Epilogue
Eighteen months later, London
‘Brodie, this is so beautiful.’ I walked out ahead of him, into the garden that had been planted on the rooftop of the new HQ of Safe Refuge. It had been designed and planted by Skye’s husband, Jack. He’d also done an amazing job on the land at the back of the building.
Skye and I had become good friends, almost on sight. And Jack and Brodie had a bromance going on that we liked to tease them about mercilessly.
And, it turned out in these weird ways of the world that Skye knew Lucy, my sister-in-law.
Lucy had worked on several events at Montgomery House.
So now we had an extended connected family, from London to Edinburgh and Dublin.
And New York, where Skye’s best friend lived and where Jack’s family lived.
Sometimes, when we were all together I looked around me and felt like I was teetering on the edge of a precipice, terrified at the amount of love flowing all around us.
Terrified it might somehow disappear. Like the way Cal had disappeared.
But Brodie always caught me in that moment and grounded me.
I walked along a path now bordered by allium and grasses. There were trees. And different levels. I came to a stop. There was a gazebo, set amongst young saplings. It looked vaguely familiar.
Brodie took my hand and I looked up at him. ‘Is that..?’
He said nothing, just smiled enigmatically and tugged me along with him. I gasped when we got to it.
‘This is the same gazebo...isn’t it?’ The gazebo from that weekend in the country.
Brodie said, ‘I had a job explaining to Gordon why I wanted it but eventually he sold it to me.’
There had been no hard feelings between Brodie and his old company and sometimes they even collaborated on big projects. But everything he did now was with a view to enhancing the community around it. Not in isolation.
I went up the steps ahead of him and almost tripped over my own feet when I saw the profusion of flowers covering almost every surface.
Petals on the floor. And the seat along the inner wall.
I remembered how desperate I’d been for him that night and how much I’d been trying to protect myself from getting hurt. Ha!
I turned to face him. He stood in the entrance, looking at me with those blue eyes that never failed to take my breath away.
‘Brodie..?’
He met me in the middle of the space. I realised he looked nervous. And then he got down on one knee and took my hands. I could feel his shaking. I could recognise what was happening here but I was also afraid to really believe...
He looked up at me. ‘I did always plan to bring you back to the Shard to do this...but somehow, I felt that I wanted to do this in the place where my life changed course for the better. Forever.’
He shook his head, ‘That night...that weekend...I knew I couldn’t live without you, Jess. But really I think I’d known it since I saw you in that red dress.’
That dress. I still wore it sometimes and it never failed to have the desired effect.
Brodie let go of my hands and took something out of his jeans pocket.
A small velvet box. He opened it up to reveal a ring with a square yellow stone surrounded by white diamonds in a platinum setting.
It was unusual and stunning. My hands were over my mouth.
Now I was shaking as it hit me. This was really happening.
It wasn’t even something I’d consciously wanted.
I’d figured we were both reluctant after witnessing less than perfect marriages but I’d be lying if I said that seeing everyone around us married and happy hadn’t made me yearn a little. ..
Brodie said, ‘Jessica Ross, will you please do me the honour of marrying me and letting me show you how much I love you, forever?’
I nodded and suddenly I was crying and half laughing and breathing so hard I felt faint.
Brodie was putting the ring on my finger and I was down at his level wrapping my arms around his neck and we were falling onto a bed of soft silken petals and kissing and kissing until we couldn’t breathe and had to come up for air.
We just lay there for a long moment and looked at each other, grinning, limbs tangled. I touched his face, and his scar, reverently. He moved his head and pressed a kiss to my palm.
‘I love you, Brodie Montgomery.’
‘I love you.’
‘Thank you,’ he said.
‘For what?’
‘For rescuing me.’
I shook my head, my eyes filling with tears. ‘No, you rescued me.’
‘You didn’t need rescuing.’
I nodded, ‘I did.’
He snorted. ‘You’re the woman who told me very clearly that she wanted me to go deeper.’
I gasped and blushed and mock hit him. ‘That’s the memory you think of? From that first night?’
He nodded and smiled and rolled onto his back and took me with him.
I spread my legs either side of him and he grabbed my ass.
He said, ‘As much as I’d like to reenact that moment right here and now, I have to inform you that we’re being filmed and that the minute we stand up, all of our nearests and dearests are going to jump out to surprise us. ’
I did notice a suspicious rustling sound just then and I smiled at Brodie. ‘No harm making them wait a little longer.’
So we kissed again, until we almost forgot, but then Tash, in her own irrepressible way was the one to say, ‘Ok, enough! This gazebo does not have actual walls you know and I think we’ve all seen more than we need to!’
We lifted our heads and everyone popped out of their hiding places around the gazebo. Skye and Jack. Lucy and my brother, Jamie. Julia, my boss, in tears. Brodie’s friends and fellow company owners.
And Tash, also in tears, and holding up a phone to capture this on camera.
I let Brodie pull me up and everyone crowded into the gazebo and there was champagne and corks being popped and glasses being passed around but just when I had that dizzying sensation of being on the edge of a precipice because there was so much love and happiness and maybe it couldn’t possibly be real – I felt arms come around my middle and I was pulled back against a strong chest.
I took a breath and believed in it. And us.
The End
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