Epilogue
Tabitha
Six months later
“Hey, you.” Tim joined me, running off the rugby field, pouring with sweat after a big game. Funnily enough, he was the last one, which wasn’t like him. He stood over the top of me, hands on hips, shifting his weight from foot to foot, slanting his face this way and that.
“Hello.” I blushed. I’d never stopped feeling that new-girlfriend shyness when he came off the field, even though the last six months had been wild. Sometimes it felt like we’d lived a couple of lifetimes together.
Tim’s grand gesture had attracted much media and public attention, sparking debates on how women were treated onscreen and in online comment sections, followed by rueful commentary that it took a man’s gesture, albeit a lovely one, to bring attention to the unfairness.
Criticism mounted over the production company’s slant on the show and opinions they’d allowed to be posted.
The show was reedited to reflect our bickering but without portraying me as the villain, and the snarky opinions were deleted.
And we’d won the prize money!
I’d like to think it was because the house had turned out so beautifully, but I suspected it was because the controversy boosted viewing numbers.
In the end, it was Mum and Dad who emerged as stars of the show—which Simon said he’d always predicted—and they’d gone straight into filming a series focused solely on the “Amor Inn,” as Dad had dubbed it in his Latin.
The production company handled all the admin for the inn, so the cleaning and cooking were always done, despite Mum and Dad’s constant muck-ups, which turned out to be essential for high ratings.
And I was getting paid back for the financial investment, which was a relief.
In my little corner of the world, my new show had a small but loyal following.
Tim, however, had vowed never to step in front of a camera again. His mother had settled in at the local memory care home, where the staff were wonderful, and Tim and I saw her often. Unfortunately, we had to stop bringing her to big games like this, as crowds now confused and upset her.
Tim tugged on my coat pocket. “I was watching you during the game.”
I poked his chest. “You must not have been concentrating very hard on the game, then.”
He gave a little smile. “What did you think?”
Inside, I melted a little because he’d never lost that desire to impress me.
“I must have missed it. I was too busy studying the architecture of—” I looked around “—rugby stands.”
His lips quirked.
“Yes, that didn’t really come off,” I admitted.
I moved closer toward him and brushed my knuckles against his.
His hair was plastered to his head, and his damp shorts and shirt clung to his body.
It was so cold, the steam from his skin and his breath were visible in the air.
I loved seeing him like this, and it was all I could do not to climb him, wrap my arms and legs around him, and smother his face with kisses.
He lifted the bottom of his rugby shirt and wiped his eyes, giving me a glimpse of his deeply cut abs. I also loved that. He gave a sly wink—he knew.
“Coming for a drink at the clubrooms?” Amy asked as she and Fitzy walked by. I noticed she quickly handed Tim something.
Then Amy and Fitzy stopped and turned toward us. The movement made me glance at them, and they were both beaming, with phones raised. Behind them, huge images of Tim and me flashed up on the scoreboard.
Tim dropped to one knee.
I gasped, and my stomach flipped. Was this really happening? We’d talked about our future, but this was so soon. The remaining lingering crowd oohed, and his teammates gathered round, steaming and sweating.
My hand flew to my chest.
“Tabitha Balfour, my sister says I’ve been half in love with you all my life, but I disagree with her.
” Beside us, Amy groaned. “I was always all the way there. A goner, crushed by the scrum, flat on the turf, in love with you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, have babies with you, look after you, love you”—he grinned—“and yeah, fight with you.” He held out a blue box with an aquamarine stone in a 1920s setting. “Will you marry me?”
A gasp went up from the players and the spectators who lingered.
My chest was tight, my throat constricted with love and excitement and surprise.
Silence fell.
I swallowed and gulped for air, trying to get the words out. Tim was starting to look a bit worried.
“Yes, I will marry you,” I gasped out. “Of course I will.”
Tim’s face split into a relieved grin, and a roar went up from the crowd. Like the day he’d won me back, I loved that he wanted to put his feelings for me out into the world, wholly vulnerable.
He pulled me up closer to him and gave me the deepest, sweetest, most wonderful kiss that tasted like salt and heat and forever.
More hoots and whistles ensued.
“I’m getting my sweat all over you,” he murmured against my lips. “I may not have thought this proposal through. Some things never change.”
“That’s okay,” I said. “I like you sweaty. And I have this dressing gown I stole from someone to change into.”
Standing on my toes, I wrapped my hands around his neck, gazed into his eyes, and pressed my lips to his. I wrapped my coat around him, though it barely came to his back, and kissed him, hardly registering the people who brushed past us, chuckling, calling out congratulations.
“Let’s drive down to the water hole,” he said. “So I can kiss you in my truck without an audience.”
Even though we now lived in his house—which turned out to have roses out front just like my dream cottage—sometimes we loved to revisit those first days when we had nowhere else to go but the truck.
“Sounds like a plan, my man.”
He burst out laughing at yet another of my dorky phrases.
“Never change, okay?” His face sobered. Tenderly, he tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “Promise?”
“Promise,” I said.
“And I’ll keep trying not to make these plans that don’t work out, where I get my sweat all over you.”
I grabbed the back of his drenched head, moved against the contours of his chest, and pressed his salty, wet lips to mine. “Oh, this plan is working out,” I whispered. “Don’t worry about that.”