“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Jamie pulled back enough to look at me. The afternoon light caught his face, those eyes shifting green the way they did when he was happy. “He also apologized. For making me bad about myself. Said he took advantage of me being too nice to call him on his shit.”
Something eased in my chest. Not forgiveness on Jamie's behalf—that wasn't mine to give—but relief. That he'd gotten something he needed. That the door had closed properly.
“You're not too much,” I said. The words came out fierce. “You never were.”
“I know.” His smile was soft. “I'm starting to believe it.”
I bent down and kissed him. Slow, thorough, the kind of kiss that said everything I didn't have words for. His hands fisted in my shirt, pulling me closer, and when we broke apart we were both breathing hard.
“Take me upstairs,” he said.
I flipped the CLOSED sign on the door and followed him up the stairs.
Later, we lay tangled together in my narrow bed.
Jamie's head rested on my chest, his fingers tracing idle patterns on my skin. The afternoon light had gone gold through the thin curtains, and from somewhere outside came the distant sound of someone shoveling snow. The radiator clicked and hummed.
“Reid texted about the trivia league again,” I said. “Sign-ups close Friday.”
“Next month?”
“Yeah.”
Jamie was quiet for a moment, his hand still moving on my chest.
“We should do it,” he said. “You and me and Reid. We just need a fourth.” His eyes brightened. “Maybe Brandy would like to join us.”
He laughed, and I felt it vibrate through my whole body. My arms tightened around him.
“I'm terrible at trivia,” I admitted. “Reid wasn't lying about that.”
“I'm pretty good, so we'll balance out.”
“You think so?”
“I know so.” He propped his chin on my chest, looked up at me with those eyes that saw too much and accepted all of it anyway. “We make a good team, remember?”
I thought about the past three weeks. The chaos and the quiet. The mornings he'd shown up with coffee, the evenings we'd spent tangled together, the way he'd learned the rhythm of my shop and my life like he'd always been part of them. The way I'd stopped flinching when he reached for me. The way I'd started reaching back.
I thought about wanting. About how it used to feel like a warning—the first step toward loss, the thing that guaranteed pain. I'd spent years keeping people at arm's length because wanting meant losing, and I'd already lost enough.
But this wanting felt different. Not wanting despite fear, but wanting through it. Letting myself have something even though I knew it could be taken away. Choosing the risk because the alternative, the empty apartment, the quiet that used to feel like peace had stopped feeling like enough.
“Yeah,” I said. “We do.”
He kissed my chest, right over my heart, then settled back against me. My arms tightened around him without thinking. Holding on, the way I'd spent years convincing myself I didn't need to.
I'd built a life around solitude. Told myself the quiet was what I wanted.
Turns out I'd just been waiting for the right person to fill it.
Jamie shifted against me, one hand splayed over my heart like he was keeping track of my heartbeat. I covered his hand with mine.
Outside, the February dark had settled over Prospect Ridge. Tomorrow there would be orders to fill, customers to help, a life to keep building. But right now, there was just this: his warmth against my side, his hand over my heart, and the quiet that finally felt like home.
Epilogue
