Epilogue
MONA
It’s after eleven on Christmas Eve when I decide I better take a shower, shaving my legs for the first time in a week.
After the traditional candlelight service at church, we all dispersed to our individual rooms and suites.
This year the house is full because the guests include my family as well as Douglas’s.
Even Quince decided to join us and is sharing a room with Douglas’s two unmarried nieces.
I’m thrilled about having so many people we love gathered for the holidays, but it’s a lot.
A lot.
And I’m exhausted because just yesterday I completed a huge job organizing and managing an extended house party in one of the largest Green Valley mansions.
It was a real success, and I got paid more than I have for any single commission in my entire career.
But I came home to a house full of people and noise and activity.
If Douglas hadn’t banished everyone else from the library and insisted I take a nap after lunch, sprawled out on the couch with my head in his lap as he read, I would have collapsed hours ago.
But the nap revived me, and the Christmas Eve service was lovely and moving.
And so I decide a shower and shave is in order before bedtime.
When I’m done, I slather on lotion, brush my hair (still dry because I kept it out of the spray), and put on a new red, fur-trimmed chemise I bought special for the holiday.
I’m pleased with the effect as I admire myself in the mirror. My body is already anticipating what’s to come.
Which is why it’s a bit of a downer when I emerge from the bathroom to discover Douglas propped up in bed in his pajamas.
Reading.
Of course.
He doesn’t even look up from the pages as he says, “Come to bed, precious love of my life. You must be exhausted.”
“I’m not that tired.”
I stand still in the middle of the floor in my pretty, flirty Christmas outfit, but he still doesn’t glance up at me.
“What are you reading?” I ask, diverted when my eyes cut down to the book he’s holding. “Is that the Bible?”
“The passage from Isaiah he used tonight prompted a thought, so I’ve been reading it in context. There’s this stunning section of poetry visualizing the re-created world as a feast. It’s an astonishing, powerful picture of joy after long waiting.”
I blow out a resigned sigh. My sweet, brilliant man will never change. I walk toward the bed.
“I’m going to use it in my book,” Douglas goes on, still glued to his reading as he flips a page. “In the chapter on—”
He breaks off mid-sentence when I gently take the Bible from his hand and set it on his nightstand. “Maybe your book can wait until after Christmas.”
He smiles up at me, perfectly agreeable, until he finally processes my appearance.
His eyes move hungrily from my bare feet all the way up to my loose hair. His face flushes. His body tenses. He swallows visibly.
But all he says is, “Ah.”
I snort. “Very romantic. What happened to wooing me with poetry?”
“Give me a moment to catch up, sweetheart. I believed you’d be too tired tonight and we’d have to wait until tomorrow morning to embody our love with carnal relations.”
I spill over in giggles at his lofty choice of words, and I realize he chose them on purpose to make me laugh when I see the fond awe and pride in his expression as he watches me.
Part of him still believes himself to be a boring, stodgy man, and even after a year together, he takes great pleasure at being able to make me laugh.
Overflowing with affection, I climb into bed on his side. He helps me arrange myself so I’m straddling his hips.
“I’m not sure I’m really in bossy mode tonight,” I say as I start unbuttoning his pajama top.
“We can rearrange ourselves at any point. But maybe give me a few minutes to look at you like this before we do.” He is looking, staring up at me with heat and excitement and trust and love.
So much love.
I smile down at him, pulling off his top and dropping it over the side of the bed when he lifts up enough to get his arms out of the sleeves. “Okay. That sounds good to me.”
We kiss for a while. Then have fun caressing each other to arousal. By then I’m turned on enough to decide bossy mode is on the menu tonight after all. I ride him until I come. Then, with his erection still buried inside me, I hold myself still as he rubs my clit until I’m climaxing again.
Only then do we roll over so he’s on top. We kiss as he thrusts with a slowly accelerating rhythm.
I never experienced it before this past year with him. To know completely. To trust completely. To give and be given completely. To give shape to my heart’s truth with my body.
He’s murmuring thick assurances about how much he loves me, how much he needs me, how he wants to spend the rest of his days with me, how warm and strong and beautiful I am, how he’s still not recovered from the miracle that happened when my light broke into his life.
He comes hard, his body shaking through the spasms as he bites back his exclamation of release.
He’s never going to be a loud man, but there are other people in the house right now, so he’s quieter even than normal.
I’m grinning uninhibitedly up at the ceiling as I cling to him afterward. He presses little kisses against my jaw and neck as his body relaxes.
After a few minutes he lifts his head. “Merry Christmas, my dearest one. I love you beyond all telling.”
I glance at the clock. It’s after midnight now. “Merry Christmas. I love you too. And you do pretty well with the telling.”
* * *
We wake up early the next morning. Not because we have to but because we always do. No one else is awake yet as we go downstairs to get coffee.
Douglas isn’t going to run today.
We drink the first cup in the kitchen. Then we take our second cups to the library since we decorated it this year with lights, garland, and even its own tree.
As I walk over to turn on the tree lights, I notice something hanging on one of the boughs that’s not supposed to be there.
I know it’s not. I placed every single ornament on this particular tree.
I blink down at a small box, secured to a branch with a ribbon. “Wh—?” I turn my head when I realize Douglas has approached behind me.
He reaches around me to take the box. Then opens it to reveal a lovely antique ring.
I start shaking.
He kneels down on one knee in front of me, extending his hand with the ring. He opens his mouth. Closes it again.
I’m trembling now, so helplessly that my teeth are nearly chattering.
“I appear to be out of words for the first time in my life,” he says, his voice thick with emotion. “But will you marry me, Mona?”
I make the most extraordinary sound. Part sob, part laugh, and part snort. Then I fall down onto my knees in front of him and throw myself against his chest.
Somewhere in the midst of all that, I manage to tell him yes.