26. Epilogue
Epilogue
One year later
T he warm, early-summer air hung heavy with the scent of roses in Duluth’s Leif Erikson Park as I laced my fingers through Kylan’s. The soft green satin of my dress brushed the sun-warmed stones beneath my feet, and I turned to him with a smile. “This place—it’s truly something else, isn’t it?”
Kylan gave me that easy grin I loved. “Yeah. Feels like the kind of place where stories begin.”
I glanced at Viviana standing in the gazebo, glowing with nervous excitement. Her groom was calm and steady beside her, like he’d always belonged in this exact spot. She told me once this was the very spot where she’d realized she loved Jack—on a solo trip last summer, when everything changed.
My eyes swept to the sides. Viv’s and Jack’s sisters stood close as attendants, their quiet support anchoring the moment, while her nieces scattered petals like bursts of sunlight and her nephew charmingly took his ringbearer duties very seriously.
I didn’t know Lillian very well, but her children were adorable.
And Belinda was radiant as ever next to her big brother.
It was all so … perfect. Complete. The kind of perfect in a way I’d never experienced.
Jenn, Kieran, and Choua leaned in close and laughed softly in front of us, and Rainn nudged me from my other side with a lazy smile.
I knew he was thinking of proposing to Sofia, and I was 100% on board.
In this garden full of people who meant everything to me, I felt lucky.
Chosen family was sometimes the best kind.
As the ceremony carried on, my thoughts drifted briefly to Jane—in a seat on the far side, her tablet in hand as she took notes for a work assignment she’d been so excited to get.
Her ex was the photographer, a lovely Japanese American woman who’d seemed even more excited about the opportunity.
And not far off, a man with furrowed eyebrows stared at Jane.
She’d whispered to me earlier that he was probably spying—or hoping she’d fail, so he could report back to her new boss (also his best friend).
Why else would he attend? she’d asked us.
But there was something in his posture, if not his expression—something waiting to unfold beneath that guarded surface.
Watching Viviana’s wedding unfold in this place that had changed everything for her, I felt the quiet thrill of new beginnings. Because true love stories—like Anne Elliot’s in Persuasion —weren’t always neat or easy, but they were worth every twist and turn.
I should know.
Later, when the music floated through the rose-scented air and guests mingled beneath rose-gold string lights, Kylan sidled up beside me with two nonalcoholic drinks.
He leaned in and brushed the corner of my mouth with his lips before handing me a glass. “If this wedding thing wears you out ...”
I laughed and shook my head. “Not a chance.”
He shrugged playfully. “Then I’ll just have to marry you. Right here. Right now.”
Something fluttered in my chest, and I smirked, squeezing his hand. “You’re going to have to work on your pitch.”
He pulled me close, grinning. “Soft launch.”
And just like that, with the warm weight of his hand in mine and the gentle hum of life all around us, my heart did that ridiculous thing it always did—full and scared and stubbornly hopeful. This time, I’d get my own happily ever after, hard-won and real.
As Kylan spun me gently beneath the stars, our eyes locked.
When he looked at me like that—as if I was his, always—I finally stopped wondering if I deserved this kind of love. This bliss. I just held on tight.