Epilogue
CLEMENTINE
One Year Later
I’m standing near Old Angus’s annual bonfire with a small box tucked into my jacket pocket, wondering whether what I’m about to do is a very good idea or a very bad one.
Around me, all of Glenfield has gathered for the completely invented Viking-Scottish tradition that Old Angus brought back from the Shetlands ages ago and has imposed on the village ever since with the authority of a retired general.
The pyre is already built on the hill, an absurdly oversized pyramid of wood that probably contains enough timber to heat the entire village through winter. But where would the fun be in such a practical approach?
The entire McGregor family is here.
Maggie reigns beside the towering stack of wood like a Scottish queen overseeing her kingdom, wrapped in a tartan blanket bearing the clan colors.
Isobel and Alistair are talking with Keira, who appears to be telling them a story involving Ragnar and the distillery, which can’t possibly lead anywhere good.
Mary and Finn arrived hand in hand, something that still makes a few villagers do a double take because Glenfield has a very long memory when it comes to gossip.
Connor is chasing after Charlie, who’s trying to get closer to the bonfire with all the determination of an almost two-year-old who has decided that adult rules simply don’t apply to him.
Cameron is somewhere in the crowd helping Ewan set up the food tables, and I’m taking advantage of this rare moment of solitude to check that the box is still in my pocket and that I haven’t somehow lost the small object inside it.
“Clementine!”
I turn to find Moira approaching with her eternal smile and a bottle of what appears to be her homemade whisky, produced under circumstances that are, at best, legally questionable.
“Good evening, Moira,” I say, accepting the glass she presses into my hand without ceremony.
“So how’s that cookbook coming along?” she asks, leaning toward me as though she’s about to receive state secrets.
I can’t help smiling.
Moira has asked me that exact question once a week for the last six months, but I suppose it’s better that she’s interested in my cookbook than in a potential wedding.
Or a baby.
“It comes out in the spring. The publisher just sent me the final cover design.”
Moira lets out a shriek loud enough to make at least fifteen people turn around.
“I knew it! I knew there was something special about you! The very first day you arrived in the village looking like a lost Parisian in that yellow jacket, I said to myself, That girl is going to write a book.”
I have absolutely no memory of Moira ever saying such a thing, but I’m not about to argue with someone who is now hugging me with the enthusiasm of a football fan whose team has just scored a winning goal.
“And it’s thanks to you,” I tell her when she finally releases me. “If you hadn’t insisted that I try all your recipes, I never would’ve come up with the structure for the book.”
“See?” Moira exclaims, smacking my shoulder. “I contribute to culture! Wait until I tell Duncan. He’ll be green with envy because all he contributes is beer consumption.”
She marches off to share this information with someone else, probably while dramatically exaggerating her role in the creative process.
I don’t mind.
I’ve learned not to worry about Glenfield’s exaggerations.
Now I simply consider them part of the village’s charm.
“Clementine!”
This time it’s Ailsa, and my heart gives a little jump because my friend is six months pregnant now and practically glowing with happiness—which is both beautiful and slightly irritating when I’m trying to keep my own secret for just a little while longer.
“How are you doing?” she asks, one hand resting protectively on her rounded stomach.
“Good. Really good. And you? The baby?”
“He kicks like he’s trying to get out in time for the bonfire. I explained that he has three more months to wait, but he doesn’t seem particularly receptive to rational arguments.”
I laugh because Ailsa attempting to reason with a fetus is exactly the sort of absurdity I love about this village.
“Are you nervous?” she asks, giving me the look she reserves for moments when she’s reading me like an open book.
“Nervous about what?”
“What you’re about to do.”
I stare at her.
“How do you know that—”
“Please, Clem. I know you well enough to recognize your major life event face. And that’s exactly the face you have right now.”
I sigh.
Having a best friend who knows you this well is both a blessing and a curse.
“Do you think it’s a good idea?”
