Epilogue
The music's loud enough to feel in my chest, and Holt's hand is warm at the small of my back as we navigate through the crowd.
String lights crisscross overhead, turning the whole town square gold and soft, and I can smell barbecue and fried dough and beer everywhere.
The sage dress swirls around my thighs with each step, light and easy.
"I can't believe it's been eight months," I say, leaning into Holt's side as someone jostles past with an armful of corn on the cob.
"Feels longer." His voice is low and close. "In a good way."
I tip my head back to grin at him. "You saying I'm exhausting to be around?"
"I'm saying every day with you feels full."
God, this man. "Smooth, Ward." I push up on my toes to kiss his jaw, tasting salt and the faint trace of his aftershave. "Real smooth."
His hand tightens at my waist, just for a second, and heat pools low in my stomach even though we're in the middle of the damn festival. Eight months and he still makes me feel like I'm burning from the inside out.
"Scout! Holt! There you are!" Maeve appears like she's been summoned, a beer in each hand and her wild curls pulled back with what looks like a bandana. "About time you two showed up."
I take one of the beers, cold condensation immediately slicking my palm. "We had to close up the shop first. Someone's gotta lock the register."
"How's business?" She takes a long pull from her own bottle, eyeing me with that knowing look she gets.
"Good. Really good." The pride's right there in my voice, no hiding it. "We've got more customers than we can handle, honestly. Had to start turning people away for next week."
And it's true. The shop's thriving, and I'm a huge part of that—the way I organized the scheduling system, how I charmed Mrs. Gunderson into actually paying on time, the fact that I learned to read Holt's shorthand and Finn's chaos and make both of them make sense on paper.
I'm good at this. Me. Scout Adler who couldn't hold down a job for more than six months her entire adult life.
"Knew you would be." Maeve bumps my shoulder with hers. "You've got that scary competent thing going on."
"Scary?" I laugh. "I'm five-three."
"And terrifying when someone tries to haggle on a quote." She grins at Holt. "You just stand there and let her do all the intimidation, don't you?"
"She's better at it," he says, and the affection there makes my throat go tight.
Someone calls my name from across the square and I turn to see Jake, the mechanic who runs the competitor shop two streets over, waving. "Scout! We still on for that poker game Thursday?"
"Wouldn't miss it!" I call back. "Prepare to lose!"
"Big talk from someone who bluffed with a pair of twos last time!"
I flip him off, laughing, and Maeve snorts into her beer. "You play poker now?"
"I play poker now," I confirm. "And I'm getting better. Slowly."
Holt's hand slides to my hip and the casual possessiveness of it sends warmth spreading through my whole body.
"Scout, you finally gonna beat Holt at darts?" Sarah from the diner appears on my other side, grinning.
"She already does," Holt says, deadpan, and I elbow him in the ribs.
"Damn right I do." I take a sip of beer, savoring the cold bite of it. "Though he's a sore loser."
"I don't lose."
"You lost last Tuesday."
"That was an anomaly."
"An anomaly you owe me twenty bucks for."
Maeve and Sarah are both laughing now, and I'm standing here with these people who know me, who wave and tease and include me in Thursday poker games and Tuesday darts, and this easy back-and-forth is everything I never knew I needed.
Inside jokes and standing plans and all these tiny threads that weave me into this place.
"There's my favorite couple!" Finn's voice cuts through the crowd before he does, all grin and mischief and that sleeveless shirt. "Looking good, Gremlin."
I do a little spin, letting the dress flare out. No hesitation. No second-guessing. "I know, right?"
"Holt, you're punching above your weight."
"I know," Holt says, and his fingers tighten on my waist, tugging me closer.
I laugh and hook my arm through Finn's. "Come on, let's get food. I'm starving."
"When aren't you starving?"
"When I'm eating."
We wind through the festival, the three of us, and everything about this feels natural. Right. Finn steering us toward the taco truck, Holt's hand never leaving me, and I belong here. Not visiting. Not temporary. Here.
We get street tacos—too many, probably—and find a spot near the bandstand where the music's not quite loud enough to drown out conversation. I bite into carnitas and practically moan.
"Jesus, Scout," Finn says around his own mouthful. "You're gonna make people think we don't feed you."
"You don't feed me. I feed myself. There's a difference." I swipe at the juice running down my chin. "These are so good."
Holt's watching me with this look on his face, soft and a little amused, and when I raise my eyebrows at him he just shakes his head and takes another bite of his taco.
