Chapter 24: The Proposal
The trail had been Allan's idea. Two months of Sundays and Tuesdays and every spare hour he could steal from the sheriff's department, and still he kept finding reasons to pull me out of the farmhouse. This time it was the leaves, he said. Peak color, and I hadn't seen the valley from the ridge yet.
I had stopped arguing with him about fresh air weeks ago. The old Sabrina, the one who first woke up in this body and stared at her own hands like they belonged to a stranger, would have found an excuse to stay inside with the truck's carburetor and a wrench. But that woman was learning. She had learned to make pie crust without crying, learned to hum along with the radio, learned the exact pressure of Allan's hand on her lower back when he guided her around a muddy patch of trail.
The air smelled like woodsmoke and turned maple. Every breath pulled something sharp and sweet into my lungs, and the grade of the path had me winded in a way the two months of farm work hadn't quite prepared me for. I paused on a switchback, hands on my hips, and let my gaze trace the ridgeline.
"Take your time," Allan said from a few steps ahead. He had turned to watch me, and there was something patient in his flint-gray eyes that I had come to recognize. He wore a faded flannel jacket over a plain cotton shirt, and he had his hands shoved casually into his pockets.
I made a show of catching my breath, even though the pause was less about the climb and more about the moment. The maples leaned over the trail, shedding leaves that spiraled down in slow, deliberate circles, and the light through the canopy had gone honey-thick and golden.
"How much farther?" I asked.
"Just around the bend." He jerked his chin upward. "Trust me. It's worth it."
I trusted him. That was the thing that still surprised me, on mornings when I woke in the unfamiliar weight of my own body and had to remember where I was. I trusted the man in front of me, whose steady presence had become the anchor of a life I never asked for and somehow couldn't imagine leaving.
The trail leveled out, and the trees opened. I walked out onto a flat shelf of granite that hung above the valley, and I stopped.
The valley below was a painted bowl of gold and crimson and burnt orange, broken by the dark green lines of pines and the silver thread of a river winding through the farmland. Distant rooftops scattered like seeds, and the late afternoon sun cast long shadows that made the whole basin glow. I stood there, breath caught somewhere between my chest and my throat, and let the sight pour over me.
"It's beautiful," I said quietly.
Allan didn't answer right away. I felt him move behind me, heard the soft scuff of his boots on stone, but I was too caught up in the view to register what he was doing. The wind lifted a strand of hair across my face, and I tucked it behind my ear, still staring at the far ridge where the light had gone almost blood-red.
"Sabrina."
His voice had a different weight to it. A thickness, like he was holding something fragile. I started to turn, and then I registered the movement in my peripheral vision, the way a man drops when he kneels.
My heart lurched.
He was on one knee on the granite, the autumn light turning his dark hair almost bronze, and in his trembling hand sat a small velvet box. The lid was open. A ring caught the sun, a modest diamond set in a thin silver band, and it glittered like the river below.
I couldn't speak. I couldn't move. My hands had gone to my mouth on their own, and I stood there, twenty-one years old in this body, thirty-eight in my memory, caught between two lives and one trembling, hopeful man.
"Sabrina," he said again, and his voice cracked, just a little, on the second syllable of my name. "I know we haven't known each other long. I know you came here with a past you can't talk about, and I know I don't know all of it. But I know you. I know the way you laugh when the truck backfires. I know the way you talk to plants like they can hear you. I know the way you fit against me at night, like you were always meant to be there."
The wind moved through the pines behind us, a long, hollow sound.
"I told my mother about you before I even brought you to meet her," he went on. "Because I knew, the first time I saw you up on that porch, I knew I had to be careful with you. And I've been careful. I've been patient. But there's not a day goes by that I don't think about the rest of my life, and every single version of it has you in it."
He took a breath, and the velvet box shook in his hand.
"Sabrina Parker, will you marry me?"
The word yes rose up in me before I could think, before I could catalog the reasons this was insane, before my old life could rear up and remind me that Justin Zygurski never should have been here, that he was supposed to be dead or hidden, that a woman named Sabrina was a fabrication stitched together from government files and a tech lab's cold machinery.