“Honestly? I think it’s perfect. This village loves public announcements. Besides, it’s fitting. You two started your story here in front of everyone with that ridiculous fake plan. It makes sense that you’d continue it the same way.”
“Except this time it’s real.”
“Exactly,” Ailsa says, squeezing my arm. “That’s why it’s perfect.”
Ewan arrives carrying beers that he distributes around the group, and he gives me a wink that instantly tells me he knows what’s about to happen.
Which means Cameron probably told him.
Which means the whole village will know soon enough because secrets in Glenfield have a lifespan of approximately fifteen minutes.
Old Angus claps his hands for attention.
It takes nearly three minutes to achieve because Glenfield has never been a model of collective discipline.
“Before we light the fire,” he announces with the solemnity of a man about to recite sacred scripture, “does anyone have anything they’d like to say?”
“Speak now or forever hold your peace,” Ailsa mutters beside me, and I bite my lip to keep from laughing.
Then I realize, with growing horror, that everyone is looking at me.
Everyone knows exactly what’s about to happen.
They’re simply waiting for me to get on with it.
Cameron appears beside me and gives me a questioning look.
I step into the center of the circle formed by the villagers around the pyre and pull the small box from my pocket.
“Cameron and I have made a decision,” I begin, my voice trembling slightly before growing steadier with every word. “Fraser Manor is going to remain in the Fraser family. But we want it to serve a purpose bigger than ourselves.”
I open the box and remove a key.
Not the old rusted key that belonged to Brodie and Mairenn.
A new key.
Freshly cut.
Bright and shining.
A symbol of a new beginning.
“We’re going to turn the west wing of the manor into a guesthouse. So other people can experience what we found there. So they can find their place. Build something of their own.”
Silence hangs in the air for exactly two seconds.
Then the village erupts.
Applause.
Cheers.
Exclamations ranging from “Bravo!” to “I told you that was a good idea!” from people who never said any such thing.
Maggie approaches with a smile that contains all the satisfaction of a strategist watching a plan unfold exactly as intended.
“You’ve done what no one managed in a hundred years,” she says, resting a hand on my shoulder. “You brought the manor back to life. And now you’re going to let other people do the same.”
“It was in Brodie’s will,” I say, turning toward Cameron. “‘So others may build what we built here.’ It took us a long time to understand what he really meant.”
Cameron slips an arm around my shoulders and draws me against him while Maggie wanders off to speak with Jane and Callum.
“You could’ve warned me you were going to announce it to the entire village,” he murmurs into my ear, amusement threading through his voice.
“Where would the fun be in that?”
“You’re becoming dangerously Scottish, Clementine McGregor.”
“Fraser-McGregor,” I correct automatically. “We agreed on Fraser-McGregor.”
“Fraser-McGregor,” he repeats, kissing the top of my head. “My apologies.”
People immediately begin crowding around us with questions.
When will the guesthouse open?
How many rooms?
Will dogs be allowed?
Will Hamish be included in the package, or will guests have to pay extra?
That last question comes from Connor, who has finally captured Charlie and is now holding firmly onto his hand to prevent another escape attempt toward the bonfire.
“Hamish isn’t for sale,” Cameron says gravely. “He’s a permanent resident of the manor with all rights and privileges attached. Along with his wife and children, naturally.”
“Then maybe that should go in the brochure,” Keira suggests. “‘Opportunity to meet a historic sheep.’ Tourists love that kind of thing.”
“We are not marketing Hamish as a tourist attraction,” I protest.
“Of course not,” Maggie says with a mysterious smile. “Hamish markets himself perfectly well.”
Old Angus chooses that moment to decide the announcements are over and it’s time to move on to serious matters.
Namely, setting an enormous wooden structure on fire for reasons that remain unclear even after forty years of tradition.
Carrying a torch lit with all the solemnity of someone passing down sacred fire from an ancient civilization, he approaches the pyre and delivers his annual proclamation with the gravity of a Greek oracle.
“Bonfires have existed ever since men got cold and wanted their neighbors to know about it.”