I look around at the festival—the lights, the laughter, the families and couples and groups of friends all tangled together in the warm night air.
The band's playing something upbeat and a little off-key, and someone's kid is spinning in circles until they fall down dizzy, and the smell of food and beer and desert night wraps around everything.
A couple walks past, the woman in a white dress that catches the string lights, and the guy's holding her hand like he's afraid she'll disappear.
Newlyweds, maybe. Or just in love. And I'm watching them when it hits—Evan never came back.
Never showed up demanding I come home or making a scene.
Just disappeared, like I always suspected he would when faced with anything real.
My parents called for a while after that.
Pleading, then angry, then disappointed.
The holy trinity of parental manipulation.
I blocked them months ago, and it hurt—still hurts sometimes, that empty space where they should be but aren't.
But then Finn steals the last taco from Holt's plate and Holt just shakes his head, resigned, and Maeve waves from across the square, and Holt's fingers are still splayed on my back.
This is my family. Better. Real.
"You know what's weird?" I say.
"What?" Holt's voice is low, just for me.
"I can't remember the last time I thought about running."
Finn freezes mid-chew, then swallows hard. "That's because you're not a flight risk anymore. You're stuck with us."
"Good." I mean it with everything in me. "I like being stuck."
Holt squeezes my hand where it's resting on my thigh, and I squeeze back, feeling the rough calluses against my palm. His hands. Hands I know as well as my own now. Hands that fix engines and hold me steady and make me come undone.
"Come with me," Holt says, low against my hair.
I tilt my head to look at him. "Where?"
"You'll see."
He stands, pulling me up with him, and his hand finds mine like it always does. Finn raises his eyebrows but doesn't comment, just grins and waves us off with his beer bottle.
"We'll be back," I call over my shoulder.
"Take your time!" Finn hollers. "But not too much time! You're missing the band!"
Holt leads me through the crowd, past the food trucks and the families and the groups of teenagers clustered around the edges.
Past the last string of lights and into the quieter space at the edge of town, where the festival sounds fade to something distant and the desert opens up around us.
My pulse is pounding and I don't know why.
We walk in silence for a minute, his hand warm and steady in mine, until we reach the overlook—the one that looks out over the whole valley, where you can see the lights of Coyote Bend spread out below.
"What are we doing?" I ask, and my voice comes out softer than I meant it to.
"I want to show you something."
But he's not looking at the view. He's looking at me, and his jaw goes tight. Nervous. Holt Ward is nervous.
"It's beautiful," I say, trying to fill the silence because that's what I do, that's who I am. "The moon's so bright—"
"Scout."
I stop talking. Look at him. He's backlit by moonlight and the distant glow of the festival.
"Holt?" My voice is barely a whisper. "You okay?"
"I'm good." He takes a breath. "Just—I need to say something."
Oh god. My heart's trying to punch through my ribs. "Okay."
"I'm not good with words. You know that."
"I know." I squeeze his hand. "You don't have to—"
"But I know what I want." His ocean-blue eyes lock on mine, steady and sure despite the nerves I can see threading through him. "And I want this. Every day. You, me, Finn being an idiot. The shop. This town. All of it."
I can't breathe. I know what's happening. I know, and my eyes are already stinging.
"I want to wake up next to you for the rest of my life." His voice drops, goes rough. "I want to fight about where to put tools and eat takeout on the couch and fix engines until we're old and gray. I want you to talk my ear off every morning and fall asleep on me every night. I want—"
He stops. Reaches into his pocket. Pulls out a ring.
Simple. Not flashy. Just a silver band with a small stone that catches the moonlight, and it's so him, so us, that I start crying before he can finish.
"Scout Adler." He says my name careful, deliberate. "Will you marry me?"
"Yes." The word bursts out of me. "God, yes. Yes."
He slides the ring onto my finger and it fits, and I throw my arms around his neck and kiss him hard enough that we both stumble. He catches me—of course he catches me—and his arms band around my waist and I'm laughing and crying and I can't tell which is which.
When I pull back we're both grinning, and I look at the ring, then at him, then at the ring again because I can't quite believe it's real.
"I love you so much," I say, and my voice cracks on the words.
"I love you too."
"Eight months ago I was running." I wipe at my eyes with my free hand, the one that's not wearing his ring. "And now—"
"Now you're staying."
"Yeah." I kiss him again, softer this time. Sealing it. "I'm staying. Forever."
"Forever."