Epilogue 1 - Luke
Three years into medical school, I’ve learned a lot of things.
How to function on four hours of sleep. How to eat granola bars like they’re a food group. How to pretend I’m not emotionally attached to my color-coded planner.
I’ve also learned that if my boyfriend tells me I “deserve a break,” it usually means he’s already planned something, and I should just go with it.
“Luke,” Silas says, leaning against the doorway of our bedroom while I stare blankly into my closet, still wearing scrubs from my part-time nursing job.
“It’s Friday. You don’t have class or work tomorrow.
You’ve been buried in anatomy for two weeks straight.
I don’t think you can stuff any more information into that brain of yours. ”
I squint at him. “Are you trying to emotionally manipulate me into leaving the apartment?”
“Yes.”
I sigh dramatically. “Rude. I was thinking PJs and Love Island reruns.”
He smiles like he already won. Which he has.
“Put on something hot,” he adds. “We’re going to Riot.”
That gets my attention.
I turn slowly. “Riot Riot?”
“The very same.”
My brows lift. “Is this a nostalgia play?”
He shrugs, trying for casual and failing. “Most of the group is back in town.”
That definitely gets my attention.
“Todd and Logan have a game Sunday against Eli’s team, so Max is here too. Micah and Colton are visiting family. Everyone else is scattered.”
I tick them off mentally. Will, Ty, Nathan, Quinn, Daniel—all missing. Still. That’s a solid lineup.
“You planned a reunion night,” I accuse.
“I planned you getting out of your head,” Silas corrects. “The reunion is a bonus.”
I grin. “God, you love me.”
“Yes,” he says easily. “Get dressed.”
Riot looks exactly the same.
Same sticky floors. Same neon lights. Same bass vibrating through my bones as if it remembers me.
The moment we walk in, I spot Todd by the bar, Logan leaning into his space like personal boundaries are optional. Eli’s already jokingly arguing with Max over something dumb. Micah and Colton are on the dance floor, moving as though they don’t have responsibilities.
I light up.
“My people!” I yell, breaking free from Silas to barrel into hugs like a human missile.
Todd catches me first. “Future doctor!”
“Third year, baby,” I announce. “I’m basically dead inside.”
Logan high-fives me. “You look good for someone who lives on caffeine.”
“I thrive on chaos.”
We fall into familiar rhythms fast—drinks, dancing, shouting over the music. Silas hangs back just enough to let me soak it all in, watching me with that soft expression that still makes my chest do stupid things. I swear the butterflies should pay rent at this point.
I dance with everyone. Todd spins me. Logan dips me dramatically. Max pretends not to enjoy it when I drag him into the circle.
I’m sweaty, buzzing, laughing too loud.
Happy.
At some point, I wander toward the bar for water because I’m allegedly an adult now. When I turn back toward the dance floor, I don’t see Silas.
Which is weird.
I scan the crowd, pushing past bodies, calling his name once. Nothing.
Then I feel it—that instinctive pull that’s been there since the beginning. I turn.
Silas is in the middle of the dance floor. On one knee. For half a second, my brain refuses to compute. Then I see the ring in his hand.
Simple. White gold band. Familiar in a way that hits straight to my lungs.
The music keeps pounding. People keep dancing around him like this isn’t the most important moment of my life. My heart tries to escape my ribcage.
“Oh my God,” I whisper.
Someone shrieks nearby. Todd freezes mid-groove, gripping Logan’s arm to get his attention.
Colton’s hands fly to his mouth, making Micah follow his gaze.
Eli immediately starts filming, or maybe he was in on this and was already filming, because Max is standing at his back, his arms around his waist, watching it all unfold.
I walk toward Silas on legs that feel like jelly.
He looks up at me, eyes steady, mouth soft, as if the rest of the world has already narrowed down to just us.
“Luke,” he says, loud enough for me to hear over the music. “I don’t want to keep calling you only my boyfriend.”
My breath leaves me in a rush.
“I want to call you my forever,” he continues. “I want choosing you every day, on purpose. I want a life that doesn’t wobble when things get hard.”
I’m already crying. Absolutely not subtle about it. Whatever. I’ve had worse breakdowns in this place.
“I don’t need a date,” Silas says, calm and sure as though he’s not on one knee in the middle of a packed dance floor. “I don’t need a plan tonight. I just need you to know that this—” He gestures between us. “—this is it for me. It always has been.”
My chest feels too full.
“I love you,” he says. “Will you marry me, hermoso?”
The music keeps pounding, but everything else seems to stall out, as if the room is holding its breath.
“Yes,” I blurt. “Yes. Obviously yes.”
Relief crosses his face so fast it makes my throat ache. He stands, sliding the ring onto my finger with hands that don’t shake, even though mine absolutely do.
I laugh and cry at the same time and throw myself into his arms, wrapping around him like gravity has temporarily stopped applying to me.
Our friends lose their minds. Eli starts saying something about being the best man, while Micah tells him obviously it’s going to be him.
Silas laughs into my hair, holding me tight.
“I knew you’d say yes,” he murmurs.
“You proposed in Riot,” I sniff. “You absolutely knew.”
“I planned responsibly,” he says, like this is a completely normal thing to say right now.
