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Louisa’s brows lifted upwards, and her eyes stung with the threat of tears.

“He told me you make him feel like he’s walking on air,” she said, then laughed. “But don’t judge him for being cheesy. He’s a boomer.”

“He’snota boomer,” Louisa corrected with a laugh of her own. “And I happen to like cheesy, especially when it’s also impossibly sweet.”

Taylor stood there awkwardly fora minute. “I guess I just wanted you to know that if you guys…like whatever you decide…I’m okay with it. Like, if you were to move in or whatever. Or get married.” She shrugged.

Louisa’s heart twisted. “We’re going to take it slow, for everyone’s sake,” she promised. “But thank you for saying that. One day, when we’reallready, maybe that’s what will happen.”

And Louisa meant it.She knew that if it were just up to her and Noah, they’d have been married within a month. But Taylor was a huge part of the picture, and despite having made inroads during their outback holiday, Louisa was going to give the teen time to fully adjust.

So, they started slowly. A few dinners a week at Noah and Taylor’s, then, some afternoons on the weekends Louisa took Taylor shopping with her, or to a movie. When Louisa’s family came to visit, Noah installed them in a Fox penthouse and they spent several days all together out on Noah’s yacht in the harbour.

Grace and Taylor bonded instantly, and by the end of the trip, Taylor was calling Grace ‘AG’ for Aunty Grace.

And while they were carefully taking the steps towards their future, to everyone’s delight, Amy stayed in rehab. Not for a month, not for three months but for six life changing months,and in that time, she seemed to find an inner peace that Noah said had been missing for a long time. By the time the Australian winter rolled around, Amy was out of rehab and planning a visit to Australia, which Noah and Louisa were wholeheartedly supporting.

When Amy visited, she stayed with Noah and Taylor, and it wasn’t remotely weird for Louisa. She was happy for Taylor to have some time with her parents under the same roof, and even happier that she kept texting Louisa and inviting her over. Louisa gave them some space though.

After the visit, it was Taylor who approached Louisa, when she was cooking the eggplant and rice dish in Noah’s kitchen.

“I really missed you, these last few weeks,” she said, lifting one shoulder, flushing to the roots of her hair.

Louisa hid her surprise, but only just. “I missed you too.” And she had. Strangely, she hadn’t been at all jealous of Noah spending time with his ex, but she’d felt a little strange to think of Taylor with her mother. Silly, unjustifiable feelings, but she’d felt them anyway.

“But it was nice, having a third person in the house. It was louder. Warmer.” She glanced up at Louisa, clearly nervous.

“What are you saying, Tay?”

“I just…It seems so dumb for you to be halfway across the city when we’re here. Why can’t you just move in already?”

Tears had clogged Louisa’s throat, making it hard to speak, and when Noah strolled in a minute later, Taylor and Louisa were hugging, both crying. He stared at them, totally perplexed.

The followingChristmas was completely different. Louisa’s parents and sister came back from Moricosia, and all of them headed out to the farm to spend the Christmas break withNoah’s family. Amy came too, still doing well, writing a memoir and filming a documentary for a wildlife preservation fund.

Louisa couldn’t have imagined that things would turn out so well, and yet, as she sat beneath the starlit sky—so bright because they were in the middle of nowhere and the stars had no light pollution to contend with—and Noah wrapped his arm around her shoulders and held her tight, she wondered if that was true.

She’d left Ares without any idea what she was going to do, only she’d had a sneaking suspicion that there had to be something better for her. Something more right. It had almost been as if fate had been pushing her towards Noah, and this big, blended, happy family.

Her heart was full.

On that same Christmas,on a romantic picnic out on the land, with just the two of them and the night birds for company, Noah finally asked Louisa the question that had burning a hole in his mind for twelve full months.

“Not a single day goes by without me thanking God for bringing you to me. I never dreamed I would meet someone like you. I no longer think in terms of myself, but always, and forever, of us. You have already given me so much, but I wonder if you’d consider giving me what I want most in the world and agree to be my wife?”

She had agreed, and when they returned to the homestead later that night, they were able to celebrate with all their dearest, most cherished loved ones.

The wedding was a beautiful,intimate affair three months later, at the Sydney Fox hotel, and unbeknownst to either, there was a hitch-hiker on board—a little baby Fox, who would grace them by the following Christmas. They named her Holly, because Christmas seemed so pivotal to their relationship, and she was the apple of all of their eyes—particularly big sister Taylor, who almost put off going away to university because she couldn’t bear to be parted from the infant.

But a prestigious spot at a Moricosian university was hard to resist, and so off Taylor went, excited to learn about her new ‘heritage’, as she liked to joke. She would be spending time with Louisa’s family, in between term times, and it gave Noah and Louisa even more reason to go back to Europe regularly.

It was, in every sense of the words, the happiest ending any couple could ever imagine, and they never, ever forgot to be grateful for that.

THE END