Epilogue
CALLUM
ONE YEAR LATER
The Velvet Antler is packed for Valentine's Day.
Every table is full, couples leaning close over candlelit dinners and expensive wine. Silas has outdone himself with the decorations this year, red roses and twinkling lights transforming the rustic space into something almost magical.
I hate it.
Not the decorations, or the crowd, or even the holiday I used to avoid like the plague. I hate that I'm sitting at the bar alone, nursing a whiskey, while my woman is fifteen minutes late.
My phone buzzes.
Nadia
Stop scowling. I can feel it from here.
Where is here exactly?
Nadia
Patience is a virtue, mountain man.
Patience is for people who aren't waiting on bratty submissives who can't tell time.
Nadia
Careful. That kind of talk might make me do something you have to punish me for later.
Always with the promises.
I pocket my phone and take another sip of whiskey, trying not to smile. A year ago, I walked into this bar dreading another Valentine's Day of fending off matchmakers and enduring pitying looks from coupled-up acquaintances.
Now I'm counting the seconds until my girlfriend walks through the door.
Partner. She hates when I call her my girlfriend. Says it sounds too casual for what we are. But fiancée still feels premature, even though the ring has been burning a hole in my pocket for three months.
The door opens, and my breath catches the same way it did the first time I saw her.
Nadia walks in wearing a deep red dress that hugs every curve I've memorized with my hands and mouth over the past twelve months.
Her braids are swept up, exposing the elegant line of her neck.
And resting against her collarbone, catching the candlelight, is the silver key I gave her the night she agreed to stay.
She hasn't taken it off since.
"Sorry I'm late." She slides onto the stool beside me and presses a kiss to my cheek. "Your brother wouldn't stop talking about the Vancouver expansion."
"Which brother?"
"Flynn. He cornered me at the office with spreadsheets." She signals to Silas for her usual. "I think he's more excited about the new contracts than you are."
"Flynn gets excited about spreadsheets. It's concerning."
"It's adorable." She accepts her wine with a grateful smile. "He also mentioned something about Sunday dinner? Apparently Declan is bringing a date."
"Declan is always bringing a date. They never last more than two weeks."
"This one's different, according to Flynn. A chef from Vancouver who's opening a restaurant in town." Nadia raises her eyebrows. "Apparently she's immune to his grumpy charm."
"No one is immune to Ridge charm."
"I wasn't." She clinks her glass against mine. "Look where that got me."
I look at her. Really look. The woman who walked into this bar a year ago was sharp edges and defensive humor, hiding her wounds behind wit and expensive shoes. The woman beside me now is softer somehow. Not less sharp, never that. But more open. More willing to let herself be seen.
We did that together. Stripped away each other's armor piece by piece until what was left was something real. Something worth fighting for.
"I have something for you." I reach into my jacket pocket, fingers brushing the velvet box I've been carrying for weeks. "Close your eyes."
"If this is another pair of noise-canceling headphones because you think I talk too much during your work calls—"
"You do talk too much during my work calls. But that's not what this is." I wait until her eyes close, then pull out the box and set it on the bar between us. "Okay. Open."
She opens her eyes. Sees the box. Goes completely still.
"Callum."
"Before you panic, it's not what you think."
"It's a ring box."
"Yes."
"Ring boxes traditionally contain rings."
"Also yes."
"And rings traditionally mean—"
"Open the box, Nadia."
Her hands shake slightly as she reaches for it. The lid lifts with a soft creak, revealing what's inside.
Not an engagement ring. Not yet.
A key. Silver, ornate, matching the one around her neck.
Her brow furrows. "I don't understand. I already have a key."
"That key was for my house. My playroom. My life as it existed a year ago." I take her hand, threading my fingers through hers. "This key is for the cabin."
"The cabin?"
"The one Flynn's been designing for the past six months.
The one Declan's crew started building last week.
" I watch understanding dawn on her face.
"Our cabin, Nadia. On the property, but separate from the main house.
Three bedrooms, a home office for your business, and a playroom that puts my current one to shame. "
"You built us a cabin?"
"I'm building us a cabin. It won't be ready until summer." I bring her hand to my lips. "I wanted you to have something that was ours. Not mine that you moved into. Ours from the beginning."
Her eyes are bright with tears she's trying not to let fall. "That's... Callum, that's insane. That's so much. I can't—"
"You can." I cup her face in my hands. "You can because you're not a houseguest anymore. You're not temporary. You're my partner in everything that matters, and I want us to have a place that reflects that."