But Justin had been dead for months. And this body, this heart that hammered against my ribs, this woman who had baked peach cakes and called Margaret mama by accident and learned to fall in love in the slow, careful way of two people who had never rushed anything in their lives, she was alive.
"Yes," I said. My voice came out strange and raw. "Yes, Allan. Yes."
His face cracked open into a grin so bright it hurt to look at. He fumbled the ring out of the box, his hands shaking badly enough that he nearly dropped it, and I laughed, a wet, broken sound, and knelt down in front of him on the cold granite. He caught my left hand in his, steadying it with his other, and slid the ring onto my finger.
It fit. Of course it fit, the way everything with Allan seemed to fit, like it was made for me.
He pulled me into his arms then, and I buried my face in the wool of his flannel and breathed him in, woodsmoke and clean sweat and something underneath that was just him. His hand came up to cradle the back of my head, and he pressed a kiss to my hair.
"I love you," he said, his voice muffled against my scalp. "God, I love you, Sabrina."
I pulled back enough to look at him. The sun had dropped lower, painting the sky in shades of pink and amber, and the valley below had gone quiet and dim. His eyes were bright with something that looked dangerously close to tears, and so were mine.
"I love you too," I said. "I didn't think I could ever have this."
"Have it," he said simply. "It's yours. All of it."
I looked down at the ring on my finger, the cool weight of silver, the small diamond catching the last of the light. In the old life, in the accountant's office in Chicago, I never would have imagined this. Never would have dreamed that a witness protection program could hand me a second skin, a third chance, a future I had stopped believing in.
The wind swept up the ridge again, carrying a loose handful of maple leaves that scattered across the granite like coins. Allan pulled me to my feet, and we stood on the edge of the overlook, watching the valley darken into evening, his arm wrapped around my shoulders, my hand linked with his, the ring a steady pressure against my skin.
I could not hold it in any longer. The word yes had opened something inside me, a floodgate I had kept barred since the day I woke up in this body, and it all came pouring out at once. I laughed, a bright, wild sound I did not recognize as my own, and I threw myself at him.
He was not ready. His balance, already shifting from kneeling on the uneven granite, gave way completely. His boots skidded on the stone, his arms flew out, and we went down together in a tangle of flannel and denim and breathless laughter. I landed on top of him, my knees finding purchase on either side of his hips, my hands braced on his chest.
He stared up at me, eyes wide, his grin half-dazed and utterly smitten. The velvet box had tumbled from his grip and lay forgotten on the rock beside us, the ring already safe on my finger.
"You tackled me," he said, his voice thick with wonder.
"I proposed back," I said, and then I broke into tears. Not sad tears. Not the wrenching kind I had learned to dread. These were something else entirely, a release of pressure I had carried so long I had forgotten it was there. They spilled hot and fast down my cheeks, and I was laughing and crying at the same time, my smile so wide it hurt my jaw.
His hands came up to my waist, steadying me as I shifted my weight, and I looked down at him. He looked up at me. The valley had gone quiet behind us, the last of the amber light catching the planes of his face, and I could see the tears standing in his own eyes, bright and unashamed.
"I love you," he said, and it came out cracked and raw and perfect.
I bent down and pressed my chest to his. I felt the heat of him through my flannel, the drum of his heartbeat against my ribs, and I kissed him. Not the careful, measured kisses we had shared in the quiet dark of the farmhouse. This one was fierce. It was hungry. It was every yes I had swallowed down for two months and every fear I had buried and every moment I had spent convincing myself that this happiness was borrowed, that it would be taken away, that someone would come knocking with a file folder and a cold explanation.
He kissed me back with the same ferocity, his hands sliding up my back, one tangling in my hair. The granite was hard beneath his shoulder blades and I was sprawled across him like I belonged there, like I had always belonged there, and it was the most alive I had felt since the day I stopped being Justin Zygurski.
