Epilogue
ELLIS - THREE MONTHS LATER
The Riverfield Jubilee always made Main Street look beautiful. Someone tested a mic at the bronze peach, kids ran around in paper crowns, and a marching band tuned in the distance.
Three months ago, we were finalists. Today, Signal House had a new presence in town. Along with my raise and new equity stake, my first Executive Producer call was one Riverfield storefront, no apologies.
Conveniently, it was also the hometown of the man I was falling for.
Cade had ducked into Brickyard to forage for snacks.
I waited in front of Cast Iron Café, which had a flyer that read: The Town Talk live on Thursdays, Start Up, Don’t Burn Down on Saturdays!
Miss Pearl stood at the corner in a sunhat and a denim shirt with her name stitched over the pocket. She directed volunteers with a pencil like it was a baton.
“If your float can’t make this turn, sugar,” she called out, loud enough that she didn’t need a megaphone, “fix it or park it.”
People listened to her; they always did.
Beau strolled by with a portable speaker and shorts that should’ve come with a citation.
“Darlings,” he drawled into the mic, “welcome to the Jubilee, Riverfield’s annual cardio for the soul. If you absolutely must misbehave, do it where my camera can see your good side.”
He blew me a kiss off-camera and sailed off to bother someone who’d actually earned it.
Across the Commons, Brickyard Brewery’s build-out turned the old feed store windows into something new—steel and glass framing the brick like it had always been there.
A COMING SOON sign hung in clean block letters.
A crew was hoisting ductwork into place while the foreman bent over the sidewalk chalking arrows.
The heavy equipment was scheduled to be delivered next week. There’d be new jobs, a taproom for Riverfield, and quiet nights.
Cade had promised it, and they were delivering it.
Tansy appeared at my elbow the way old money enters a room—soundless, scented, and absolutely sure it belongs.
“Darling,” she cooed, all pearls and perfume, “let’s take a photo in the shade.”
She’d brought a cake on a rolling cart with three tiers of sugar magnolias and a fondant facade that was The Langford Hotel down to the balcony railings.
She waved Beck over and he approached with the careful, neutral face of a person who knew better than to argue with Tansy Langford.
Cade eased into the crowd with the calm of a man who never really clocks out. He wore a Station 1 T-shirt and a crisp ball cap. His eyes did their quiet scan while the rest of him looked… ridiculously good.
Cameras hovered just far enough back to make the moment look candid. But I knew my aunt. This was far from candid.
Tansy lifted the lid and, inside, a cream envelope waited: CONGRATULATIONS, OWNER.
She handed it to Beck like it was a weightless feather. But inside there was something that weighed a ton:
ASSIGNMENT OF MAJORITY INTEREST
BECK LANGFORD – 51% owner
Mortgage Principal: $10,000,000
Staffing: $220,000 / month
Operations Loss: -$150,000 / month
Deferred Renovations: $3,000,000
Projected Monroe / Coulter Wedding Revenue: pending Lila Monroe final venue selection
Portico Fire Litigation: pending
The numbers were big and round on purpose—easy to read without a calculator.
It wasn’t a gift wrapped in a bow; it was a bill. An invoice.
“Majority owner, darling,” Tansy crooned to the two nearest cameras. Then she tilted her head and said to Beck, lower, “Control looks good on you. A little legal weather after the Portico fire. Just a minor kerfuffle. You understand.”
“Mom?” he asked, his jaw tight. “Is this some kind of joke?”
She looked at him with steel in her eyes. “This is no joke, son. This is liability. There are vendors to calm and staff to pay. Not to mention a potential multimillion-dollar lawsuit from a plaintiff who practices law for a living.”
I pictured the sharp-dressed attorney whose sponsorship dinner had been ruined by the fire. Perfect suit, ruined night, and a threat to sue that still hung over the hotel like smoke.
I understood enough to know that majority didn’t mean Beck would be richer. It meant he’d be responsible for it all. The profits, the debts, the risk.
