Page 132 of Dirty Mechanic

The wind stirs through the trees, rattling leaves and memory.

I exhale. Long. Slow. Like I’ve been holding my breath since the day she came home.

Annabelle reaches for my hand.

We stand there, quiet. The space Misty left behind holds warmth in the air. Not empty. Not really.

Just open.

Like the start of something new.

Golden light spills across the porch as I slide my hand into Derek’s—his rough calluses grounding me like roots in soil. We watch the last of the Honeycrisp apples come down in lazy arcs, the orchard alive with laughter and clangs from the distant cider press. Crates stack high along the fence, children dart between rows with sticky fingers and leaf-crowns, and somewhere out there, someone starts a round of “Take Me Home, Country Roads” on a banjo.

It’s Harvest Fest in Lords Valley.

The air smells like woodsmoke and cinnamon and fresh pie crusts—the kind that flake on your lips and melt into memories. In the field below, workers in flannel shirts and rolled-up sleeves lift baskets of red-and-green apples onto wagons bound for the cider mill. Our orchard, once a whispered promise of second chances, now stretches in neat rows—roots deep, trunks sturdy, leaves lit like fire.

This morning, Derek fuelled up his Mustang for one last time—racing not for glory, but in Blake’s name. Though Blake still sleeps in a rehabilitation unit two towns over, his presence is felt everywhere—on Derek’s chest, in the banner at the starting line: For Blake—Run Free.

Derek crossed the finish line first.

But he didn’t celebrate. He walked off the track, kissed me breathless, and said, “One dream at a time.” Then he handed over the deed to Blake’s pig herd to a neighbour—sold, paused, set aside. Waiting. Because that life belongs to Blake when he’s ready to claim it again.

Misty’s been in New York for months now—keeping her distance, healing, hiding from Rick in plain sight. We don’t ask for details. She sends postcards instead of explanations.

Caroline just secured a settlement from Huntz’s frozen assets and insurance to cover Blake’s long-term care. And true to form, after the race, she arrives at the orchard wielding her infamous half-sugar apple pizza like Exhibit A, balanced in one arm—her six-month-old son tucked into the other. He’s swaddled in flannel and already scowling, like he’s preparing to file his first injunction.

“Figured we earned a treat,” she says, grinning. “No calories today. I wrote it into the bylaws.”

We laugh—because how could we not? Caroline is the kind of woman who brings a lawsuit and a pie to a knife fight and wins both.

After the race, we return to the orchard, where friends and family surround the apple tree we grafted with our own hands. The initials D + A glisten on the small wooden marker at its roots. Beneath a canopy of blooming branches, sunlight pours like honey over every face I love.

Guests mingle beneath the blooming apple trees, sunlight pouring through the branches like honey.

A framed photo sits at the edge of the altar—Blake, boots caked in mud and grinning wide, holding a squirming piglet from the herd he loved more than sleep.

Beside it, someone’s placed his racing helmet, polished and still scratched from the last time he beat Derek in the rain.

He’s not here. Not really. But he’s felt.

As Caroline lifts her son onto her hip and opens the ceremony, I glance out at the crowd. Neighbors, friends, family.

I know every face.

Still, my gaze lingers a second too long on a tall man near the treeline.

Not Rick. Just someone with the same build, the same dark jacket.

My pulse quiets when he waves to someone in the second row. But it takes a full breath before my ribs stop tightening.

Not over. Not yet.

But today, we stand in the sun. And that has to be enough.

Caroline officiates our wedding—again—and this time, there are no loopholes, no handcuffs, no legal red tape or forged pages. Just us, the sunlight, and a ring that shines like it remembers every storm we weathered to get here.

As Derek and I share our first kiss as husband and wife—again—the crowd erupts into cheers and cider-fueled applause. But before we can step down from under the blooming apple tree, Marty Boone clears his throat from the front row and raises his hand like a man about to ask a very bold question.