Epilogue #2
Reid had changed the name as a wedding present, put Montrose right there beside Halyard, so everyone would know this was ours equally. My name on the letterhead. My name on the building. My name on something, finally, after all those years of being invisible.
“It looks good,” Reid said, the day the new sign went up. “Halyard Montrose. Has a ring to it.”
“It does.”
“Though technically you’re a Navarro now.”
“I can be both.” I leaned against him. “Montrose is who I was. Navarro is who I’m becoming. I want both of them.”
He kissed my temple. “Then you’ll have both of them. You’ll have everything.”
Blair came over when Timmy was three months old. She brought gifts and champagne and a card signed by half of Newport society, people who’d ignored me, people who’d believed Stan’s lies, people who’d watched me almost drown in that ballroom of whispers.
Congratulations on your beautiful son. We’re so happy for you.
“Hypocrites,” I said, reading the signatures.
“Completely.” Blair poured us both a glass. “But useful hypocrites. You’ll need them eventually.”
“Will I?”
“You’re Blythe Navarro now. Co-founder of Halyard Montrose. Wife of the man who brought down Chadwick Shipping. Mother of the cutest baby in Newport.” She clinked her glass against mine. “You’re going to run this town, whether you want to or not.”
I thought about that. About what I wanted. About what I’d spent my whole life believing I couldn’t have.
“Maybe,” I said. “But not yet. Right now I just want to be a mom.”
“That’s valid.” Blair smiled. “For the record, you’re going to be amazing at that too.”
Delphine video-called from Paris that evening. She cooed over Timmy through the screen, made Reid hold him up at seventeen different angles, and declared him the most handsome baby she’d ever seen.
“He looks like Reid,” she said.
“Everyone says that.” I watched Timmy grab at Reid’s finger. “I don’t understand how, but they do.”
“It’s the expression.” Delphine laughed. “That serious little face. He’s going to be exactly like his father.”
His father.
Reid looked up at the words, and the look we traded held all of it, understanding, gratitude, a shared recognition of everything that phrase meant.
“Yeah,” I said softly. “He is.”
***
That night, after Delphine had signed off and Blair had gone home, Reid and I sat in the nursery with Timmy sleeping between us.
The room was quiet. The sailboat mobile turned slowly overhead. Through the window, I could see the harbor, the water that had almost killed me, now just a view.
“I never thought I’d have this,” Reid said quietly.
“Have what?”
“A family.” He looked at Timmy, at me. “A home. Something worth living for beyond revenge.” His voice cracked. “I spent so many years alone. Building that machine. Thinking that destruction was the only thing I was good for.”
“And now?”
“Now I know better.” He reached over and took my hand. “Now I know that building is better than destroying. That loving is better than hating. That this-” He gestured at the nursery, at our sleeping son. “This is what matters. This is what my father would have wanted for me.”
I squeezed his hand. “He got his wish, then.”
“I hope so.” Reid’s eyes were bright. “I really hope so.”
Timmy made a small sound in his sleep, a sigh, or maybe a dream. We both looked down at him, this tiny person who had changed everything.
“I love you,” I said. “Both of you. So much.”
“I love you too.” Reid pulled me closer, wrapping his arm around my shoulders. “More than I ever thought I could love anything.”
We sat there in the dim light of the nursery, our son sleeping peacefully between us. The boat in the harbor, the Timmy now, freshly renamed, rocked gently at its mooring. The dog snored in the hallway. The house was quiet and warm and full of everything I’d ever wanted.
I thought about the woman I’d been last summer. Standing on the deck of that yacht, reading congratulation messages addressed to someone else. Married to a man who’d never loved me. Believing I was broken. Believing I was worthless. Believing I was nothing.
That woman was gone.
I was Blythe Montrose Navarro. I had a husband who loved me, a son who needed me, a company with my name on it, a house that was mine. I had friends who’d stood by me and enemies who’d been brought low. I had a life I’d built with my own hands, from the ashes of the one that had burned.
I had everything.
Reid pressed his lips to my hair. “What are you thinking about?”
“The water,” I said. “How I almost drowned in it. And how you pulled me out.”
“I’d do it again.” His arm tightened around me. “Every time. Forever.”
“I know.” I smiled. “But you won’t have to. I can swim now.”
He laughed softly. “Yeah. You can.”
Timmy stirred, made a small sound, settled back into sleep. His tiny hand curled around Reid’s finger.
“This is it,” I said quietly. “Isn’t it? This is the life we were supposed to have.”
“This is the life we built.” Reid looked at me, his eyes full of love. “Together.”
I leaned my head against his shoulder and watched our son sleep, and I thought: Yes. This is it. This is everything.
Outside the window, the harbor lights glittered on the dark water.
And for the first time in my life, I wasn’t afraid of drowning.
THE END