Epilogue One #3
“I grew up believing every room was a game you could win if you were loud enough and fast enough. Logan asks why until your own logic collapses. He taught me to check my math. He taught me humility, which required several explanations and at least one diagram. He taught me that kindness doesn’t need an audience—that you can quietly fix something for a person and never invoice them for it, even emotionally. ”
His eyes find mine across the room. I raise one eyebrow. He inclines his head a fraction.
“I read rooms. Logan reads the world. For fifteen years, he has lent me his eyes whenever mine failed—look at both sides. Do it slow. Check twice. Then decide.
“This summer, when my life went off a cliff, he stood in my office and fought me for my own future. Then he stayed for the worst afternoon of it, because that is what Logan does.
“He stays.”
Dominic lifts his glass.
“Everyone says I gave Logan a family. Get it right one more time: the kid saved me first. He has been saving me for fifteen years. I just talk louder, so it looked like the other thing.”
Every glass rises.
“To Audrey—the only person who has ever out-calculated him. And to Logan Whitman. My first investor. My other brother. The best man I know, which makes it frankly ridiculous that I’m the one holding the title tonight.
“To the happy couple.”
“To the happy couple!” the boathouse roars.
Logan stands, crosses to my husband, and hugs him in front of everyone—both arms, no calibration, a real one.
“Your speech contained multiple exaggerations,” he says into Dominic’s shoulder, just loudly enough for the microphone to catch. “Withdraw none of them.”
Dominic throws his head back and laughs.
When the sun sets, the lawn fills up with everybody Logan and Audrey love, dancing in the gold.
Bennett and Layla, slow and easy, like their wedding never ended—for them I don’t think it did.
Caleb dips Serena until she threatens litigation and then he dips her farther.
David and Nora sway with Michaela standing on her father’s shoes.
Even Audrey’s burly brothers have brought dates and are dancing to celebrate their sister.
I stand at the edge of it and run the final audit of the season: every couple in this little family of ours started as a collision nobody planned—a wrong number, a scandal, a hand-block, a custody war, a drunken dare in Tokyo—and every single one of them ended up here, on this lawn, in this light, chosen on purpose.
The sheets balance. They always did. We just took the long way to the totals.
Warm arms come around me from behind, and a jaw settles against my temple, and I lean back into my husband without checking who it is, because I never have to check anymore.
“That was a beautiful speech,” I murmur. “I’m so proud of you for highlighting what a wonderful man Logan is on his special day.”
“Thankfully, I learn from my mistakes.” His hands press warm against my waist, and beyond us the light goes molten on the water, and the quartet slides into something slow.
He turns me around, holds out his hand, palm up the way he did that first time at Bennett and Layla’s wedding, the way he did at the gala, the way I hope he does when we’re ninety—and grins at me in that way that always makes my knees quake.
“Dance with me till the lights go out, Mrs. Pemberton-Cruz.”
I slide into his waiting arms. “At least until the cake is cut.”
He dips his face toward my neck, inhaling deeply as his lips brush against my pulse point. “Please tell me that’s happening very, very soon.”
“It is.” I loop my hands around his neck, laughing at his impatience—not that mine’s much better. “But I need to tell you something first.”
His eyebrows lift in question. “You look nervous. Do I need to be worried?”
I shake my head. “I don’t think so. At least, I hope not.”
“I’m listening.” His worried eyes search mine.
“I’ve been systematically swapping my champagne for sparkling apple cider all day,” I confess, keeping my voice low enough that it doesn’t carry over the string quartet.
Dominic’s swaying slows just a fraction. His thumbs, which had been drawing lazy, distracting circles on my lower back, pause. He tilts his head, his dark eyes scanning my face. “Why? Did the caterers mess up the vintage?”
“The vintage is perfect,” I say, my heart rate accelerating. “My biology, however, is currently demanding I cut back on certain things—like alcohol, caffeine . . . soft cheese.”
He goes completely still. For a man who thrives on motion and leverage, the absolute absence of movement is staggering. I watch the information process behind his eyes—the fake drinking, the slight exhaustion I’d blamed on wedding coordination, the sudden, uncharacteristic nerves I’m displaying.
“Jenna,” he breathes, his voice dropping into a register that bypasses my ears and reverberates directly in my chest. “Sweetheart.”
“I fully intended to wait until we were back at the house,” I tell him, the words tumbling out in a rush of unprecedented vulnerability.
“I wanted to do this whole bit to make it memorable. But keeping a secret from you for twelve consecutive hours is proving to be entirely too much. I simply can’t hold it in anymore. ”
His hands slide up to grip my waist, firm and grounding. “Are you saying . . .”
“I’m saying we are going to need to babyproof the factory,” I whisper, a watery smile breaking through. “I’m pregnant, Dominic.”
For a second, the billionaire who always has a snappy comeback is entirely speechless.
Then, a ragged, beautiful sound escapes his throat—a laugh that is half-disbelief and half-pure, unadulterated awe.
Before I can brace myself, his hands drop to my thighs and he lifts me straight off the grass, spinning me into the crisp October air.
“Dominic!” I gasp, gripping his broad shoulders as the fairy lights blur into streaks of gold.
“You’re pregnant,” he murmurs, burying his face in my neck as he slowly lets my feet touch the ground again. His breath is hot and shaky against my skin. “We’re having a baby. A kid, Jen. Our kid.”
“Yes,” I manage to say, threading my fingers into the thick hair at the nape of his neck. “Though I expect you to maintain absolute secrecy until the end of the first trimester. No telling Bennett, and absolutely no telling Logan until we know everything’s going to work out.”
He pulls back just enough to look at me, his eyes shining with an emotion so profound it knocks the breath right out of my lungs.
“I’ll sign whatever NDA you want, partner,” he murmurs, his thumbs gently sweeping across my cheekbones. “A baby. God, you’re going to be the most terrifying, magnificent mother in existence. The PTA won’t stand a chance.”
“I already have thoughts on their fundraising inefficiencies,” I admit, leaning my forehead against his.
He laughs again, kissing me with a reverence that makes the rest of the wedding fade into background noise. “Let’s go watch Logan and Audrey cut that cake,” he whispers against my mouth. “And then I’m taking my pregnant wife home so I can start heavily investing in your prenatal exercises.”
“That is the most romantic thing you’ve ever said to me.”
“I’m just getting started, Pemberton-Cruz.”