And Beck, as Director of Operations at The Langford Hotel, knew exactly which VIP client was holding that threat like a lit match.
“If you say no,” Tansy said, “the board brings in a stranger with a briefcase and a corporate brand. They won’t know the staff, they won’t care about the town, and they’ll cut whatever’s easiest.”
Beck’s jaw flexed. I could practically see the spreadsheet light up behind his eyes. Staff he wouldn’t want to abandon, vendors who trusted him, not the board, and a building he’d already been waking up in the middle of the night to worry about.
Saying no wouldn’t save him; it would just hand the mess to someone who cared less.
Beck kept his voice light and steady. “I know payroll hits on the first whether we’re full or not. I know that mortgage interest doesn’t care who’s tired. And I know that when the roof leaks, they’re already calling me.”
Tansy’s eyebrow lifted, just a fraction.
He slid the paper back into the envelope and tapped it once, like he was sealing a deal with himself first.
“So, let’s stop pretending this isn’t already my problem,” he said. “We’ll keep the lights on.”
“Thank you, dear,” Tansy said, kissing his cheek as cameras flashed.
Cade’s hand settled at the center of my back, warm and sure.
Steady enough to anchor me. It said I’m here in the language we’d learned over three months—cold waters pressed into my palm, shared calendars.
There was a spare key on my ring now, and a drawer at his place that wasn’t empty anymore.
Time hadn’t cooled anything; we’d just learned how to carry it.
A group of people formed near the barricade by the sponsor wall. I saw sequins, clipboards, and Lila Monroe’s entourage in sunglasses, moving quickly. They blocked a stroller and then a fire lane, which irritated me.
Before my producer brain could assemble a sentence, a man in a plain suit and a discreet earpiece stepped through them. He straightened one stand, said three hushed words, and the whole group shifted six feet without a single eyeroll or raised voice.
Then he turned in our direction and started walking over, unhurried, like a man who trusted the crowd to move around him.
“Rhett Coulter,” he said, offering a card to Beck first, then to me.
Coulter Risk Group, Private Security.
“We keep things safe and make it look like no one needed managing,” he said.
Beck took it with a laugh. “And you do it cuter than my ‘Please Cooperate’ signs ever could.”
A flick of a smile from Rhett. “Signs ask nicely. I get results.” He nodded once. “Call if you need protection.”
Then, he was gone, redirecting a golf cart.
“Oh my God,” Beck said under his breath.
His eyes tracked Rhett like he’d just found a new favorite channel to watch.
“Rhett is currently dating world-famous pop singer Lila Monroe,” I said, because I’m helpful. “Allegedly straight.”
“So… a project,” Beck said, as if he hadn’t just been handed a ten-million-dollar challenge with beautiful frosting.
“He’s not her bodyguard anymore,” I added. “He upgraded to fiancé and runs his own security firm now. Lila’s in town to sing at the Jubilee and tour wedding venues. The Langford is very high on her maybe list, which now makes it very much your problem.”
Lila’s celebrity planner had been holding dates across half the Southeast for months, and this trip was about crowning one ballroom the winner.
Beck blew out a breath. “Perfect. The first man I notice in three years shows up with a maybe-Monroe wedding, my hotel on the line, and his own security detail.” His gaze stayed locked on Rhett. “That’s not a crush, that’s a full-scale project with chiseled cheekbones.”
I raised an eyebrow. “What do his cheekbones have to do with—”
But I was distracted by my phone buzzing with an email from Signal House; a new Location Addendum.
Final sign-off for the Riverfield storefront we’d fought for when we could have run back to Atlanta.
The role of Executive Producer was already on lock for me, and my equity had started vesting.
I added my signature onto the document as I stood on the sidewalk.
I felt the ping that meant done and tucked my phone away.
I let the calm under my ribs expand.
We belonged here.
Cade appeared at my elbow.
“Hydrate,” he said, holding out a bottle.
Not a question.
Our fingers met on the plastic, a light scrape of fingertips that rocketed my pulse.
