EPILOGUE
EVERETT
ONE YEAR LATER
The Mountain Bloom Festival is in full swing when I find her.
Rowan's standing at the wildflower booth, talking to Mrs. Patterson about native plant restoration. She's wearing a sundress I've never seen before, her hair loose around her shoulders. Her hiking boots are scuffed now, broken in from a year of weekend treks through my timber stands.
Our timber stands. She corrects me every time I say it wrong.
"There he is." Mama appears at my elbow, a basket of her famous blueberry muffins hooked over one arm. "You gonna stand there staring all day or you gonna do something about it?"
"Working up to it."
"Work faster. I want grandchildren before I'm too old to spoil them."
I shoot her a look. She grins, unrepentant, and wanders off to harass some other poor soul.
The ring box is burning a hole in my pocket. I've been carrying it for three weeks, waiting for the right moment. There were a dozen opportunities. Coffee on the porch at sunrise. The overlook where I first showed her the valley. The exact spot in the timber stand where I pressed her against a tree and changed both our lives.
But none of them felt right. None of them captured what she means to me.
Rowan spots me and waves. Her smile lights up her whole face. That smile still knocks the breath out of me, even after a year of waking up to it every morning.
"Hey, stranger." She links her arm through mine when I reach her. "Mrs. Patterson was just telling me about the invasive species problem on the south ridge."
"Was she."
"I told her I'd take a look next week. Maybe we can work it into the management plan."
"We."
She raises an eyebrow. "You got a problem with that?"
"No, ma'am."
The truth is, I don't have a problem with anything anymore. Rowan transferred to the Reno office eight months ago. She drives forty-five minutes each way, three days a week. The other two days she works from the cabin, her laptop set up at my kitchen table, surrounded by the same paperwork that used to terrify me.
The county renewed Cole Timber's operating license last month. Ten-year certification, the longest they offer. Rowan wasn't involved in the decision, obviously. But she helped me organize the records so thoroughly that the review board didn't have a single question.
We make a good team. In the woods. In the office. In bed.
Especially in bed.
I pull her away from the booth, away from the crowd, toward the gazebo at the edge of the festival grounds. The gazebo I renovated with lumber from my own land. The gazebo where my parents got married forty years ago.
"Ev." She laughs as I tug her up the steps. "What are you doing?"
"Something I should've done months ago."
I turn to face her. The late afternoon sun catches the gold in her hazel eyes. She's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, and I still can't believe she chose me.
"Rowan Cafferty." I pull the ring box from my pocket. Her breath catches. "A year ago, you showed up at my operation with a clipboard and a bad attitude."
"I did not have a bad attitude."
"You called me a problem to be solved."
