Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
I closed the front door with my heel and leaned back against it for a second, the box heavy in my arms.
I knew exactly what was inside.
That knowledge made my chest feel too full, like I’d swallowed something warm and bright and it didn’t quite fit yet.
Author copies.
The final volume of Oracle’s Silence.
Five books. Five years. Five different versions of myself poured into ink and paper and stubborn hope.
I carried the box into the dining room and set it on the table, my fingers trembling just a little as I sliced the tape. The cardboard flaps fell open, and there they were—clean spines, crisp covers, the solid weight of something finished.
I lifted one out and took it into the living room, settling onto the couch like this was a ceremony instead of a victory lap.
I started at the beginning.
I didn’t make it far.
“Fuck this,” I muttered, already flipping pages.
I went straight to the back.
There they were.
The last three pages.
The culmination of everything Seris and Kael had survived—ruined cities, lies whispered by prophets, choices that cost them everything except each other. They stood together in the final panels not because the world had been fixed, but because they had been.
They didn’t get the life anyone else expected.
They didn’t get a clean, shiny version of happiness.
They got their happiness.
Earned. Chosen. Quietly fierce.
Love without conditions. A future that didn’t have to look like anyone else’s to be real.
My throat tightened.
I knew my fans were going to be split right down the middle.
Some would scream for more—more battles, more danger, more proof that suffering equaled worth.
I’d left the door open just enough for future adventures if they wanted them.
But they weren’t going to get them from me.
This was where I chose to stop writing their story—and let them live on.
I’d ended it with love.
With their personal peace.
With two people standing in the aftermath and choosing to keep living.
And wasn’t that the bravest ending of all?
My phone buzzed in my back pocket. I fished it out.
Edith.
“I tracked the package,” she said breathlessly the second I answered. “I know it arrived. Did you open the door? Are they there?”
“They’re here,” I said, smiling. “I’m already holding one.”
“Oh my God, Chloe,” she said, voice breaking. “I cried. I ugly cried. I cried so hard my husband thought someone died. You ripped me apart and put me back together again.”
I laughed softly. “That was kind of the goal.”
“I want more,” she declared.
“You’ll get more,” I said easily. “I’ve already started a new series.”
A beat.
“About Seris and Kael?”
“No,” I said gently. “Their story is done.”
“But—”
“They got their happily ever after,” I said. “Exactly the one they were meant to have.”
There was a long pause.
“All right,” Edith muttered. “I don’t like it, but I respect it.”
I smiled to myself.
We hung up, and I stayed there on the couch for a while longer, book resting in my lap, letting the quiet settle.
Later that night, Zarek closed the book in bed and turned to me, his expression unreadable for half a second.
Then he smiled.
“You are amazing,” he said. “Congratulations, sweetheart.”
I felt heat rush into my cheeks. Zarek liking my work had always mattered more than any review or sales number. He’d been my first reader in every sense that counted.
“Seriously,” he added, brushing his thumb along my jaw. “This is going to launch you into the stratosphere. I’ll be able to quit, and you can keep me in the lifestyle I want to become accustomed to. Champagne and caviar, baby!”
I snorted.
Then I giggled.
Which was all the invitation he needed.
Zarek attacked.
I shrieked as his fingers found every ticklish spot I had, laughter bubbling out of me until I couldn’t breathe.
“Stop,” I wheezed. “Please, I’m begging you—stop!”
He finally did, pulling me into his arms, my ear settling over his heart as he held me close.
His ribs were healed now. Fully. He was back on full firefighting duty, moving like himself again.
He stroked my hair slowly, again and again, grounding both of us.
“If you keep that up,” I murmured, “I’m going to fall asleep.”
“Don’t,” he said quietly. “I want to ask you something.”
I shifted slightly. “Okay.”
“Did you give any more thought to what Zoe suggested?”
That woke me up instantly.
A week after the mission-takedown, Zoe and I had been talking—about life, about perspective, about how quickly everything could change. She blindsided me.
She’d offered to be our surrogate.
Not as a grand gesture. Not as a sacrifice.
As a choice.
She knew my problem. My eggs were viable. My uterus wasn’t.
Before she approached me, she’d already done the screenings. Passed everything with ease. She hadn’t asked permission—she’d simply offered, calmly and deliberately.
Of course I’d immediately said no.
She’d told me I wasn’t asking. She was offering.
I told her the whole idea was off the table, but that night I went home and told Zarek. He’d told me it was my decision. That our family could be just the two of us forever and he’d be happy. That any path I chose, he’d walk with me.
I’d asked if it would change how he saw Zoe.
He’d laughed. “In my mind, Zoe will always be Zoe.” I totally understood what he was saying.
Now, lying there with his heartbeat steady beneath my ear, I finally whispered the truth.
“I want to do it.”
His breath stilled.
Then he kissed my hair.
“Then that’s what we’ll do,” he said simply.
No pressure. No expectations.
Just us.
And for the first time in a very long time, the future didn’t only feel better, but just a little bit brighter, too.