Epilogue
Adam had been talking about the open house for three weeks.
Not obsessively. Just enough for me to know he cared. Then two days before the day, I started to care. Then I started to care enough that I was obsessing on how many different types of cheeses should be on the cheeseboard. I called Chloe.
Problem solved.
The first guests arrived at four. It was kind of mellow.
Too mellow if you asked me. We definitely needed sangria.
Lucky for Adam, I had all the fixings. Now, I’m not talking so much sangria that some of the rugs on his gorgeous hardwood floors would get stained, just enough that there would be more laughter. Loud laughter.
James was in his element. He had appointed himself official greeter and dinosaur ambassador and was currently explaining to Lettie from the Down Home Diner that the Ankylosaurus was technically more heavily armored than a tank.
Everybody loved James. How could they not? He was also explaining it was going to be his birthday next month, and what presents he wanted. He wasn’t doing it in a greedy way, it was just a part of James; if something came to his head, it came out of his mouth. The kid still killed me.
I wondered just how many people in Jasper Creek were going to give him presents, and when Adam was going to notice what he was doing and put a stop to it.
Of course, he’d never seen my niece in action with her swear jar, where she forced any adult around her to pay up a dollar for a swear.
I think her college fund was well past five thousand dollars.
Renzo and Millie were in the corner near the window with Ford and Ruby. Little Grandma was installed in the best chair in the living room with a glass of sweet tea, surveying the queendom she had personally built. And she was mostly right.
Angelica arrived at five with her brother Malik, his wife Farah, and two of their three daughters in tow. She looked like she was genuinely off-duty, which was different from her performance-off-duty, and I was one of about six people on earth who could tell the difference.
I crossed to her immediately.
"You came."
"I told you I was coming." She hugged me, then held me at arm's length and looked at the faded mark above my eyebrow, which had mostly healed but still made people who knew wince slightly when they noticed it. "I'm going to need the full story."
"Later." I looked past her. "It’s great you brought Malik and his family. I didn’t know they were in town."
“Yeah, Bruno’s in town too, so he said he would stop by.”
“That’s great. I know you said you don’t see enough of him.”
“Nobody does. I can’t wait.”
We talked for a few more minutes until Carrie showed up with her hoard and I was pulled away.
I didn't see Adam disappear from the room.
I noticed he was gone, and then I noticed James was gone, and then I found both of them in the kitchen, heads together over something on the counter. Adam straightened when he heard me come in, looking like a man who had just been caught.
"Everything okay?" I asked.
"Fine." He was suspiciously relaxed about it. "James was showing me his new card trick."
James held up a deck of cards. "It's not ready yet," he said seriously. "I need to practice more."
"Okay," I said slowly, and went back to the party.
Twenty minutes later, Adam found me.
He put his hand on the small of my back and leaned in. "Come outside for a second."
Adam had strung lights along the railing, and they were just starting to glow in the early evening dimness.
Half the party had drifted out behind us, the way party guests do when something pulls them without their knowing why.
Renzo and Millie. Ford and Ruby. Carrie with Tommy's hand in hers.
Little Grandma was already installed in a chair someone had carried out for her, which told me she'd known something was coming. Little Grandma always knew.
Angelica drifted out with Malik and his family.
James materialized at my elbow.
Adam turned to face me.
The lights caught the line of his jaw, the steadiness in his eyes. He reached into his jacket pocket and I stopped breathing. He held out a ring.
The ring was simple and perfect and entirely him — clean lines, a single stone, no fuss.
"Zoe Avery." His voice was low enough to be private and clear enough to carry.
"I came to Jasper Creek to build something.
I didn't know you were what I was building toward.
" The corner of his mouth moved. "You are the best surprise of my life.
You are my heart. And I would very much like to spend the rest of mine being yours. "
He went down on one knee.
The porch went completely silent.
"Dad," James said clearly into the silence.
Adam kept his eyes on me. "Not right now, bud."
"But Dad, I have the ring box."
Adam blinked.
The ring was in his hand.
James was striding over to us and thrust the box up beside the ring. “Here, Miss Zoe. You’re going to need someplace to put the ring.”
I looked around, and sure enough, everybody was recording this.
“I think I want to wear the ring, Honey.”
He frowned. Then Adam slipped the ring on my finger.
“It looks pretty on your hand.” James nodded. “You should wear it all the time.”
I bent down and hugged him. “I’m going to. Do you know why?”
“Because this means you and Dad are going to get married. But not until after my birthday.”
I grinned. “You’re right, not until after your birthday.”
“Son?”
James looked up and sideways at his dad.
