Wedding Bet (Fixer Brothers Construction Co #8)

Epilogue

JAMIE, 18 MONTHS LATER

My fingers flew over the screen of my cheap old cell phone, tapping on the wrong things about four times before I finally managed to properly call Landry’s cell. A beachy breeze blew over my face as I headed out from work after a long morning.

I’d just taken a quick detour toward the ocean for a relaxing five-minute walk, and had received a phone call that would change my life.

“Hello, my love,” Landry finally answered, just like he always did.

“I got it,” I blurted out before he even had the chance to say more. “I got the job, Landry. They actually wanted me.”

I’d applied to a job at a brunch restaurant that was about a billion times fancier than the kitchen I’d been working for—and the place was in Denver, Colorado.

Denver.

Somewhere I never thought I’d end up, and somewhere I’d never even wanted to be in the past.

But over the past year, not only had my love for the mountains grown, but Mom had also admitted that she’d gotten the bug to try moving closer to Chase. We’d discussed it one night earlier this year, and had been shocked when both of us had the same idea.

The thought of all of us being in the same place again—close to Chase and to each other—felt like a gift. Landry would always have business meetings in both places, but more of his work was starting to be in Denver again, and I knew I’d get to see him even more, too.

The restaurant where I’d interviewed was about twenty minutes east down the mountains from my brother. It would be a midpoint from where Landry lived and where Chase was in Jade River, and I couldn’t wait.

A beautiful, velvety laugh came from Landry’s end. “Of course they did. You’re phenomenal. Congratulations, I knew you’d snag it.”

“I couldn’t have done this without you,” I said. “Literally.”

It was true.

Last week, Landry had offered to pay for my flight out to do a last-minute interview there. It was the kind of thing I usually would have refused, but the longer I’d been with Landry, the more I’d realized that any offer of money was never done out of pity.

It really was something that could change our lives.

The restaurant was the kind of place I’d have felt out of place even stepping into, as well, even a year ago. But—with a lot of encouragement from Landry—I’d slowly built up confidence in myself and my skills.

I did have a lot of experience, now. I knew how to handle the stress of peak restaurant service. And when I’d walked in to interview with the new place, I did my best to hide what a shuddering, nervous wreck I was on the inside.

I channeled my confidence.

I looked the part.

And after performing a test run yesterday in their kitchen, they’d just called me and said they’d be happy to hire me.

“I don’t even know how to process it,” I told Landry over the phone. “The base pay is so much better. The tips are shared equally, and they’re naturally going to be much higher. It’ll still be stressful, but it’s going to be amazing, Landry.”

The ocean glittered in the afternoon sunlight beside me. It was the same beach I’d seen countless times, but now it somehow seemed even more infinite.

My heart ached.

I would always love California. This would forever be my home.

But for the first time, I was letting myself enjoy change. I’d realized that life was going to be a wild, chaotic ride anyway, and that sometimes, change was inevitable.

And sometimes, change could be incredible .

“Listen,” Landry said, “I’m on the handsfree in my car right now, but I’m twenty minutes away from you. Let’s go out somewhere nice tonight and celebrate?”

Landry had already been in LA this week, planning on driving down to visit me in Stellara Beach tonight. But there was no shot that I would have been able to hold my excitement in long enough to wait twenty minutes to tell him the good news.

I let out a slow breath, unable to keep a smile from my face. “Okay. Yes. Tonight, you may take me out to any place you’d like. I promise I won’t even complain about you grabbing the check.”

Landry laughed. “Perfect. I’ll see you in twenty.”

The rest of my walk home was unlike any other I’d had before. When I turned onto the little street where I lived with my roommates, I wasn’t full of dread and panic as usual. And as I walked up to the house, I had none of the resentment I typically felt.

Soon, I’d be moving out and starting anew. With some of Landry’s help with the costs of moving, it didn’t even feel impossible, anymore. I’d made him promise that he’d let me pay it back, in full, once I was employed for a while in Colorado.

And I would make good on that promise. Even if he didn’t need the money, I had a while to go before I was comfortable sharing finances.

And even if I couldn’t afford something alone…

The hum of Landry’s car appeared behind me right as I was about to walk inside. I was still in my grungy work clothes, but he didn’t seem to care, running up to me right away and catching me in a tight hug.

“You did it. You fucking did it, like I knew you would,” he said, kissing my hair. “I love you, Jamie.”

“I love you too,” I said. When I kissed him, it felt like the first time again.

“Okay, someone needs to go back in time and punch me in the face,” I said five weeks later.

