Page 89 of The Final Rose

“Surely I said something way more colorful than that,” I argue.

“Oh, you did, but they are still recording, darling.”

I nod dutifully, and I can’t stop the little smile on my lips.

“It was out there,” he points at the back lawn. “When I asked if it was a sport of yours to emasculate all the men in your life.”

“YES!” Dario yells from somewhere.

Sebastian turns away from me for the first time, searching for a face among many. “Are your brothers here?”

I nod, “Yeah.”

“Oh, nice to finally meet you.”

He doesn’t wait for them to reply. His eyes are on me again. “It was in this house that I fell in love with you, Callie, and you know why?”

My vision blurs and I shake my head.

“Because I fell in love when I laid my eyes on you for the first time.”

I’m crying. I’m crying silently and I don’t know what to do. No one tells you what you say when the man you love says all these nice things for the first time.

But then I remember.

“Oh god, I love you, too!”

He chuckles a little, but a weighted breath dislodges from his chest like he thought for a silly second that I don’t feel the same.

“Well, that’s a great thing to know. Because I have a question for you…”

Sebastian removes his hands from mine and lowers down, bending on one knee. The crew obviously doesn’t give a crap anymore because they all gasp and I hear Ben swearing.

I place my hand in my mouth, shaking as the tears stream down. I can’t breathe. I can’t think.

Sebastian grabs something from his pocket, a box.

“I knew it when I saw you for the first time. I knew it when we talked and when we joked. Even when we fought. I always knewyou were the person who was going to change my entire life. Calliope Sosa, will you marry me?”

I’m sure I don’t have words in me. Tears pour down my cheeks, but then a hollow sound finds its way out. I can barely hear myself over the beat of my heart, but everything in me is saying the same word over and over again.

“Yes!”

I say it again as he puts a huge ring on my finger. I say it as I cry and as he stands up and takes me in his arms.

I repeat the word in my head when we kiss. His mouth over mine, his body so perfect with me.

I shake, I cry, and I laugh.

Sebastian Riggs finally chose.

And he choseme.

Epilogue

Callie

I hold the edgeof the hot tub, my knuckles white. My leg kicks, the water splashing away and I curse colorfully in Spanish.

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