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“What about your girl?” I poked my fingertip into Callan’s side, laughing when I hit a ticklish spot.
“Tied for first,” he grumbled, tickling me back without remorse. “Now let’s get out of this murder shack before anyone else shows up and I have to kill them.”
Chapter 31
Rory
My father,Cormac, and Callan took care of Seamus, with some help from Dev and his crew, though they all knew better than to tell me any details. While I felt no remorse for whatever they did, I had always been squeamish about the specifics of their torture. All I cared about was that he was gone, that my newly found family and I were no longer in danger.
Shortly after taking care of Seamus, my father leaked the details of his arrangement with Alex and co. A couple enemies came out of the woodwork, but with Dev’s focus back on his job rather than keeping me safe, the danger never came close to home.
And that’s what this place, these people, had become. Dev’s home became mine. Books piled up in the corners, ponytail holders wrapped around banisters so they were always available to pull my hair into the ponytails Dev loved to wrap in his fist. Bex eventually gave my bed back, though we moved it to create a guest bedroom, keeping my old room as a home office.
Our friends also made their mark. Handmade vases filled with bouquets started popping up around the house, a new one each time Wren and Ames came to visit. Even with my life no longer in danger, they were still my friends, showing upunannounced to laze on the couch or with a handful of wedding magazines, ready to plan their own weddings.
“Bex hasn’t proposed yet,” Wren said one day as we flipped through wedding magazines alongside Ames. “But I don’t think it’ll take much prompting for her to do it.”
“How subtly are you planning to sway her?” I asked, keeping my voice low so Dev couldn’t overhear our conversation from the other room.
“Pretty subtle,” Wren mused, face serious even as Ames snorted her disbelief. “Maybe something like…Hey Dev!” She called, my husband popping his head around the corner of the kitchen, his signature grin on his face.
“Yeah, Wrennie?”
“Can you tell Bex that if she proposes by June, I can probably get our wedding together by next spring? I’m really on a deadline here if I want to get the right flowers.”
“Can do,” Dev said, saluting his best friend with a smile.
We laughed about it later in bed that night, my leg hiked around Dev’s hip, his fist tangled in my hair as he pecked kisses across my face.
“What do you think?” I asked. “When will Bex propose?”
“She bought the ring weeks ago. She said - and I quote - ‘When Wren wants me to propose, she’ll make it pretty obvious.’ Though I have a feeling she’ll make Wren sweat a little longer. The torture is kind of their thing.” He grinned as I laughed at his assessment. He did that more often, if that was possible. The smiling.
Now that my life wasn’t in danger, now that I’d stopped trying to deny what was between us, he frowned less often.
I was better for it, too. Less bitter, less insecure. I no longer wondered what would happen if Dev stopped needing our alliance. My life was safe, and he was still here. He’d integrated me into each aspect of his life, made his home ours, made hisfriends ours, gave me a life I’d only ever wished for in the most hidden parts of my mind.
But the wedding planning, watching our friends prepare to marry the loves of their lives, also had me wondering about Dev’s and my origin story.
“Do you ever wonder what would have happened if my father hadn’t insisted you prove your loyalty? If the idea of marriage had never come up?” I asked, tilting my face into the crook of his neck as I nuzzled closer.
“I didn’t realize it at first, but I had spent months preparing for you. Buying this house, telling my parents about you, it was all leading up to this.” Dev pulled back, tugging on my hair until my eyes were on his as he said, “There’s no universe, no situation, where I would’ve left that room not engaged to you. No world in which I wouldn’t be married to you.”
“In this life and every one after,” I whispered, the words from our vows holding more weight with his confession.
“In this life and every one after,” he promised.
Epilogue
Rory
Ames and Alexgot married in the fall, on one of the days where all the leaves had already turned yellow and orange and red, only barely hanging onto the trees. By the next weekend, they would all be on the ground, waiting to be raked up, but today, they were still holding on, providing the perfect backdrop.
They’d hired Fiona, Ames claiming she’d never trust anyone else to put together a wedding after working so closely with her for my own. And given months instead of weeks to put a wedding together? There was no comparison.
The giant oak tree in the center of the venue - an open field in the middle of the forest - was threaded through with dozens of strands of fairy lights, which hung down like garland from the branches of the tree.
Alex stood next to the tree, Dev and Bex standing behind him, the three of them in matching burgundy suits. Wren and I stood to their left, waiting along with the few dozen friends and family members Alex and Ames had invited, who sat in wooden chairs on either side of the aisle.