Three years ago, I thought loving someone meant I had to shrink myself. Now, I know better. Silas presses a kiss to my temple, warm and steady.
“We don’t have to rush,” he says quietly.
I grin, lifting my hand so the ring catches the light. “Good. Because I have exams.”
He chuckles, pulling me close.
We finally stumble through the door sometime after 2 a.m., both of us flushed and laughing, my ring catching every stray light in the hallway as though it’s trying to prove it’s real.
Silas kicks the door shut behind us, deadbolts it without looking, then turns and backs me gently against the wall with his body—chest to chest, hips to hips, heat rolling off him in waves.
I’m still buzzing—alcohol, adrenaline, the high of yes and the way our friends screamed when he slid the ring on. My hands are shaking a little when I reach up to cup his face.
He catches them, brings them to his mouth, kisses each knuckle slow and deliberate, eyes locked on mine.
“You don’t have exams tonight,” he murmurs, voice low and rough, the way it gets when he’s already thinking about how he wants to take me apart. “Or tomorrow.”
My breath hitches. “No. I don’t.”
“Which means…” His lips brush the inside of my wrist, then the pulse point, then up the inside of my forearm—slow, deliberate, mapping every sensitive spot he’s learned by heart over the last three years. “I have all night to help you get rid of the rest of that tension.”
Heat floods me so fast my knees almost buckle.
“Silas—”
He presses closer, thigh sliding between mine, giving me just enough friction to make me gasp.
His mouth finds the side of my neck—open, wet kisses that turn into soft bites, then soothing licks.
One hand slides under my shirt, palm flat and warm against my stomach, fingers splaying wide like he’s trying to feel every inch of me at once.
“You’ve been wound so tight lately,” he whispers against my skin, voice dark and smooth as velvet. “All those late nights, all that studying, all that pressure… I’ve felt it in the way you tense when you think I’m asleep.”
I whimper when his teeth graze my earlobe.
“Let me take it,” he says. “Let me make you forget everything except how good this feels. How good we feel.”
My head tips back against the wall. “Please.”
That one word is all it takes.
He kisses me—deep, filthy, claiming—while I toe off my shoes and his hands work my shirt up and off, jeans next, boxers last. I’m naked in seconds, skin prickling in the cool air, cock already hard and leaking against my stomach.
He doesn’t touch me there yet. Instead, he drops to his knees, hands sliding up the backs of my thighs, spreading me just enough to press his face to the crease where leg meets hip and inhales.
“Fuck,” he groans, voice wrecked. “You smell so good. Always do.”
Then his mouth is on me—hot, wet, greedy. He takes me deep in one slow slide, throat relaxing, tongue flat and pressing along the underside. I cry out, hands fisting in his hair, hips jerking forward before I can stop them.
He hums approval, the vibration shooting straight through me.
One hand grips my ass, fingers digging in; the other hand wraps around the base, stroking what his mouth can’t reach.
He works me slow at first—long, deliberate pulls—then faster, messier, spit slicking his chin, eyes flicking up to watch every reaction on my face.
“Daddy—” The word slips out, needy and raw.
He pulls off with a wet pop, strokes me fast and slick. “That’s it, baby. Let go. I’ve got you.”
I’m shaking—thighs trembling, breath ragged. He takes me deep again, throat working around me, and I shatter with a broken moan—spilling down his throat, hips bucking, vision whiting out.
He doesn’t stop until I’m oversensitive and whimpering, then he rises slowly, kissing his way up my body—stomach, chest, throat—until he’s kissing me again, deep and filthy, letting me taste myself on his tongue.
“Bed,” he rasps against my mouth.
I nod, legs still shaky.
He scoops me up—effortless and possessive—and carries me to the bedroom, lays me out on the sheets like something precious. His clothes hit the floor in seconds. When he settles over me, skin to skin, cock hard and leaking against my thigh, I wrap my legs around his waist and pull him down.
“Inside me,” I beg. “Now. I need you.”
He groans, reaches for the lube on the nightstand and slicks himself, then his fingers. He preps me slowly—two fingers, then three—curling, stroking, whispering praise the whole time.
“So beautiful…taking me so well…my fiancé…fuck, I love you…”
When he pushes in—slow, deep, stretching me perfectly—we both moan, long and broken. He holds still for a second, forehead pressed to mine, breathing hard.
“Mine,” he whispers.
“Yours,” I breathe back. “Always.”
Then he moves—slow rolls at first, deep and deliberate, building to something harder, hungrier. His hand wraps around me again, stroking in time with his thrusts. I arch, nails raking down his back, crying out every time he hits that spot.
“Come for me again, hermoso,” he growls. “I want to feel you clench around me.” He grabs my hand then—fingers interlacing with mine, the cool metal of my ring pressing into his palm like a brand. “Want to feel this—my ring on your finger—while you fall apart for me.”
That does it.
I come hard—shuddering, clenching around him, spilling over his fist with his name on my lips. He follows seconds later—burying deep, groaning low and wrecked into my neck.
We collapse together; sweaty, sated, tangled in sheets and each other.
He kisses my temple, my cheek, the corner of my mouth.
“Fiancé,” he murmurs, voice hoarse and reverent.
I smile against his skin, ring glinting in the low light.
“Fiancé,” I echo.