Then he lowers the torch.
The flames explode upward instantly.
Cameron takes my hand, and together we stand watching the fire climb toward the Scottish sky.
“Are you happy?” he asks softly.
“Yes. Are you?”
“Terrified,” he admits. “We’re turning the manor into a guesthouse. We’re inviting strangers into our home. We’ll have reservations to manage. Maintenance. Online reviews...”
“You’re afraid of online reviews now?”
“I’m afraid of anything that involves sharing part of our life with the outside world after what happened last year.”
I squeeze his hand.
“It’s different this time. We control what we share. We decide the boundaries. And we’re not sharing our private life. We’re sharing a place. Our private life stays private.”
He turns to look at me with that intensity that still melts me after a year.
“I love you,” he says simply.
“I love you too.”
Moira passes by with her homemade whisky and generously tops off our glasses before wandering away while humming something that vaguely resembles a traditional Scottish song, though it’s probably entirely her own invention.
The fire crackles higher.
The villagers begin singing.
First a few scattered voices.
Then more.
Until the entire village joins together in an old song I didn’t know a year ago but am slowly learning because Glenfield has a way of absorbing you before you even realize it.
Ewan joins us.
“So,” he says with the crooked grin he saves for moments when he’s particularly pleased with himself, “a guesthouse, huh? Good idea.”
“You already knew,” I say suspiciously. “Cameron told you.”
“Maybe. But it’s nice hearing it officially.”
He raises his glass.
“To my cousin, who finally figured out she was home.”
The three of us clink glasses together.
And I realize he’s right.
I am home.
Not in Paris, where I spent most of my life.
Not in the apartment that felt tiny and depressing when I went back to collect my things.
But here.
In Glenfield.
In this Scottish village where everyone knows everyone else and sheep wander into manor houses in the middle of the night.
The evening continues.
People laugh.
Sing.
Drink homemade whisky.
Charlie falls asleep in Maggie’s arms while she rocks him gently and hums under her breath.
Ailsa talks with Jane about pregnancy and babies and all the things I still don’t entirely understand but find less frightening than I once did.
And somewhere in the crowd, I spot Hamish.
Watching us.
Wearing that unmistakable expression of sheepish satisfaction he does so well.
He’s been here since the beginning.
He was there the day I arrived.
There during the chaotic fake plan.
There when everything fell apart.
There when we found our way back to each other.
And now he’s here to watch what comes next.
Cameron follows my gaze and smiles.
“He’s happy,” he says.
“How do you know?”
“I don’t. I can just feel it. He’s seen what he wanted to see.”
“And what’s that?”
“That the manor is alive again. That the story continues. That Brodie and Mairenn would be proud.”
Tears rise unexpectedly in my eyes because Cameron is right, and I hadn’t realized how much that mattered to me until this moment.
We stand there hand in hand, watching the flames consume the pyre while the village sings around us.
And for the first time in a very long time, I’m not thinking about tomorrow.
I’m not planning.
I’m not controlling anything.
I’m simply here.
In the present moment.
With the man I love.
And the village that became my family.
Old Angus wanders over carrying his personal bottle.
“You’re going to do good work with that guesthouse,” he declares with the certainty of a man who believes he knows the future. “People need places like Fraser Manor. Places with history that aren’t trapped by it. Places that keep living.”
He raises his bottle.
“To Brodie and Mairenn, who built something that lasted. And to the two of you, who are about to do the same.”
We toast with him before he wanders off to bother someone else, most likely Moira, who will lecture him about his whisky consumption before immediately pouring him another glass.
Gradually, the villagers begin making their way back down toward Glenfield in small groups, surrounded by conversation and the lingering scent of smoke.
Cameron and I walk down with them hand in hand.
And I know that next year we’ll still be here.
And the year after that.
And every year after.
Because this is where we chose to build our life.
And somewhere behind us, Hamish follows quietly through the Scottish night.
The silent guardian of Fraser Manor.
And of everyone who chooses to stay.