“I love you,” he said, pulling back to gaze down at me. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.” I cleared my throat. “At the risk of asking an ungracious question . . . ,” I began, when he smiled down at me, and I smiled back.
“Don’t worry, Sentinel. There’s a ring. I just hadn’t anticipated there’d be a moment quite this perfect.” He let his gaze slip across the crowd that watched and cheered around us. “Or a location.”
Forever, he said silently, just for me. And for an eternity after that.
Forever, I agreed.
EPILOGUE
TROMPE L’OEIL
Green had been her signature color. Orange most definitely was not. But it was oh so satisfying to see Sorcha and Adrien Reed stripped of expensive clothes and jewelry.
Sorcha was now known as the “Chicago Witch,” and her treatment only slightly warmer than her ancestors’ treatment in Salem likely had been.
The raid of Reed’s office had been accidentally successful, at least after the fact. While there, a very nervous admin confessed to the CPD that Reed had moved computers and files into the Community Safety Center—the very outpost he’d created to coordinate public safety—only the week before. He’d probably thought no one would question files stored in a facility dedicated to the public welfare.
Once again, he’d underestimated us.
Nick Breckenridge had broken the story of Reed’s criminal involvement. The Reeds had been stripped of their friends, their positions, and the sycophantic devotion they believed they were entitled to. I’d grinned hugely at the photograph of the two of them in their ill-fitting jumpsuits, hair uncoiffed and Botox (or magic) fading, shuffling along with legs and hands chained together. Logan Hill had been behind them, looking decidedly unhappy about the turn of events.
The trio was now in the same prison that held Regan and Seth Tate and a handful of shifters. And since Seth was technically on our side, he promised they wouldn’t have access to magic for a very long time.
Robert was healing physically but had a long way to go emotionally. Rather than admitting he’d been played by the Reeds, he’d decided the story, the charges, the magic were part of a conspiracy. He was an intelligent man, and I had to hope he’d come around. But my father’s prejudices—which, ironically, he’d mostly grown out of—had infected Robert.
He’d refused to see me, had even declined to attend the dinner Ethan and I had had with my parents to celebrate my birthday. It hadn’t been the most relaxing evening—they were still my parents, after all—and Robert’s absence had been obvious. Elizabeth had come, made apologies, but the stiffness in her smile showed she also wasn’t quite sure of me, or of us.
Ethan said he had another surprise, so when we’d climbed back into his car after an evening with more “foams” and “mousses” than should ever have been together on a single plate, he demanded I wear a blindfold “so as not to spoil the surprise.”
The request was odd enough in itself, but the fact that he’d had one was rather intriguing. I was learning all sorts of things about my Masterly fiancé.
And I was still getting used to calling him that.
Ethan drove the car north; I could tell the direction from the scent of the lake to our right and the quiet of the dark water. The sounds of the city on our left extended only so far. But when we left Lake Shore and headed into the city, I lost my sense of direction. He turned enough times that I thought we might be going in circles, which seemed more surreptitious than necessary considering the fact that I couldn’t see at all.
“Could I at least get a hint?”
As if sensing he had me on the hook, he took a moment to answer. “I need to return something.”
I chuckled. “I hope you’re not thinking about returning me.”
“No,” he said with a smile I could hear. “I’ve long since ripped your tags off.”
“Har-har.”
After a few more quiet minutes, the car slowed and pulled to a stop. “A moment, Sentinel.”
The weight in the car shifted, and the door shut. A moment later, my door opened and he touched my arm. “I’m here, Sentinel. Let me help you out.”
I put my hand in his, turned to put my feet on the ground, and stood. I took in a breath, trying to scent out where I was, but got nothing unusual. “Time to take this off?”
“Not yet,” he said, closing the car door, and situating himself on my right-hand side, tucking my arm into his. “A bit farther to go first. Just hold on to me.”
Not having a better choice—I’d long ago decided to trust him—I took careful steps, one hand wrapped around his biceps, the other out and feeling for any obstacles in my way. That was how I knew we’d passed through a door and traveled down a hallway before emerging into a larger room. A few more steps, and he came to a stop.
“I’m going to take the blindfold off now.”
I nodded while he unknotted the silk, then blinked when he revealed only darkness.
There was a buzz of sound . . . and then the lights came on.
“Dear God,” I said, eyes wide and staring. We weren’t in a room, big or otherwise.
We were in the middle of Wrigley Field.
I turned in a long, slow circle.
Because my last try had gone so horribly wrong, I hadn’t actually been inside Wrigley since becoming a vampire. I hadn’t seen the bleachers, the scoreboard, the Wrigley rooftops where fans outside the stadium watched the games. None of it since I’d gotten fangs, which didn’t explain why I was here now.