I’d just sat down after a solid eight hours of unpacking my stuff from boxes, after helping Mom unpack yesterday at her place for another eight hours.

And I was here .

In Colorado.

With Landry by my side.

He’d helped with every little part of the move, including helping me score a six-month lease on a temporary apartment. It was a nice, new-build place, and it would give me a springboard to look for a more permanent place to live now that I was here.

Landry came up and offered me a high-five. “You did it,” he said.

“I really did it. I can’t believe it.”

It had been five weeks. A normal person would plan a big move for a whole hell of a lot longer than five weeks . But because I was crazy, and because Landry was a superhero who had hired movers to help out me and Mom, we’d been able to do it in five weeks.

I was really here, ready to start my new job the next morning.

“You know what time it is, my love,” Landry said, coming up and ruffling my hair, pressing a kiss to the side of my face.

“Time for me to take a shower.”

He laughed. “Okay. Yes. Time to shower, but then time to get our asses to Jade Brewery.”

I leaned back, breathing in deeply. “God, you have no idea how good that sounds right now. A beer and a plate of French fries could make me see heaven right now.”

“Let’s do it.”

Half an hour later we were on the road, heading up further into the mountains.

This time of the year, it was nothing like I’d ever seen before: green, green, and more green, as far as the eye could see. Summer here was the polar opposite of what December had been like. Birds flitted between every tree as we rounded the mountain roads, and wildflowers in every color sprang out from every inch of the land.

I had a beer waiting for me at Jade Brewery.

A job waiting for me at an amazing restaurant tomorrow morning.

And my love beside me, the wind blowing in his hair from the open window.

What more could I have ever asked for?

“One of my favorite things about you being here now is that we can come here,” Landry said as we got out of the car and headed toward the brewery in the breeze. “It’s one of my favorite places now. The Fixer Brothers offices are right across the street, and everyone hangs out here.”

“I came here when I visited a couple of years ago, and I fell in love instantly,” I told him.

We walked up to the big front doors and swung them open, the smell of beer hitting the air.

And then I heard a sound that made me jump a little.

As soon as we stepped in, a roar of cheers and applause erupted out, and for a moment I felt like I was dreaming.

“ Surprise! ”

First, I saw Chase, straight across the inside of the brewery by the long bar.

And as I looked around I realized we were surrounded by familiar faces and new ones, everyone looking at me and Landry and cheering. The inside seating areas had multicolored balloons all over the ceiling, and a sign that said Welcome to Colorado, Jamie was hung above the bar.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Chase said, running over and tackling me in a hug.

“Holy shit,” I said. “Is this for me?”

“Of course it’s for you!”

I was still frozen in place as I looked all around. The brewery already felt like a homey, cabin-like place, and seeing it like this—with so many people who were here for me —took it to a level I never could have expected.

I felt my throat get a little tighter before I even realized I was about to cry.

“Welcome, love,” Landry said, leaning in and kissing me.

“You were part of setting this up?” I asked him, wiping away the stray tear that had fallen down my cheek. “Oh my God. No one’s ever done anything like this for me.”

I pulled in a breath as the music got louder in the bar and people started to mingle around. Multiple members of the Fixer Brothers’ construction and TV crew came up to introduce themselves to me, each one of them seeming more welcoming than the last.

It wasn’t an understatement when I’d said nothing like this had ever happened to me. Most years I didn’t even celebrate my birthday, let alone getting to have a huge celebration just because I’d moved to Colorado.

I felt like I was someone else entirely. Someone I never dreamed I could be.

“So, Jamie, I hear you can cook a mean chocolate cake,” Kace Tomlin said to me. Kace was Nathan’s partner and was a world-famous pro quarterback, and he was just here , in front of me.

“I can say that I don’t suck at baking cake,” I admitted.

“Good enough for me,” Kace said, giving me a pat on the back. “Then you’re invited to my cookout next weekend. Be there! That means you, too, Landry.”

“Hey, where’s my cookout invite?” Storm Rosling called out from the next group over. He was also a pro football player on the Denver Ferals, and dating Landry’s best friend Emmett.

Kace waved a hand through the air. “Storm, you know you’re always invited. I’ll be mad if I don’t see you there, too.”

This place was stuffed to the brim full of cool people. People I liked being around, and people who didn’t treat you any differently if you were a multimillionaire or just getting by, like me.

I looked over and saw that at a booth, next to Chase, even my mom was here.

And I swore another tear was about to stream down my face.