“Do you think I can kiss Zoe now?”
“Me first.” James kissed me on the cheek. I grinned.
Then I stood up, and Adam made sure that he was not upstaged by his son and gave me the kiss of a lifetime.
The porch exploded. I could hear them but couldn’t see them. I was lost in Adam’s kiss.
I was crying and laughing simultaneously, which I hadn't known was possible until this exact moment.
An hour later, Bruno Drakos showed up. He was built like a man who had never once in his life wondered if he could handle a situation. Angelica squealed and ran to give him a hug. As soon as he saw her, he melted.
I was so busy watching the reunion, I didn’t notice the man beside him. He stood slightly back from the brother and sister, not looking awkward, just at peace. Then I noticed his laughing eyes. I liked them.
I went over and introduced myself. "I'm Zoe." I handed him a beer from the cooler on the side table. "I'm Adam's—" I paused, because fiancée was still so new, " —Zoe."
“I’m Matthew, a friend of Bruno’s.”
I looked at Angelica, who shrugged. She didn’t know him either, but she sure was noticing him, and trying not to.
“And you must be Bruno,” I said, introducing myself to her brother. Bruno grinned. It transformed his face. "I've heard about you."
"Good things, I hope."
"Mostly." His eyes moved across the room. They landed briefly on his brother Renzo.
“I need to go catch up,” he said. “You good?” he asked Matthew.
Matthew nodded.
Angelica left with Bruno, but then I was hustled away by James.
It was an hour later that I noticed Matthew was on the periphery of a conversation that Millie and Angelica were having. He looked relaxed and patient.
Bruno came up beside me.
"He seems very relaxed around Angelica," I said to Bruno.
Bruno took a pull of his beer. "He couldn't give less of a shit that my sister is famous. If anything —" He shook his head. "If anything, that's a mark against her in his book."
I looked at Angelica, who was laughing at something Millie had said, her whole face open in the way it only got when she was genuinely off-guard. She still wasn't looking at Matthew.
"Is she in trouble?" I asked.
Bruno's mouth curved. "When Matthew sets his sights on something, he doesn't miss." He said it with the fond resignation of a man who had watched this happen before. "So yeah, she's in trouble."
I was going to enjoy this enormously.
An hour later, I found Angelica alone near the edge of the porch railing, looking out at the trees with a glass of wine she'd been working on for a while.
I leaned on the railing beside her.
"So," I said.
"Don't," she said.
"I haven't said anything."
"You have a face." She took a sip of wine. "I know your face."
"I'm just standing here. On my engagement porch."
She cut me a sideways look. "Congratulations, by the way. Genuinely. Adam is wonderful and you deserve wonderful."
"Thank you." I paused. "Bruno's friend seems nice."
The silence that followed was extremely informative.
"He's fine," Angelica said.
"He's been looking at you for the last forty-five minutes."
"People look at me. I'm famous."
"Angelica." I turned to face her. "He is not looking at you because you're famous."
She was quiet for a moment. In the warm light from the strings overhead, I could see the thing she was working very hard not to show, which was that she already knew that.
"Bruno says he's a good man," she said finally.
"Bruno would know."
"Bruno also says he's—" She stopped. Her jaw tightened slightly. "Relentless. When he wants something."
I looked back through the porch doors, where Matthew Grainger was talking to Renzo with the easy patience of a man who was in absolutely no hurry and had no intention of going anywhere.
"Angelica," I said.
"What."
"I think Jasper Creek just got more interesting."
She made a sound that was not agreement and was not denial and was completely, entirely, her.
I raised my glass.
She raised hers.
James and Adam found us just like that. James looked shy, which was not normal for him. Actually, he looked shy and a little scared. I squatted down so we were at the same eye-level. “What’s wrong, Honey?”
“It’s what we talked about last week. And what happened tonight. I can’t be married to you just because I gave you the box, right?”
“That’s right, Honey. I’m engaged to your dad, but I love you to the moon and back.”
“Do I still call you Miss Zoe, or are you my mom now?”
“You have a mom who’s up in heaven, but I could be your mom here on earth if you want.”
I watched as he tilted his head and considered this.
“Would we still talk about dinosaurs and play Mario Kart? And would you still make chocolate chip pancakes?”
“Yes.” I held my breath.
He gave me the biggest grin and threw his arms around my neck. “I love you, Mom.”
“I love you, too, James.”
I looked over James’ head to Adam. He had tears in his eyes.
“My life is absolutely perfect. Just perfect.” I whispered.
Read about Angelica and Matthew’s story in Born for Starlight