Epilogue
Quinn
One year later, and the light still caught me off guard.
It came into the kitchen differently now—softer, warmer, like the house itself had learned how to hold it.
I’d watch it spill across the stone counters we’d picked out together, pooling in the corners of the room we’d built from scratch.
Naomi had argued for the bigger windows.
I’d argued for the deeper sink. We’d both won, in the end.
It was ours.
I’d proposed with a diamond so big it looked ridiculous on her finger at first. She’d laughed, holding her hand up to the light like she couldn’t believe it was real. "It’s too much," she’d said. I’d kissed her knuckles and told her, "It’ll look right once the wedding band’s there." And it did.
We’d kept the wedding small—just the people who mattered. The week before, I’d given her the emerald earrings, and her reaction was exactly what I’d hoped for. She’d worn them on our wedding day like they were proof of something.
I’d sold the penthouse without a second thought. "I never lived there," I’d told the realtor, signing the papers. "I just kept my things there."
The money had gone into this house. Not the house she’d gotten from the divorce, we were renting that one out now. This was the house she’d met me in, the one with the shag carpet.
Except now, it was our dream house, with the reading nook she’d sketched on a napkin, the garden she’d wanted, the ridiculous deep soaking tub she’d been dreaming of since we first started talking about a home. It was everything she’d stopped believing she’d get to have.
And now it was real.
I stood in the kitchen, watching her through the window. She was in one of my shirts, her hair still messy from sleep, coffee warming her hands. The diamond on her finger caught the light and threw it across the ceiling in little moving pieces, like the house was winking at me.
I looked up and found her in the garden. And I had to pinch myself like I still couldn’t quite believe she’d be there when I checked.
She held up a rose, and raised her eyebrows. Coming?
I grinned, setting down my coffee to go to her.
I’d spent years standing at the edges of her life, waiting for her to turn and see me. And then, one night, she had. She’d decided to be petty, just that once, and fake-date me so she wouldn’t have to go to a wedding alone. Best decision she’d ever made.
Now, she stood in my yard, barefoot in the grass, and holding out the rose like an offering.
The rest of my life was standing right there in front of me.
And for once, I didn’t keep it waiting.
THE END