Epilogue
One Year Later
As I predicted, the front porch has become my favorite place to sit and unwind or think through things.
With one addition. Walker built a full bed-sized swing that both of us can share.
And I’m not even embarrassed to admit we’ve slept out here a few nights.
It has come to feel like home because it is.
I tug the blanket tighter around my shoulders, tucking my feet beneath me as the evening air goes from warm to just cool enough to notice.
The fabric is soft from use, worn in all the right places, and it still has that faint, familiar scent that followed it from his house to my apartment and back again.
Now the blanket resides at our home. His and mine.
A soft breeze moves through the trees, wafting the scent of salt. The sun has just dipped low, leaving streaks of gold and soft pink across the sky, and the quiet hum of the evening settles in around me.
Inside, I can hear movement. After dinner, Walker needed to check on something in the processing barn.
I guess he’s back now because I hear drawers opening, cabinets closing, and the low murmur of him talking to himself about something that probably makes perfect sense to him and absolutely no sense to anyone else.
I smile. How is this my life?
A year ago, I said yes after our fake dates became real ones. In his proposal, he agreed to any type of wedding I wanted. I think my mother scared him talking about elephants.
All I wanted was something small and quick. I’d waited for this man all my life, and I was too impatient to wait any longer.
There were no planners. No dates chosen months in advance. Just one morning when we had a conversation that started simple and turned into something that felt too right to question.
We flew to Vegas. Just the two of us. We called Tom and our friends from the hotel after the deed was done.
When we got back from our two-day honeymoon, Poppy surprised us with a bonfire on the beach with all our friends to celebrate our wedding. It was perfect and so us.
There had been laughter, music, food passed around on paper plates, and a cooler full of beverages that never seemed to run out.
I remember that night so clearly. I had looked across the fire at Walker and realized something.
There’s nothing missing in my life. I have everything and more than I could have ever dreamed of.
The front door opens behind me.
“Been looking for you,” Walker says, his voice warm and easy as he comes out onto the porch.
“I’m exactly where I always am after dinner.”
He drops down beside me and hauls me onto his lap. I snuggle in, the wood creaking softly under the shift in weight.
“Dad called. He’s taking the kids to Disney World tomorrow. That should be a treat.”
“I miss him. When is he coming home?”
Shortly after our wedding, Tom announced he was going to visit his daughters and get to know his grandkids. So far, he’s spent three months with Sophie, then Lily, and now he’s at Caroline’s in Florida.
“He’ll find his way home eventually. He sounds like he’s having a good time. I can’t remember my dad ever staying away from the island this long.”
“It’s good for him, but I miss him.” Tom is the father I wish I’d had growing up. We sent my parents an announcement of our marriage. Not an invitation. Not asking for approval. They don’t get a say in whom I love and married.
Walker went behind my back and arranged for Arya to come for a visit. It was good to see her. Her wedding is taking place next month. She invited us, but I’m not sure if we’ll go. I’d like to be there for my sister, but I no longer feel the need for approval from my parents.
We sit in the swing for a while, the conversation slipping into the natural rhythm we’ve found over the past year.
“I stopped by the new building today,” he tells me.
I groan softly, dropping my head against his shoulder. “Don’t remind me.”
He laughs at my reaction. “You should be proud of what that building stands for.”
“I am proud of it. I just didn’t think being overwhelmed would come with it.”
“You’ve hired good people. Now you need to learn to delegate and turn them loose.”
“That’s my plan. There’s just a lot that needs my attention to get the ball rolling. I never imagined that taking my business online would result in so many orders.”
“That’s a good problem to have.”
He’s right. It is. It just means I had to rent a building and renovate it, hire more people to do the cutting and sewing, figure out production schedules, and then there’s the nightmare of shipping…
He kisses me. “You’ll figure it out.”
I look up at him. “You say that like it’s easy.”
“You’ve done everything else you set your mind to. Don’t see why this would be any different.”
There it is. That steady confidence that doesn’t push. Doesn’t pressure. Just believes. In me.
Now here I am, sitting on this porch, in this life, with a man who has never once tried to take control away from me. He let me walk away when I needed to and then showed me what was real.
“What are you thinking about?” he asks.
I smile, resting my hand over his. “Just how right this feels.”
He nods but doesn’t answer right away. He doesn’t need to. His thumb sweeps slowly over my knuckles, a familiar motion that says more than words ever could.
“Yeah,” he agrees. “It does.”
What’s Up Next?
CLOSING THE DEAL
She was the one person he never got over.
Everyone on Faire Island knows Murphy men stay put. They work hard, keep their promises, and love hard once they finally fall.
But years ago, she left with no explanation that ever made sense. Just a shattered heart and a future that never happened.
Now he’s settled into the life he built without her. The island. His work. His routines. Quiet nights. No expectations. No complications.
He told himself he was happy.
Then she comes back to Faire Island like she never broke him in the first place.
Only this time, she’s carrying secrets he never saw coming.
The girl he loved is gone. In her place is a woman with shadows in her eyes, walls around her heart, and reasons for leaving that might change everything he thought he knew.
He should stay away.
Instead, he finds himself pulled right back into her orbit and into old memories, unfinished feelings, and a connection they never lost.
But second chances aren’t always romantic.
Sometimes they’re messy.
Sometimes they hurt worse the second time around.
And sometimes the person who broke your heart is the only one who can heal it.
Closing the Deal is a heartfelt, emotional second-chance romance filled with small-town charm, buried secrets, chemistry that never faded, and a love story years in the making.