up around the waist and slings her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
“Jenni’s begging to play The Game of Life. Colt, Molly, you in?” Rhett calls out, referring to one of the older kids from the community center that Molly and Colt became close with years ago when he first served his parole.
Molly laughs. “This is a trap, but fine. She has our son anyway.” She loops her arm through Colt’s and follows them off.
“Sorry we’re late. My sister’s in town and we got caught up talking with her,” Dani says with an eye roll as she steps in.
“That’s okay, you didn’t miss anything,” I tell her, smiling as she pulls Lydia into a hug.
Dani exhales. “Issues with her long-term boyfriend again. And honestly? I think she’s having an existential crisis. She’s been a surgeon on the West Coast for years, but lately… I don’t know, she’s questioning everything.”
“Invite her to the bachelorette,” I joke. “Might be the kind of break she needs. Plus, Vegas isn't too far from California.”
Dani snorts. “That sounds like a nightmare.”
“Congrats again,” Lawson says, sliding in for a quick hug.
He’s the only one Rhett confided in before proposing, and watching their brotherhood grow, turning into something more like best friends than two friends who didn't know their past history, makes me ridiculously happy.
Especially since I never had siblings of my own and I know Rhett always wanted that.
“Heard about Vegas.”
I laugh. “Already?”
“Whitewood Creek’s mayor has a big mouth,” he says, joking about Rae.
I grin, cheeks aching from all this smiling.
“Hope you don’t mind,” Lawson adds. “I just got off the phone with our cousin Austin. He’s been out in California, working as a firefighter for years, but he’s planning to move back to North Carolina now due to some family stuff. I invited him to Vegas.”
I shrug. At this point, what else can I do but accept it? This is my life now, a family so big it’s bursting at the seams. A family that celebrates us, claims us, loves us. Something I never thought I’d get.
“Sounds like a blast.”
“Austin's moving to North Carolina?” Lydia asks from beside me, her already pale face draining another shade whiter, her blonde hair practically blending into her skin.
“Oh right,” Lawson says, snapping his fingers. “I forgot you met him a few years ago when he came in to help out with the farm after Colt got locked up.”
“Yeah,” Lydia says, forcing a smile. “That was… a long time ago.” Then she walks off before I can ask what that’s about.
“We’re gonna go play some games. You two joining?” Dani asks, her fingers laced with Lawson’s.
“In a little bit,” I say.
They disappear into the crowd, leaving me standing there, soaking in the view. Laughter spills from every corner of the Manor, kids shriek as they chase each other through the yard, music hums low in the background, and my eyes sting with tears.
“Hey, wifey.” Rhett slides back to my side, tugging me into his chest. He kisses me slow, then leans back, brows furrowed as he studies my face. “Hey, you okay?”
“Yeah,” I whisper, my voice catching. “I’m just… so happy. I didn't think it was possible to be this happy.”
His mouth curves. “You deserve it. It’s not too much?”
I shake my head. “No. It’s perfect.” And it is. More perfect than I ever dared hope. “I love you.”
"I love you too, baby."
And I love this town. This life. Two things I never thought I’d find my way back to again.
The End.