I took a long pull from the bottle. Cade watched my throat, just for a moment.
“I’m not great with speeches,” he said, low enough that it slipped under the band. “I don’t have the perfect words. I have facts.”
He held his eyes on mine. “Fact one: I love you.”
My lungs forgot to function for a moment. The street, the music, the crowd all went blurry.
“Copy,” I said, the only answer that didn’t dull the moment. “I love you, too.”
His thumb tapped the bottle once like a quiet promise. The parade flowed back in around us. Music threaded through the Commons, kids chased bubbles, and somebody’s dog tried to sing along with the brass section.
Near the sponsor wall, Beck lifted the cake knife like it was part of a coronation. Tansy angled herself toward the nearest phone, already finding her light. Beck didn’t wait for direction.
“Keys to a chore,” he said, voice steady but not showy. “We’ll take care of this place. Staff, guests, building, all of it. If we’re doing it right, y’all will only notice that it feels good to be here.”
The little crowd around us cheered.
“Give me this over fireworks any night,” Cade said, low enough that it was meant for me.
Across the Commons, Beau cruised by with his portable speaker like a one-man parade.
“Riverfield, you look sensational!” he shouted. “If you’re going to fall in love, do it where the camera can see you.”
Every phone within twenty feet tilted as if he’d issued a command. Beau had blown past a million followers in three months. Some days it felt like he owned the town for thirty seconds at a time, and he was generous enough to share.
Miss Pearl slipped through the edges with a tray of lemonade, refilling cups and hearts at the same time.
“Drink up,” she said as she came close to us. “It’s hot work, being proud of each other.”
Cade and I smiled.
The band struck up their song, and the first float—a battery romance display—rolled by. Miss Pearl saluted it.
Wyatt stood near the barricade with a to-go coffee, watching the floats roll past. When Brickyard’s banner came into view, he gave Cade a small nod and went back to watching.
Brickyard’s crew across the street applauded the band between songs, then went back to the hard work of opening a brewery.
Beck edged closer as another float cleared the turn. “Did that man really just say ‘protection’ and then walk away?”
“Lila’s guy, Rhett Coulter?” I asked. “I’m sure he’d love to have The Langford Hotel on his client list.”
Beck’s eyes tracked Rhett’s retreating back.
“Ellis?” he said.
“Hmm?”
“Do me a favor and lose his card for an hour,” Beck said. “I need the illusion of choosing.”
“Not much of a choice, all things considered,” I said, gesturing toward the hotel.
Beck’s eyes went wide, full of numbers and worst-case scenarios.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “Rhett walks like he eats problems for breakfast.”
Hope twitched at the corner of Beck’s mouth. “Noted.”
He set off toward the hotel like a man realizing the enormity of the challenge before him.
Cade’s palm grazed the back of my neck with just enough pressure to register.
“Tonight?” he asked, his voice low.
“Count on it,” I said.
The Jubilee flowed past us in a blur of horns, glitter, and hand-painted floats wobbling by.
Tansy waved like a queen who’d pawned the crown for cash flow.
Beck cut the first slice of his new task.
Rhett reset a barricade with one hand while a professionally late pop star drifted in, and the town forgave her on sight.
Our storefront flyer curled at a corner; I smoothed it flat and let my fingers stay there.
Three months ago, I was living on an incidental hold and pretending not to want what I wanted. Today, I’d signed my name, slid my hand into the hand of the man I loved, and stood in a town that had decided to keep us.
Across the Commons, Beck slipped a majority-ownership envelope into his inside pocket and a card that read COULTER into his wallet.
Soon, Lila Monroe would marry Rhett; this weekend would decide whether The Langford Hotel hosted the wedding.
Rhett on the security contract. Beck on the hook for everything else—staff, lawsuits, leaking roofs… and the straight fiancé he suddenly couldn’t stop watching.
As far as Tansy was concerned, every piece was in place. That was usually Riverfield’s cue to misbehave.
The Jubilee rolled on.
So did we.
**
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