I lift my head.
And for one suspended, blazing heartbeat, the whole world is ours.
EPILOGUE
PART II
Eight months later
Tuscany is breathtaking.
The sun is setting over rolling hills, washing everything in gold, and the villa behind us looks like it was built for a fairy tale. Stone walls, climbing roses, and enough candles to make Mama Draven declare the “frequencies ideal for union.”
This is our wedding day.
We waited because neither of us wanted a ceremony without our baby. And now Zane Draven Jr.—all chubby cheeks and soft curls—is asleep in his little crib at the edge of the courtyard, blissfully unaware that his parents are about to bind themselves together in front of everyone we love.
The band is here. Jude teary-eyed, King pretending not to be teary-eyed, and Bishop filming everything for the behind-the-scenes documentary Freddie swears is going to break the internet.
My mom is here. My uncle. My cousins.
Everyone from Oregon Zane personally flew out because “a fucking queen deserves her court.”
And of course…Mama Draven.
She circles us with a bowl of smoking sage, muttering incantations that make my family politely smile and Zane stand taller like he’s being knighted.
“Bless the union,” she whispers, flicking a bit of ash. “Bless the child. Bless the path. Bless the womb?—”
“Mama,” Zane hisses.
“What?” she cackles. “I’m manifesting.”
I choke on a laugh and grip Zane’s hand, and he squeezes back, firm, grounding, full of that love that still terrifies and steadies me in equal measure.
Then it’s time.
We stand beneath the arch dripping with white roses.
A string quartet plays the instrumental version ofHalo of Fire.
And as the crowd fades into soft murmurs, Zane looks at me like the whole world is kneeling.
He goes first.
“Ruby,” he says, voice low and rough, the way it gets when he’s about to ruin me in every possible way, “before you, I lived in black noise. I lived in shadows. I lived in a world that never matched the one inside my head. But then you let me carry you out out of that shitty coffee shop with your Coldplay playlists and your smart mouth and your refusal to let anyone—including me—tell you who the hell you were.”
A ripple of laughter rolls through our guests.
“You softened my rage,” he continues. “You steadied my mind. You gave me a hum that brought me home. And when you carried our son, you didn’t just change my life. You rebuilt it. So I vow to love you. To honor you. To listen—always listen—to you.To never make choices for your body or your mind. I vow to be your partner, not your shadow. And I vow to spend every day making you feel as wanted and adored as I did the moment you said you were staying.”
My eyes burn.
He touches my cheek, gentle as breath. “You’re my love. My peace. My fire. My home.”
I can barely breathe, then it’s my turn.
“Zane,” I begin, my voice trembling, “you came into my life like…well, like a man who breaks into a coffee shop and throws my phone out a window. And I should’ve run. Every instinct told me to run. But then you looked at me like I was something worth staying for, and I didn’t run. I stayed.”
