Epilogue
AMELIA
The first thing I noticed was the smell.
Cold air, dry and sharp, carrying woodsmoke and snow and the faint, metallic tang of winter.
I stepped out of the car and it hit me like a memory—every walk home from school in February, every hot cocoa at the kitchen table, every night I’d pressed my forehead to my bedroom window and tried to imagine what the rest of the world smelled like.
Now I knew.
And somehow, I was bringing the rest of the world back with me.
Levi came around the front of the rental, his boots crunching over packed snow in my parents’ driveway. He carried my travel bag in one hand like it weighed nothing and smoothed his free palm down the front of his jacket like he was about to walk into a briefing.
“Last chance to run,” I murmured.
He glanced over at me, mouth twitching. “Is that for me or for you?”
“Definitely you,” I said. “Once you enter, you may never be allowed to leave.”
“Good,” he said, and there was nothing joking about that word at all. “I’m counting on that.”
The porch light clicked on before we reached the steps.
The door opened halfway, and my mother peeked out like she’d been listening for the sound of tires on snow. Her face broke into a smile that undid something behind my ribs.
“Amelia,” she said, pushing the door all the way open. “You made it.”
“We made it,” I corrected, stepping aside so she could see him.
Levi straightened a little, not in that parade-ground way, but in the quiet, respectful way he used with people he cared about. Or wanted to.
“Mrs. Emerson,” he said. “It’s good to finally meet you.”
“Jo,” she said immediately, wiping her hands on her sweater before offering one. “I’m only Mrs. Emerson when I’m signing petitions.”
He shook her hand, careful and firm, like he was afraid he’d break her if he used his full strength. Her eyes flicked to me over his shoulder, and the look there—fondness, relief, naked curiosity—made my throat feel tight.
“Come in, come in,” she said, stepping back. “It’s freezing out there. Your father’s pretending he isn’t peeking through the kitchen window.”
“I heard that,” Dad called from somewhere inside. “And it’s called situational awareness.”
Levi’s mouth curled. “I like him already.”
We stepped into the warmth.
The house hadn’t changed much. Same narrow entryway, same cluttered corkboard with overlapping appointment cards and political cartoons, same coat hooks overloaded with winter gear. The smell was the same, too—onions and garlic and something yeasty rising on the counter.
Home. Layered with new edges now, new shadows, but still home.
By the time I’d kicked off my boots and hung my coat, Dad appeared in the doorway to the kitchen, dish towel over one shoulder.
He took Levi in with a single, thorough look. Not hostile. Just … measuring. The way he’d once looked at my first DSLR, weighing its capabilities and flaws.
“Mr. Dane,” he said, offering a hand.
“Mr. Emerson,” Levi said. “Call me Levi.”
Their grips met in the air between them, two men trying not to squeeze too hard and failing.
“Name’s solid,” Dad said, releasing him. “I had a dog named Levi once.”
“Dad,” I groaned.
He grinned at me unabashedly, then turned back to Levi. “You take care of my girl down there in your billionaire bunker?”
“Every second I get,” Levi said, simple and unflinching.
Something in my father’s shoulders eased.
“Then you’re welcome at my table,” he said. “Come on. Soup’s on. Your mother’s been stress-cooking since you texted from the airport.”
Dinner was loud and normal and strange all at once.
They asked about the flight. About the weather in Charleston. About whether Canadians in the U.S. still got teased about saying “sorry” too much.
Levi handled it with the same calm competence he took into war rooms. He told stories that were true but curated—about the food in Charleston, about the humor that comes from putting a bunch of ex-military brothers in the same kitchen, about how unnerving it was to learn he had a whole other set of siblings hidden on the other side of the country.
He didn’t mention abductions, or zip ties, or older women with raspy voices and vendettas. He didn’t mention The Vanguard.
He didn’t need to. The danger hummed under my skin like a low-grade fever. It was part of us now, woven into every conversation between the lines.
At one point, Mom set down a basket of bread with a sigh.
“Every time I turn on the news and there’s some political crisis or explosion overseas, I think, ‘Is my daughter walking toward that?’” she said. “Now I have to worry about secret fortresses and shadow organizations, too?”
“Mom,” I said gently. “We talked about the fortress. It’s mostly sunrooms and coffee and Levi doing pushups.”
Dad took a sip of his wine. “So, this place—Dominion Hall,” he said. “You’re really moving in there? Permanently?”
“Not permanently,” I said. “Not yet. We’re taking a suite for now. It’s basically an apartment. Kitchenette, sitting room, the works. It’s down the hall from Levi’s brothers and their partners.”