I broke the kiss to catch my breath, and we lay there, forehead to forehead, our voices tangled in the space between.
"I can't believe you said yes," he whispered.
"I can't believe you asked."
"Been planning it for a month." His grin turned sheepish. "Bought the ring three weeks ago. Been carrying it in my pocket, waiting for the right moment. Almost gave it to you at the salvage yard last Tuesday when you finally got that damned carburetor to idle smooth."
I laughed, a wet, hiccuping sound. "You almost proposed over a carburetor?"
"You looked so happy." He reached up and brushed a tear from my cheek with the pad of his thumb. "You looked like you'd found something you thought you'd lost."
The words hit me somewhere soft and deep. I looked down at him, at this patient, steady man who had taken my confession about witness protection without flinching, who had told his mother about me before he even brought me to her door, who had carried me to bed without waking me and told me he was saving himself for marriage like it was the most natural thing in the world.
I kissed him again, slower this time, softer, a thank you and a promise folded into one. His hands settled on my hips, and I felt the hard granite pressing through my jeans, the cold wind on my neck, and the warm solid weight of him beneath me, and I thought, this is what it means to be found.
He broke the kiss after a long moment and looked up at me, his flint-gray eyes gone dark and tender.
"We should get you off the cold rock," he said.
"You're the one lying on it."
"You're the one on top of me." He grinned. "I'm not complaining. But my back is starting to voice concerns."
I laughed and rolled off him, landing on the granite beside him, the two of us sprawled on our backs like teenagers, staring up at the sky that had deepened into violet and amber. The first stars were pricking through overhead, faint and cautious. I held up my left hand, watching the diamond catch the last of the light, and I could not stop smiling.
He reached over and laced his fingers through mine. His hand was warm and calloused, and the ring pressed between our palms like a secret.
"My mother is going to cry," he said.
"Good."
"She might hug you for an uncomfortably long time."
"I can handle that." I turned my head to look at him. "I could use more hugs like that."
He rolled onto his side, propping himself up on one elbow. The movement brought his face close to mine, and I could smell the woodsmoke in his flannel, the clean, familiar scent I had come to associate with safety. He traced the line of my jaw with his fingertips, featherlight, and I shivered.
"I want to marry you," he said quietly, like he was still testing the words. "I want to wake up next to you every morning. I want to fix up that truck and drive it to the county fair. I want to sit on the porch with you when we're old and the gardenia has taken over the whole side of the house."
I felt my eyes sting again. "That's a big want."
"It's the only want I've got." He leaned in and kissed me, soft and thorough and full of promise. "Everything else is just details."
I pulled back, and I could feel my own smile, wide and unguarded and utterly out of control.
"Then let's get out of this cold wind," I said, "and you can tell me all the details."
He helped me to my feet, and we stood together at the edge of the overlook, the valley dark below us, the ring a warm weight on my finger. The wind had picked up, carrying the first chill of evening, but I barely felt it. His arm came around my shoulder, and I leaned into him, and for the first time since I had woken up in a body that was not mine, I felt like I was exactly where I was supposed to be.
He helped me down the last stretch of the trail, his hand firm around mine, and I barely felt the rocks through my boots. I couldn't stop looking at my left hand. Every time the ring caught the light filtering through the trees, something in my chest gave a happy little lurch, and I caught myself grinning like an idiot.
"You're going to trip," Allan said, amused.
"I'm not going to trip."
"You've looked at your hand four times in the last minute."
"It's a nice hand," I said, holding it up so the diamond flashed. "It has a nice ring on it."
He laughed, that low, warm sound that had become my favorite thing in the world, and pulled me closer as the trail opened up into the clearing where his truck waited. The old F-150 sat in the gravel lot, dust on its fenders, and beside it the sky had gone the color of bruised peaches. The air was sharp and cold, carrying the distant smell of someone's wood stove.
He walked me to the passenger door and opened it, one hand on the frame like he was helping me into a carriage instead of a work truck with a cracked vinyl bench seat.