“Chase got you to come out to a brewery, huh?” I asked as I walked over and hugged Mom.

She beamed up at me. “I was pretty exhausted after yesterday, but I wouldn’t miss this for the world,” she said. “Both my babies under one roof. And did you see they have a boozy mango cocktail here?”

My mom was mango obsessed, and already she’d found her favorite thing on the menu.

“I heard somebody say mango,” Rush, the brewery owner, called out from behind the bar. “Coming right up.”

Mom clapped her hands together. “Yep. I think I’m going to love it here.”

My heart was so full it could burst.

Landry found me soon after, coming up to put his arms around me as Chase and Adam got caught up in a conversation with my mom.

“My marshmallow,” he said softly near my ear, pressing a kiss to my earlobe and gently swaying with me in his arms.

It felt like a whole different world, so long ago, when he’d first called me that. It had come to mean something even sweeter with time—I was proud to be something soft and sweet for him. Well, hard and sweet, sometimes.

“When in the fresh hell did I get so lucky?” I asked him.

“I don’t think it’s luck,” Landry said. “You were so qualified for this job.”

“Not just the job, though,” I said, turning and looking into his eyes. “You. Us. A little over a year ago, I still thought I wouldn’t be ready for a serious relationship for years .”

“Tell me about it,” he said. “I don’t know how I deserve you, but I’m not complaining.”

“Hey. Let me show you something,” I said, pulling out my phone. I opened the screen to show him a picture of a small house. It was set into the mountains, surrounded by pine trees filtering in beautiful light, like everything here in Jade River.

“That’s such a cute house.”

“It really is,” I said, staring down at the screen. My heart beat a little bit faster. “Apparently, this little beauty is up for rent starting in January. And that’ll be right around when my six-month apartment lease here ends,” I told Landry. I watched as his expression changed rapidly, from neutral curiosity to excitement.

“Yes,” he blurted out before I could say anything. “Immediately yes.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “Landry, I haven’t even said anything yet,” I told him, giving him a little playful shove. “There’s no guarantees, obviously, and we’re in a super competitive rental market. But… if you were up for it, we could do this together. And I could actually split the rent with you, with my new job.”

Inside, I knew that Landry had enough money to buy most of the houses on the entire block, if he really wanted to. But he also knew how important it was for me to contribute, equally, and for the first time, I knew I could.

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to, and I know renting even a tiny, affordable place doesn’t make that much sense, because you have the Denver penthouse too—”

Landry broke me off with a kiss. “I would be so happy to split a place with you, Jamie,” he murmured, taking a deep breath. He rested his forehead on mine. “We can still spend some time at my LA house, too, but… I’d ditch the Denver penthouse, Jamie. I’d love to be here with you.”

Excitement filled every cell in my body. “We’re really going to do this,” I said.

“ Yes ,” he whispered again, and I’d never heard anything sweeter.

For so long, I’d thought true love would be like getting whisked away with a strong, powerful, beautiful man, being pulled along on a ride. And Landry was certainly all of those things, but our love was nothing like the storybook tales.

It did feel equal. Both of our lives had only opened up and blossomed from knowing one another.

Nothing felt off-limits now.

Big things. Marriage. Kids. A full, real life together.

All of it felt possible, now, instead of a far-flung dream.

Soon we headed out onto the big open back patio at Jade Brewery. The karaoke machine got fired up, and everyone joined out back. The wind picked up for a second, shaking a big tree in the back landscaped area and sending a bunch of little yellow-orange blooms floating into the air. The little petals floated downward, sprinkling over the grass and glowing in the light of the sunset.

“Look at that,” Landry said, gazing out. “Our own little Colorado snowglobe, even in summer.”

My heart squeezed inside. “I think I could be happy anywhere with you, Landry.”

He leaned in close to me again, kissing me softly beneath my ear. “I know I could be, too.”

I hummed, pulling back and giving him a look. “Well, certainly not the Antarctic circle. And probably not in the middle of a desert, with no electricity. And I really never saw myself as a remote mountain living kind of guy—”

Landry laughed at me. “You are adorable, and I hope you know that.”

I kissed him again, letting my lips linger on his for a long moment. “Let’s go celebrate,” I murmured. “And then head back home so I can have my way with you.”

“Say no more,” he told me.

We celebrated all night, making Jade Brewery ours, surrounded by people we loved.

I knew it was only the start of our journey. And I knew we’d be there for each other—through every bump, every curve, and every new adventure we started together.

Nothing could be more real than that.

Thank you for reading!