Angus caught his breath. It felt like his heart might have stopped when she pushed the ring back into his hand.
But she was smiling. And holding out her left hand.
‘I’m more than ready,’ she said, her voice wobbling. ‘And you couldn’t possibly dream up a more romantic place to propose than this.’
Angus had a lump in his throat that made it impossible to get many words out at all.
It was just as well that he didn’t need very many.
‘Will you marry me,’ he managed. ‘Please?’
Tilly only seemed to need one word.
‘Yes.’
* * *
At the other end of the most romantic day of her life, Tilly and Angus were at La Maisonette. They lit every candle and turned on all the fairy lights. Tilly was wearing her beautiful red dress and they were drinking champagne. Anddancing.
‘I said Ididn’tdance,’ Angus said in response to Tilly’s astonished expression when he’d made the invitation. ‘Not that I didn’t know how to. I’ve just never really wanted to – until today.’
So here they were, dancing. On a very small terrace, but how much room did you need for slow dancing, cheek to cheek, like the lyrics in the song that was floating around them.
‘Lady in Red’.
It wastheirsong, now.
Forever…
EPILOGUE
A YEAR LATER…
St Margaret’s Chapel, in Edinburgh Castle, was tiny.
It had thick stone walls, a lovely archway in front of the altar and small wooden pews that could only accommodate a handful of people.
Which wasn’t a problem. The people who meant the most were all here, from both sides of the English Channel.
Luc had two-year-old Maddie sitting on his knee, possibly because there was no room on her mother’s lap. Sophie was in the late stages of her second pregnancy.
Ellie and Julien, who had become firm friends when Tilly had moved in to live with Angus in La Maisonette until they could find a house of their own, were also here with their three children. Moira’s baby had thankfully arrived just in time to allow his parents to attend this wedding and was currently sound asleep in his mother’s arms, with proud father Douglas almost unable to take his eyes off his newborn son.
Monique, the family friend who was like an aunt to Tilly, was sitting alone at the moment because Tilly’s mother would be arriving with the bride.
Angus blew out a breath, emotions threatening to become too much. He was indescribably happy, of course, but there was so much else in the mix.
Excitement that this day had finally arrived.
Gratitude that Tilly seemed to still be as much in love with him as he was with her.
Enormous hope for the future.
But a tinge of sadness for the past.
Angus wished his father could have been here, but it felt like his spirit was very close because Angus and Tilly had chosen to make their vows in the very same chapel his parents had been married in. It was also why Angus had chosen to wear the McLeod tartan for this ceremony.
He found himself lifting his gaze to the small stained-glass window above the altar, as if he’d just missed catching a glimpse of a passing ghost. How good would it be if his dad could see that his dying wish had come true?
