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He got out, rounded the car, and opened the door for me. Together, we walked into Pasta Bella, hand in hand.
The only person I hadn’t thought about today, as nostalgia flooded me, was Kristen Rhys, the woman who orchestrated two of the worst days of my life. I knew we wouldn’t be bumping into her.
After she cornered me at school, Wolfe had finally picked up the phone and answered her. He helped her find a job in Alaska, then proceeded to make her sign a contract more restricting than a restraining order.
Rhys was not to return to the state of Illinois and seek us out. She gave him her word that she was done messing with our family.
“What are you thinking about?” my husband asked as he pushed the door to the restaurant open.
Buttery, liquid light enveloped us immediately, candles and red tablecloths and rich wood everywhere.
The place was packed, and among the bobbing heads and laughter, I found Angelo, his arm draped over the shoulder of a beautiful girl with long black hair and slanted eyes.
We walked toward them.
“I’m thinking about how happy you make me,” I said, frankly.
We stopped two feet from Angelo.
He turned around and smiled at me, happiness shining from his blue, ocean eyes.
“We made it,” I whispered. “Apart.”
“You look beautiful, Francesca Rossi.” Angelo pulled me by the collar for a slow, suffocating hug, whispering in my ear. “But not as beautiful as my future wife.”
WOLFE
SIX YEARS AFTER
I watched my wife from what used to be her bedroom window many, many years ago, my hand caressing the wooden box where Emmeline—it was her room now—kept all her seashells.
Francesca and I had agreed early into parenthood that we didn’t want to continue her family tradition of the notes. Too much pressure and confusion.
My eyes followed my wife as she said goodbye to her favorite vegetable garden that she had tended to for over a decade with Josh and Emmeline hugging each of her hips and little Christian in her arms.
Sterling was there, too, rubbing my wife’s shoulder with a smile.
Later on tonight, we were going to board a plane that would take us to DC. I was going to start serving my country the way I’d dreamed about since I was an orphan—as the president of the United States.
We had dreams to chase, a country to serve, and a lifetime to love each other more fiercely and strongly than we did the last year.
But as I looked down at her, I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that my decision to steal her under the starless Chicago sky ten years ago was the best choice I’d made.
I loved my country ferociously.
I loved my wife more.
FIN.
Bonus Epilogue
WOLFE
I was going to kill a man.
There were quite a few to choose from, and all of them deserved to have their neck cut, drained, and made into a vase for my flower-loving wife.
I could start with Prince Andreis of Heldrich, who had been eyeing Francesca for twenty minutes straight, like it was a staring competition she did not participate in.
