Epilogue #2
Rose felt it before she understood it. A change in Logan’s breathing. A soft, sudden tightening in the air between them. He looked at her then, and something in his eyes made her heart stumble so hard she nearly reached for the chair beside her.
“Logan?” she whispered.
For the first time since Rose had known him, he looked almost uncertain.
He released her mother’s hand gently and stepped back, his gaze moving from her to Lord Algernon, addressing them both with equal care.
“There is something,” he said.
Her father’s expression sharpened, her mother’s hand rose to her throat as Logan drew in one slow breath.
Rose could not move.
“I would ask fer yer blessing,” he said, his voice low, rough around the edges but steady. “Tae ask Rose tae marry me.”
Silence fell. It was not long, perhaps only a few heartbeats, but it felt endless.
Rose stared at him, unable to understand that the words had truly been spoken aloud. Logan stood before her parents, proud and still, yet his hand had tightened once at his side, betraying the strain beneath the calm.
Her parents looked at each other, and something moved between them.
Then Lord Algernon turned back to Logan. His voice, when it came, was weak but certain. “You have it.”
Rose’s breath left her.
Her mother smiled through tears. “Gladly.”
Logan went still.
Lady Algernon looked at Rose then, her expression softening into something that nearly broke her. “I could not have imagined a kinder man for you, my darling.”
Her father’s mouth curved faintly. “Nor a braver one, though I imagine he will be impossible to argue with.”
“He is,” Rose whispered, and a laugh caught wetly in her throat.
Logan turned toward her and the chamber seemed to disappear.
He crossed the distance slowly, like he was approaching something that frightened him. Rose’s hands trembled at her sides. She could not stop smiling. Happiness moved through her so fiercely that it felt almost like panic, bright and wild and impossible to contain.
Logan stopped before her.
“Rose,” he said.
Her name had never sounded like that.
He lowered himself to one knee.
A soft sound broke from her mother. Her father muttered something Rose could not hear, but it sounded suspiciously like a prayer.
Logan reached into his coat and drew out a ring.
It was simple—a delicate gold band set with a small pale stone that caught the firelight with a soft, clear gleam. It was the most beautiful ring she had ever seen, because it was held in his hand. He had chosen it for her.
Rose pressed both hands to her mouth.
Logan looked up at her, and beneath all the strength of him, she saw the naked tenderness he gave to almost no one. His voice, when it came, was rough.
“I dinnae have pretty words prepared,” he said.
Rose laughed through the tears that had already spilled onto her cheeks.
His mouth softened.
“I have spent me life thinking love made men careless,” he continued.
“Weak. Foolish. I thought a man could keep himself safe if he kept enough distance between his heart and everything that might break it.” His throat worked.
“Then ye came tae me hall and there hasnae been distance enough in all o’ Scotland tae keep me from ye since. ”
Rose’s hands trembled harder against her mouth.
“Ye made me home warmer,” he said quietly. “Ye made me silences less empty. Ye made me want a life that wasnae only duty and ghosts. And if ye choose me, Rose Algernon, I swear I will spend every day giving ye the freedom tae choose me again.”
Her tears fell freely now.
Logan held the ring up, his gaze never leaving hers.
“Will ye marry me, lass?”
For a heartbeat, Rose could not speak.
Every road and place seemed to gather inside her at once. Briar Hall. The tavern road. The river path. The chamber where he had given her berries. The chess table. The inn. The dungeon. The northern road where she had not looked back.
All of it had led here.
“Yes,” she breathed.
Logan’s eyes closed.
“Yes,” she said again, stronger now, laughing and crying all at once. “Yes, Logan. Of course I will marry you.”
He rose before the ring was fully on her finger, catching her against him as she all but threw herself into his arms. His laugh broke against her hair, low and shaken and more beautiful than any music.
Rose held him with no thought for who watched, no thought for dignity, no thought for anything except the feel of him alive and warm and hers.
Then he lifted her.
“Logan,” she gasped, half laughing as he spun her once, carefully enough not to startle her and yet with such open joy that even her father laughed from the bed.
Her mother was crying again. Christina had appeared in the doorway at some point, one hand pressed to her mouth, eyes shining. The servant who had brought Lady Algernon stood behind her, smiling so broadly she looked close to bursting.
Logan set Rose down but did not let her go.
The ring felt strange and perfect on her finger. Rose looked at it, then up at him.
“My mother is watching,” she whispered.
His eyes darkened with warmth. “Aye.”
“My father too.”
“Aye.”
“So you should probably kiss me very properly.”
A smile spread across Logan’s face then.
“Properly?” he murmured.
“As your future wife, I insist upon it.”
His hand lifted to her cheek, careful of the bruise that had nearly faded. “Then I wouldnae dare refuse.”
He kissed her there in the healing chamber, with her parents smiling through tears, with rain soft against the window, with the fire casting gold over the walls that had become shelter, home, beginning.
Rose gave in to it, smiling against his mouth, and for once there was nothing to run from. Only Logan’s arms around her. Her father’s laugh. Her mother’s tears.
And the bright, impossible future waiting for them.
But there’s more…
The danger has passed, but Rose and Logan’s story is far from over.