"Your chariot," he said.
I climbed in, the seat creaking under me, and settled back against the worn upholstery. I held my hand out in front of me again, turning it this way and that, watching the diamond catch the fading light. It was small. Modest. The kind of ring a deputy sheriff on a small-town salary could afford without starving. But it was perfect, and it was on my finger, and the man who gave it to me was walking around the back of the truck right now.
I heard his boots on the gravel, and then the brief, quiet sound of his phone. A soft click of a message sending. I didn't think anything of it. I was too busy staring at the ring again, turning it like a compass pointing somewhere I had never let myself believe I could go.
The driver's door opened and Allan climbed in. He smelled like woodsmoke and cold air, and he had that rumpled, happy look about him, the same look he'd worn the first morning I woke up in his arms. He settled behind the wheel and reached over to take my hand, his thumb brushing over the band.
"You sure it's not too loose?" he asked.
"It's perfect," I said. "It's all perfect."
He leaned over and kissed me. Just once, soft and quick, like he couldn't help himself. Then he turned the key and the engine rumbled to life, and we rolled out of the gravel lot onto the dirt road that led back toward town.
I leaned my head against the window and watched the trees slide past, dark shapes against the dimming sky. The ring was a small, steady pressure against my finger. I kept looking at it.
"You're doing it again," Allan said.
"Looking at my hand?"
"Staring at your hand."
"I have a good reason." I held it up, letting the yellow dashboard light catch the stone. "There's a ring on it."
"There's a ring on it," he agreed, and I could hear the smile in his voice.
We drove in comfortable silence for a while, past the turnoff for the old mill, past the church with its white steeple going gray in the dusk, past the general store where the owner had already flipped the sign to closed. The streetlights were coming on, throwing pools of orange light onto the pavement. I felt light. Floating. Like the woman who had climbed into this truck an hour ago, nervous about a walk in the woods, had been replaced by someone braver.
The truck slowed as we came to the last stoplight before the farmhouse turnoff. Allan's phone buzzed in the cup holder, and I glanced at it out of habit. The screen lit up with a message from a contact I didn't recognize. Just a name and a few words I couldn't read before the screen dimmed.
"Everything okay?" I asked.
"Yeah." He reached over and squeezed my hand. "Just the station. They're confirming my shift for tomorrow."
The light turned green, and he eased the truck forward. I didn't think about the message again. I turned my hand over in his and looked at the ring, at the way the silver caught the glow of the streetlights, and I could not stop smiling.
The farmhouse came into view, its porch light already on, the gardenia bush Allan had planted by the steps now taller than my knee. He pulled into the gravel drive and killed the engine, and for a moment we both sat there in the quiet, the cab warm and dim.
He killed the engine, and the quiet settled around us like a blanket. The porch light threw a warm cone across the gravel, and the gardenia bush rustled in the evening breeze. I unbuckled my seatbelt and reached for the door handle, but Allan caught my wrist.
"Wait," he said. "Let me get it."
I laughed. "I've been opening doors for myself for thirty-eight years, Allan. I think I can manage."
"I know you can." He was already out of the truck, coming around to my side, and he opened the door with a little flourish that made me roll my eyes and smile at the same time. "Indulge me. Tonight's a special night."
"Every night's a special night with you," I said, and he got that soft, dazed look he always got when I said things like that.
He took my hand and helped me down from the cab, and we walked up the gravel path together, his arm around my waist, my hand linked with his. The farmhouse loomed ahead, warm and dark in the porch light, and I could see the silhouette of the gardenia bush beside the steps.
"You know," I said, as he reached for the front door, "I never actually asked what you planned for tonight after the hike. I just assumed dinner."
"Dinner's part of it," he said. His voice had a strange, jittery quality to it, but I put it down to the engagement. "I may have gone to a little extra trouble."
The door swung open, and the house was dark. Completely dark, the way it never was when we came home together, because Allan always flipped on the entryway light out of habit.
"Allan?" I stepped inside, and the floorboards creaked under my boots. "Why is it—"
He flipped the switch.
