Epilogue Two - The Ashes #2
Constance passes me first and stops long enough to put her hand on my good shoulder.
"Just so you know," she whispers calmly, "if you hurt her, I'll break your face."
Then she keeps walking.
Jesus. She's unbearable.
Honestly, though? I'm fond of her.
Summer comes toward me once they've disappeared inside, shopping bags swinging from her wrists. She sets them down on the gravel and steps straight into my arms.
Instinct. Always instinct.
I pull her in carefully and kiss her forehead. "Have a good day?"
"It was strange without you," she says quietly. "But can you please explain why there's a gigantic tent and a load of tables in our backyard?"
Our backyard.
Christ.
I run my thumb slowly across her lower lip. "I love it when you say ours."
"And I love you."
I look at her—this woman standing in front of me with the sun catching in her hair, red again now the way it's supposed to be. Looking at me like I'm the center of her whole damn world.
She's the center of mine. She has been since the day I met her.
I take one slow step back.
Confusion flashes across her face, the kind that nearly makes me laugh, because she genuinely looks wounded that I didn't say it straight back.
"Jacob?"
My pulse pounds so hard I can feel it in my throat. Everything else in the world goes quiet. Just her. Always her.
I lower myself down onto one knee.
And she freezes completely. Her hands fly up to her mouth, her eyes going so wide they barely look real.
Fuck. My chest hurts.
Not the shoulder this time. Her. Loving her this much.
"Summer Miller," I say quietly.
Tears are already filling her eyes.
"Baby. My ray of fucking sunshine. My everything." My voice goes rough on the last word and stays there.
Pull yourself together, Darnell.
"I asked you to marry me once already." I keep my eyes locked on hers. "And you said yes."
A shaky laugh gets out of her through the tears.
"But now I'm asking you properly."
I pull the box out of my pocket and open it between us, and the stone catches the sunlight.
"So I'm asking you with everything I've got left to give. My heart. My soul. My skin and my bones."
She's crying openly now.
"And if it takes the rest of my life proving how much I love you, then that's exactly what I'll fucking do."
I swallow hard.
"Will you make me the happiest man alive and be my wife?"
For a second, she just stares. At the ring. At my face. Like her brain physically can't process what's in front of her.
Then—
"Jacob…" Her voice breaks apart completely. "I already said—"
"Yes or no, baby."
A wet laugh. Then a sob.
"Yes." She's crying hard now. "Yes. Yes, a million times yes."
The relief crashes through me so hard I nearly laugh out loud. Instead my eyes sting. Jesus Christ. I'm actually crying.
I take the ring out of the box and slide it onto her finger, and it fits perfectly.
Summer lifts her hand slowly into the sunlight and the diamond throws light across both of us. Then she notices the center stone properly.
"Jacob." Her voice shakes. "It's beautiful."
I get back to my feet.
"The stone is so…" She turns her hand, studying it. "Different."
I rub at the back of my neck, and the nerves hit me properly for the first time all day. Because this part is either the most meaningful thing I've ever done or completely fucking insane, and I genuinely don't know which until she tells me.
"Yeah. About that."
She looks up, confused.
"After your mother was cremated," I say slowly, "I asked for some of the ashes." I cringe a little. “Well, actually they weren’t going to give me them until I brought up some old files and—” I stop myself.
Summer goes completely still.
"They're inside the ring."
Silence.
Fuck.
I’m pretty sure my stomach just fell out of my ass.
"I just figured—" I swallow. "She could still be with us. For this. For the wedding. For the rest of our lives."
She stares at me for one long second.
Then her legs go out from under her and she sits down hard on the gravel, sobbing.
"Baby—" Panic hits me and I'm down beside her before I've thought about it. "Fuck, if I overstepped, I'm sor—"
"How?"
I blink. Suddenly feeling like I’ve been slapped. "What?"
"How did I get this lucky?" she says through the tears.
The relief nearly takes the breath out of my lungs.
She laughs shakily, staring at the ring again. Then she lifts her hand and presses it gently to her lips.
"I love you, Mama," she whispers, broken. "And I know you'd be happy for me right now."
Damn, that nearly destroys me where I sit.
I brush the tears off her cheeks carefully with my thumb. "She knew," I murmur.
Summer looks up at me.
"She knew I'd take care of you." Emotion sits heavy in my throat. "I don't know how she knew. But she did."
She smiles through it. "Smart lady."
Then the screen door bangs off its frame hard enough to make us both jump.
"Can we come out yet, or what?"
Constance is standing on the porch holding a beer while Adelaide tries desperately to drag her back inside by the arm.
"For Christ's sake," Adelaide hisses.
"What?" Constance says, entirely unbothered. "I'm emotionally invested."
Summer bursts out laughing beside me, and the sound of it becomes my favorite thing in the world all over again.
I get up first, then help her to her feet, and grin toward the house.
"You can all come out now." My chest swells so hard it aches. "She said yes."
The house erupts.
Cheering explodes from inside and everybody comes pouring onto the porch, clapping, shouting, whistling. Summer's whole face lights up the second she sees them.
Harris and Sarah. Black. Carter. Half my department. Half the Dogwood.
Mason, with one hand hovering at Reyes's elbow on the porch steps. And some of the survivors from the warehouse.
People who went through hell alongside us. People who understand exactly what it takes to crawl out the other side of something ugly and keep living anyway.
Then Carter and Mason step forward holding a folded banner between them.
They pull it apart slowly, and the words stretch out across the porch in big black letters.
MRS. DARNELL.
Summer stares at it. Then looks up at me, laughing through the tears.
"Mrs. Darnell," she says softly.
God. The way she says it nearly puts me back on one knee.
She smiles wider. "I like that name."
And honestly?
So do I.