“Dane…” she whispered, voice frayed.
“Come,” I murmured. “There’s more.”
We rode the lift to the fourth floor—her floor.
The doors opened to her library.
Actual library.
Floor-to-ceiling shelves. Rolling ladders. A skylight carved open to the sky she’d always lifted her eyes toward when dreaming. A deep window seat piled with velvet cushions. A writing desk older than both of us by a century. Stacks of books waiting for their homes.
Penn pressed a hand to her mouth.
Her knees nearly buckled.
Carrie cried again.
“Jesus Christ,” she whispered. “Is there somewhere I can order a Dane? Do they come in two-packs? Do they come with assembly instructions? I’ll take three.”
Penn laughed through her tears and leaned fully into me.
I guided her forward, my hand over her heart.
“This is yours,” I said softly. “All of it. The building. The floors. The library. The rooftop. The offices.”
Penn shook her head. “No. No… Dane, I… I can’t—”
“Yes,” I whispered. “You can. You will. It was always meant to be yours.”
She sobbed.
Carrie sobbed louder.
Staff moved quietly around us, placing flowers, adjusting chairs, setting out leather-bound notebooks and fountain pens and little brass hourglasses. The smell of fresh bread drifted down the hall.
Penn turned slowly, taking in every corner.
“My dreams,” she whispered. “My… everything. You… you did all this?”
“For you,” I said simply. “For the life you were supposed to have before the world dimmed your light.”
She melted into me, shaking.
I held her.
Carrie looked around with furious envy and tender joy. “I hate you for this,” she told me. “And I love you for this. And I want one. Just one Dane. I know you don’t have a brother, but I’m asking anyway.”
Penn snorted through tears. “He doesn’t.”
“Figures,” Carrie muttered. “The good ones never do.”
I kissed Penn’s hair. “Come on. Lunch is waiting.”
The rooftop garden opened like a secret the sky had been keeping.
Glass walls. Soft pockets of shade. Hanging seats that swayed gently in the breeze. A long table under a pergola draped in jasmine. Sun spilling like honey across the wood.
Lunch waited. Warm bread. Pasta. Fruit. Pastries. A carafe of peach iced tea I’d asked for specifically because she liked it and never thought to ask.