The lights blazed on, and the living room exploded with sound and color. A dozen voices shouted in unison, "Surprise!" and I jumped so hard I nearly dropped the ring off my finger. Streamers hung from the ceiling beams, and a huge banner stretched across the mantelpiece, gold letters on white: CONGRATULATIONS SABRINA AND ALLAN.
The room was full of faces I knew. Margaret stood at the front, beaming, her silver hair catching the light. Behind her were the general store owner and his wife, the woman from the church who had brought me a casserole my second week, the mechanic from the salvage yard who'd helped me source parts for the truck, a handful of Allan's coworkers from the sheriff's department in their off-duty clothes. They all had drinks in their hands and confetti in their hair, and they were all looking at me like I was the reason the room was lit up.
Margaret crossed the room before I could speak. She wrapped her arms around me and pulled me into a hug so tight I could feel the buttons of her cardigan pressing into my cheek.
"Oh, sweetheart," she said, her voice thick with tears. "Oh, my sweet girl. Welcome to the family."
And I burst into tears.
Not the gentle, pretty kind. The ugly, shoulder-shaking, I-can't-breathe kind. I buried my face in the wool of her cardigan and sobbed, and she just held me, rocking me gently, her hand stroking my hair while the room went quiet and warm around us.
"Shh," she murmured. "I know. I know, honey. Let it out."
The tears eased after a long moment, leaving me hiccuping against her shoulder. She pulled back and cupped my face in her hands, her thumbs brushing the wetness from my cheeks, and she looked at me with such tender pride that I almost started crying again.
"Look at you," she said softly. "Just look at you."
She kissed my forehead, a long, gentle press of her lips to my skin, and then she stepped back and held out her hand, palm up.
"Let me see the ring."
I held out my left hand, and she took it gently, turning it this way and that in the light. The diamond caught the overhead glow, sending a tiny scatter of light across the ceiling. She studied it for a long moment, and then her breath caught.
"Allan," she said, without looking away from my hand. "You used your grandmother's ring."
Allan appeared at her shoulder, looking nervous and pleased and a little like he'd been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. "I thought it should stay in the family," he said. "If she wanted it. If it fit."
"Of course she wanted it." Margaret squeezed my fingers. "It looks perfect on you, Sabrina. It was made for you."
I looked down at the ring, and suddenly it meant so much more. Not just a ring from a department store, picked off a display case. A family heirloom, handed down through generations, worn by women who had loved and been loved in this valley for decades. And Allan had chosen to give it to me. To a woman who hadn't existed three months ago.
I opened my mouth to say something, but what came out was a watery, broken sound that might have been thank you or might have been nothing at all. Margaret just pulled me into another hug, and this time the crowd around us burst into applause.
Allan materialized at my elbow with a glass of champagne, the bubbles rising in a thin stream of gold. "I believe this is customary," he said, his voice warm and a little unsteady.
I took the glass, and I set it down on the side table without drinking from it. Then I turned to him, and I kissed him.
It wasn't the fierce, hungry kiss from the overlook. It was something softer, deeper, a kiss that held a promise I had never thought I'd be able to make. He made a small sound against my mouth, and his hand came up to cup the back of my head, and the crowd whooped and whistled around us.
When I finally pulled back, his eyes were bright, and he was grinning like he'd won every lottery there was.
"I love you," I said, and it came out clear and steady.
"I love you too," he said. "Welcome home."
I looked around the room at the gathered faces, at the banner and the streamers and the cake on the kitchen counter that someone had decorated with a tiny bride and groom. At Margaret, who was wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. At the mechanic from the salvage yard, raising his beer in my direction. At the sheriff's deputies, who had traded their uniforms for flannel and jeans and looked just as warm and human as anyone else.
A woman named Sabrina Parker stood in a farmhouse in rural Vermont, a ring on her finger and a life she had never expected wrapped around her like a quilt.
And for the first time, I didn't feel like I was wearing someone else's skin. I felt like I was home.