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She scrunched up her face but his hand was reaching over the table, grabbing hers as though his life depended on it.

“You told me you loved me and I started talking about Marguerite and Cressida and using them as shields. Using them as excuses.”

Her eyes widened but she didn’t dare hope; she had to protect herself, even now.

“You told me you loved me and instead of being brave enough to admit I felt the same, I tried to cling to the goddamn rules we made up a lifetime ago.”

“It wasn’t that long.”

“Wasn’t it? I was a different person, and so were you. Tia, I don’t know if I even was a person until I met you. There is something about how you see me, how you understand me that fully unlocks the essence not only of what I am, but what I want to be. It scares the hell out of me too,” he promised. “Everything about you does. I’m scared to admit how much I love you, how much I need you in my life; I’m scared to tell you that creating a baby with you is everything I want—and something I want us to wait to do, because I’m selfish enough to know I want more time with you first. I’m scared of all of it, of the possibility that you might wake up one day and leave me, that you might realise I’m not worth loving. I’m scared of how I could cope with that—I don’t think I would, by the way. But most of all, above absolutely all else, I’m scared of living without you, because I know my life will never again feel complete. You woke me up, you made me see things in full colour, in brightness and beauty and I just⁠—”

The waiter appeared with a mineral water and started speaking in rapid French. Tia, though proficient, couldn’t shake her brain out of its love-stupor quickly enough to listen.

Hamish said something to the waiter; they were alone once more.

“It’s quite possible I fell in love with you that afternoon in the penthouse, when you were snappy at me for being rude to you; you were the most beautiful, scathing, intelligent, interesting, wonderful, fascinating woman I had ever met. Everything that came after that was because I knew, on some level, I wanted to keep you in my life. I just didn’t fully understand why until I realised that maybe I’d ruined it all for good. That maybe my behaviour had frightened you away.”

She closed her eyes, his fears a perfect mirror of her own. “Hamish,” she whispered, shaking her head slightly.

“I don’t need you to agree to stay married to me, or have a baby with me, or do anything more than think about what I’ve said. I love you, Tia. I’ve loved you as long as I’ve known you—and I always will.”

Her heart was no longer in her chest.

How could it be when it had beaten so hard against her ribs—with the force to break free?

“I’m not sure that’s good enough,” she said, fingers trembling as she pulled her hand from his and sipped her wine.

His face looked crestfallen.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” she demanded, her pulse racing.

“I know. I fucked it up, I told you.”

“No, you really didn’t. That’s not how love works. I love you, Hamish. I love you. I don’t want to think about it, I just want to be with you. Married, because why not? Everything we said at your family’s estate is true. We didn’t need a big wedding because we’ve always been focused on how to make a marriage work—the rest of our lives. We are a team. A partnership. Everything you said. We just happen to love each other, too. Is there a better kind of relationship?”

He stared at her, shaking his head. “Is this a dream?”

Her smile lifted. She leaned forward. “Maybe. But it’s our dream, and I’m pretty sure we’ve both earned it.”

And they had. Through hardship, hurt, and with perseverance, they’d built a future that was worthy of them with the person in the world they loved most, and could trust.

Waiting to fall pregnant made sense. While they didn’t take an official honeymoon, the next twelve months were spent in a perpetual state of newlywed bliss, traveling often, or staying home, but always together, always sharing, touching, exploring, loving. It was inevitable then, that by the time their first wedding anniversary came around, Tia had fallen pregnant.

They relented and allowed Eleanor to throw them an anniversary party, on the one very strict condition that no photographers for gossip magazines were allowed. Ewan came, but Cressida did not—their divorce was still pending but it was clear that the couple wasn’t going to make it. And while Tia continued to feel a degree of sympathy for the other woman, she was also a little glad to be spared the complexity of navigating that relationship at family events.

It also paved the way for the brothers to find a way to coexist. Not to become trusted friends right away, but at least to be in a room and make conversation without it turning into an argument.

Though Eleanor’s cancer spread, she fought it tooth and nail. To meet her first grandchild, and then to meet the twins who followed in due course. It was an excellent way to encourage her to keep fighting.

By the time she succumbed to her illness, she’d seen four children born to Tia and Hamish, and Ewan remarried to a single mother he’d met at a fancy restaurant—she’d been waitressing and had spilled a tray of drinks in his lap. She’d been so mortified, and he’d spent the rest of the night assuring her he was absolutely fine. He adopted her three children, and loved them as his own, and Eleanor adored them.

As for Roman and Kate, they were like family to Tia, and so of course, to Hamish, and baby Grace was their most treasured angel. In time, they added another daughter, and a son to their brood, and their children grew up almost as siblings, spending holidays and special occasions together, with Roman and Kate becoming unofficial members of the Ashcombe family.

And so, all was right in the world. Tia often reflected on the twists of life that had brought them here. Had Kate not been attacked, she may never have met Roman, and the man she thought of as a brother may never have fallen in love. Their love brought baby Grace into the world, and it was holding their darling daughter that had made Tia realise what she wanted in her own life. From that moment on, everything that was set in motion had brought her to the future a teenage Tia would never have dared dream of—but adult Tia didn’t once doubt she deserved.

THE END