13. Epilogue
Epilogue
Rory
Six months with Bram Stryge, and I’m still ridiculously in love with him.
The last box out of my old apartment is labeled MISC: SURRENDER, because I ran out of patience with packing three boxes ago.
Bram carries it up the porch steps one-handed.
I watch the easy way he handles a box I could barely drag across the floor.
He's spent the morning carrying my things without a word of complaint.
It’s fine. I complained enough for both of us.
After six months of bringing my things here a little at a time, I am officially moving in. My old lease is over, the keys are handed back, and everything I own now lives in a cedar-shingled Cape Cod at the end of a gravel lane, in a house built for gargoyle proportions.
Well, a nest, like he calls it. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to calling my home a nest, but I’m making efforts.
He walks the box through the front door cut wide enough for wings and sets it on the bench in the entry hall.
Most of the hooks above it are mounted at an altitude I will never reach without a stepladder or a boost. My yellow raincoat hangs from the lowest one, six inches above my head, because he installed a new hook last month at what he called "your scale”.
I don’t think I ever loved a piece of hardware more in my life.
The whole house smells like cedar and coffee and him, rain on warm stone.
I can see his enormous armless chair by the fieldstone fireplace, with my sofa beside it looking almost comically small.
When I first came here, there was so much space between things.
Now my throw pillows are piled in the big chair.
My plants fill the kitchen windowsill. There's a rainbow of my folders on the second shelf of his beautifully severe bookcase, filed between the atlases and the boxed primary sources.
It looks like a parrot moved into a monastery.
I still get a little thrill from seeing them there.
Bram looks from the box to me, and the scowl he wore while carrying it softens.
"That's the last of it," he says.
"That's it." I blow a curl out of my eyes. My hair has escaped its clip, and I have a smear of packing-tape adhesive on my forearm. "As of noon today, I am officially living here.”
He doesn't smile. His gaze moves past me into the living room, and he rests a hand on the box.
"You're sure about this house?”
"Bram." I scoff. “We talked about this a million times.”
"I could buy you a bigger one." He looks back at me. "Or build you one, closer to town. Whatever you want."
He means it. I only have to say yes, and he'll start asking what I want in a house, how many rooms, where I'd like the windows.
He'd leave the nest he built for himself if he thought I'd be happier somewhere else.
I look past him at my coat on its new hook and the pillows in his chair, and I can't imagine wanting to leave any of it.
I laugh, cross the hall, and put both hands flat on his chest, right over the place where his stone always warms first.
"Look at me. I’v already lived here for six months in everything but paperwork. I know where the good mugs are. My coat has its own dedicated child-height hook." His mouth twitches. I stroke my thumbs over his chest. "I don't want a bigger house. This house is perfect for me. Just like you."
Warmth blooms under my palms, spreading out from where I'm touching.
Even after six months, I love feeling it happen.
I press closer, tipping my head back so he can see how much I mean what I just said.
Somewhere in this town there are people who believe this man is cold to the touch. Sucks to be them.
His shoulders ease, and he covers both my hands with one of his. The band of raised stone around his finger presses warm against my knuckles. I rub a fingertip along the band, enjoying having him to myself now that the moving is done. Then I glance at my watch, and his hand stills over mine.
"That's the fourth time in an hour," he says.
"It is not."
"Fifth."
"Okay, wow, narc." I try to laugh it off, but it comes out a little too loud. "A woman can't have a healthy relationship with her own wrist?"
He gives me a look that suggests I might want to try that answer again. Before I can come up with a better one, he unfolds his wings.
They come around slow, both of them, a dark warm curve of slate closing off the hallway, the hooks, the boxes, until I can't see past him.
I step into the shelter of his wings and slide my arms around his waist. The membranes hold his warmth, and the tension I've been carrying all morning begins to ease. I close my eyes and lean into him.
My cheek finds his chest. I listen to the slow beat of his heart and let out a long breath. His hand settles against my back.
"Nervous about meeting my parents?" His voice is low and gentle.
His parents are somewhere on the road to Saltford Bay, with packed luggage and plans to have dinner with us tonight.
They've come to meet me, the human their son mated, and I want so badly for them to be glad he chose me.
I've been thinking about what to say all morning.
I can talk about work. I can tell them about my kids at school.
It's harder to imagine sitting across from them and letting them get to know me without trying to impress them.
What if I'm too loud? What if they take one look at me and wonder what their son could possibly see in me?
I curl my fingers into the back of his hoodie.
Bram wants me here. I know that. He's never once asked me to be quieter or tidier or earn the space I take up in his life, and I don't want to spend this afternoon worrying myself into a panic. But I'm still glad he asked.
"It's silly," I say into his sternum, with a small, embarrassed laugh. "But yes."
His wings draw a little closer around us. "They'll love you just as much as I do." He says it so simply that I lift my head. "You're my mate. To them that means you're family. Same as you're family to me. It's already done, Rory. They're not coming to decide anything. They're coming to meet you."
I look up at him. I hadn't thought of it that way. While I've been worrying about whether they'll like me, he's been looking forward to introducing me as part of his family. I can hear it in his voice, and I want to meet the people who raised him to be so sure of that.
"Okay," I say, and mean it. I rest my cheek against him again. For the first time all day, I don't feel the urge to check my watch.
He holds me another moment, then draws his wings back and folds them behind his shoulders. Daylight reaches us again, and he tips my chin up with a finger, his green eyes bright.
"Get your coat," he says. "We're celebrating. Pie at the Wandering Gnome before dinner."
"Sir, yes, sir." I'm already reaching for the yellow raincoat on my child-height hook. "Mathilda's going to make a whole thing of it."
“She better have French silk." He waits while I tug the coat free of the hook. Then, as I turn, he catches my hand, and the corner of his mouth does its slow climb. "I might even let you have the last slice."
I stop with my coat dangling from one hand. He knows exactly how to distract me, and judging by that smirk, he's enjoying himself. Good. I've spent six months getting him to smile at me, and I have every intention of keeping it up.
"I want it in writing," I say. “Notarized."
"Don't push it, brat."
I drop my coat over the box, grab two fistfuls of his hoodie and he bends to meet me.
The kiss is warm and slow, and I forget about pie for a moment.
His mouth moves gently over mine while his hand spreads across the whole of my back.
I press up on my toes, wanting another kiss before he's finished giving me this one.
He obliges, drawing me closer, and I smile against his mouth. We have all afternoon.
I break the kiss first. He stays close, his hand warm through my shirt, and I loosen my grip on his hoodie. I want to see his face when I say it.
"I love you, Coach Bram."
The green eyes go soft over the smirk, and his thumb strokes my back.
"And I love you, brat.”
THE END