"A place with three bedrooms."
"For when we need the space."
She laughs, wet and wondering. "You're thinking about kids? We've been together a year."
"I'm thinking about the future. Whatever shape that takes." I wipe a tear from her cheek with my thumb. "No pressure. No timeline. Just possibility."
"Possibility." She turns the word over like she's tasting it. "I like that."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah." She pulls me down for a kiss that tastes like wine and salt and everything I never knew I wanted. "I love you, Callum Ridge. Even when you make insane grand gestures that put my tiny Christmas present to shame."
"What did you get me for Christmas?"
"A new coffee maker. Because your old one was a crime against humanity."
"I liked my old coffee maker."
"Your old coffee maker produced liquid that could strip paint. You're welcome."
I laugh against her mouth, and she laughs with me, and for a moment we're just two people ridiculous in love in the middle of a crowded bar on Valentine's Day.
"Dance with me." She pulls back, tugging at my hand. "I know you don't dance, but it's Valentine's Day and you just told me you're building us a house and I need to be vertical and touching you right now."
"Vertical seems negotiable."
"Later. Dance first."
I let her lead me to the small dance floor where a handful of other couples are swaying to something slow and romantic. She fits against me perfectly, her head on my chest, her body warm and familiar in my arms.
"One year ago," she murmurs against my shirt, "I walked into this bar convinced my life was falling apart."
"And now?"
"Now I know it wasn't falling apart. It was falling into place." She tilts her face up to look at me. "Everything that went wrong led me here. To you. To this."
"That's very philosophical for a woman who once threatened to murder me over the dishwasher."
"The dishwasher thing is a legitimate grievance and I stand by it."
I spin her in a clumsy turn that makes her laugh. "For the record, I walked into this bar one year ago convinced I was fine being alone forever."
"And now?"
"Now I can't imagine my life without you in it. Can't remember what I did with all the silence before you filled it up with your opinions and your demands and your complete inability to let me win an argument."
"I let you win arguments."
"You let me think I've won arguments. Big difference."
She grins up at me, unrepentant. "You're learning."
The song ends, but we keep swaying. Around us, life continues. Silas pours drinks and makes small talk. Couples celebrate their love in a dozen different ways. The town we've built our life in hums with the same warmth and nostalgia that made me stay all those years ago.
But now it's not just my town. It's ours.
"I want to go home." Nadia's voice drops lower, her fingers tracing patterns on the back of my neck. "I want you to take me to that playroom and remind me who I belong to."
Heat flares in my chest. "What happened to celebrating Valentine's Day properly?"
"This is proper. This is the most proper thing I can think of." She rises on her toes to whisper in my ear. "Take me home, sir. I've been a very good girl all year and I think I deserve a reward."
I pull back to look at her, this woman who crashed into my life and refused to leave.
Who pushed and tested and fought me every step of the way until I proved I could hold on.
Who wears my key around her neck and will soon have a home I built for her and might someday, if I'm very lucky, wear my ring on her finger.
"Let's go home."
We settle the tab and wave goodbye to Silas, who gives me a knowing look that I studiously ignore. Nadia's hand rests on my thigh the whole way, warm and steady.
When we pull into the garage, she's out of the truck before I've even cut the engine. I catch up to her at the door, pressing her against the frame with my body.
"In a hurry?"
"I've been thinking about this all day." She arches against me. "All through Flynn's spreadsheets. All through getting dressed. All through making myself fifteen minutes late just to watch you scowl at your phone."
"You were late on purpose?"
"Anticipation is half the fun." She nips at my jaw. "Now stop talking and take me inside."
I take her inside.
And later, when she's boneless and satisfied in my arms, the new key clutched in her hand like a treasure, I let myself imagine the future we're building.
Sunday dinners with my brothers and whatever partners they eventually find.
Holidays filled with chaos and laughter and probably at least one argument about politics.
A cabin rising from the mountain earth, designed for a life we'll create together.
And maybe, someday, tiny feet running through the halls and voices calling us names we haven't earned yet.
"What are you thinking about?" Nadia's voice is sleepy, satisfied.
"The future."
"Anything good?"
"Everything good." I press a kiss to her hair. "Go to sleep, love. We've got a lifetime to figure it out."
She's asleep within minutes, her breath evening out against my chest. I stay awake a while longer, holding her, watching the moonlight play across her skin.
One year ago, I offered a stranger a fake relationship to survive a wedding weekend.
Now I can't imagine surviving anything without her.
Happy Valentine's Day to me.