“Communal living for the rich and paranoid,” Mom said dryly. “I suppose there are worse things.”
Levi smiled faintly. “It’s secure,” he said, voice steady. “As secure as anywhere can be when powerful people are trying to make you disappear. For now, it’s the safest place for Amelia to be. For all of us.”
Mom and Dad exchanged a look over the table. Decades of shared code passed between them in half a second.
“I don’t like the idea of anyone trying to make my daughter disappear,” Mom said, eyes sharp. “But I like the idea of her facing it without a roof like that over her head even less.”
Dad nodded. “You both do what you need to to stay alive,” he said. “If that means hunkering down in a billionaire compound for a while …” He shrugged. “We’ve seen stranger things in the papers.”
“Plus,” I added, trying to soften the edges, “at some point, once things settle, we want to build something of our own. Still near the family, but … separate. A house that’s ours.
Maybe in Montana for summers, Charleston the rest of the year.
Somewhere with a kitchen big enough for Mom to come take it over when she visits. ”
Mom’s eyes softened. “You’re really thinking about that?” she asked. “Houses. Future. Seasons.”
I met her gaze. “Yeah,” I said quietly. “I am.”
Her hand came across the table, fingertips brushing my wrist in a brief, wordless I’m happy for you.
The rest of the evening was easier.
Dad told Levi embarrassing stories about my childhood—like the time I’d fact-checked a teacher’s lesson plan and brought printouts to class. Levi looked delighted.
Mom dragged me into the kitchen under the pretense of needing help with dishes and promptly whispered, “He’s handsome and his eyes are so soft on you. Don’t screw this up.”
“I wasn’t planning on it,” I whispered back.
By the time we’d finished dessert and more wine than I usually drank on a weeknight, the house felt smaller in a good way. Like it had stretched to fit Levi without breaking. Like something fundamental had shifted and then re-settle into a new shape.
“Go on,” Mom said, shooing us toward the back door. “Take him to the lake before his blood fully congeals in this Canadian cold.”
“I’m pretty sure that’s not how blood works,” Dad said mildly.
“It’s a metaphor,” she shot back. “Honestly.”
Levi slipped his hand into mine as we stepped out into the night.
It was darker than Charleston, the sky sharper. Fewer streetlights, fewer people, more stars. Snow squeaked under our feet as we followed the familiar path between the neighbor’s fence and the stand of scraggly pines that led down toward the water.
“Was that good?” Levi asked after a while.
“Surprisingly,” I said. “I thought Mom might grill you about your intentions or something.”
“She doesn’t need to,” he said. “She already knows.”
I glanced up at him. “Does she?”
He nodded once. “Yeah. Parents like that—they read the room. Your dad’s been watching me like I’m carrying unexploded ordnance, and he still handed me a second glass of wine.”
“A high honor in this house,” I said solemnly.
We reached the small clearing at the edge of the lake. It was frozen over, but the ice wasn’t thick enough to skate on yet. The surface reflected starlight in fractured patches where the snow had blown clear.
I had stood here a thousand times in my life. After exams. After breakups. After nights where the news was too heavy and I needed to remember that the world was bigger than my laptop screen.
I’d stood here before my first trip to Afghanistan, breath puffing white in the air, phone clutched in my gloved hand as Derek’s voice crackled through with last-minute instructions.
I’d promised myself then that I would always come back.
That there would be a version of me who stood at this shoreline knowing how the story turned out.
Now here I was, and the story was stranger than anything I’d imagined.
Levi let go of my hand long enough to shove his own into his pockets and look out over the ice.
“This place suits you,” he said. “Quiet. Cold. Stubborn.”
I bumped my shoulder into his. “Did you just call my childhood home stubborn?”
He smiled. “I meant you. But if the shoe fits …”
“Oh, I’ll show you stubborn,” I said, but the words were soft.
We stood in silence for a minute, breath hanging between us like tiny clouds. I could feel him thinking beside me, thoughts layered and heavy. The same way they got when he was planning something.
My heart tripped.
“Levi,” I said carefully, “if you’re about to tell me you’re going after Victoria alone, I’m going to push you into that lake and let the ice finish the job.”
He huffed out a laugh, vapor curling in the air. “I’m not going after anyone tonight,” he said. “Except you.”
I turned fully toward him.
He was still staring out at the lake, like he was drawing courage from the dark. Then he shifted, facing me, and the look in his eyes nearly took my legs out from under me.