After everything the close calls, the fear, the nights I wasn’t sure I’d make it through the organization that had torn through my life was finally, mostly gone. The last time that desperate pair came looking for Sergio, it was obvious they had nothing left to bargain with. The threat had crumbled, and with it, a lot of the anger I’d been carrying.

The Sander family had done damage I wouldn’t pretend away. But they had paid for it in ways that were hard to ignore, and what I saw in them now wasn’t arrogance. It was something quieter and more broken.

Malcom had a prosthetic leg now, fitted beneath his dress pants so smoothly you wouldn’t notice unless you were looking for it.

Greg came forward first, bags in both arms, moving carefully like he was afraid of startling me. "Mrs. Hale, this is just a small thing from us. Fresh eggs from our own chickens, vegetables from Mom’s garden. You’ve just had pups and you’re still recovering you need to eat well." He paused, then added quietly, "We know you don’t need anything from us. But we needed to bring something."

The humility in his voice hit me somewhere deep. I couldn’t find the right words fast enough.

Lewis stepped in and took the bags from him. "Since you’ve come all this way, stay for a meal."

Vivian glanced at me quickly, then shook her head. "No, no, we don’t want to impose. We only came to see that Mrs. Hale was well."

A year ago, Vivian wouldn’t have hesitated to walk into any room like she owned it. That version of her was gone. What stood in front of me now was a woman who had been humbled all the way down to her bones.

I had every reason to send them away. Instead I heard myself say, "Stay for dinner."

"Really?" The light that jumped into Vivian’s eyes was immediate. "I heard you had twins." She turned back toward the car. "I brought something for them."

Malcom reached out and caught her arm. "You don’t have to show those."

But she was already pulling things out hand-knitted blankets, soft yarn dolls, little handcrafted toys. There were miniature car models and tiny carved figures, all made by hand, all careful and deliberate.

Something squeezed in my chest. Malcom used to make little things like that for me when I was small. Greg had picked up the habit without being asked.

Vivian held the bag out gently. "They’re nothing fancy. We know you could buy better. But Malcom said homemade is safer fewer chemicals, nothing artificial. He and Greg made all of it." She took a breath. "Riley, I know you may never fully forgive us. I’m not asking for that. I’m only asking you not to turn away what little good we can still offer you and your pups. All we want is for you all to be safe. The Sander family can’t survive any more fractures."

Her words landed quietly, without drama. I was the one who had been wronged but they had suffered too. Even the Blackwells hadn’t come out of this unscathed. There were no real winners in any of it.

I took the bag from her hands. "Thank you. I mean that."

The tension in Malcom’s face eased. Vivian’s eyes went glassy. "Come inside," I said. "Let’s have dinner."

She nodded, pressing her fingers to her cheeks. "Yes. Yes, alright."

I looked around the table and felt the weight of it all settle over me like something warm. My parents from a life that had already ended, and my family from the one I was living now all of them here, in the same room, at the same table. It felt like something I might have imagined while I was fighting to stay alive. Like a dream I was afraid to believe in.

Lewis poured wine into my glass, only halfway, and lifted his own. "Riley, let’s raise a toast to your new life."

Not a second chance. A new life. Something entirely its own.

Lena’s eyes were soft and bright. "My sweet girl, I hope every hard thing you’ve carried finally loosens its grip, and that this coming year brings you nothing but new beginnings."

Grant cleared his throat and raised his glass. "I hope you stay safe, and that the road ahead is smooth and full of joy."

Riley smiled that smile of hers the one that always felt like sunlight. "People who keep reaching for the light eventually become it. Riley, let’s both live like that from now on."

Vivian’s eyes filled. She couldn’t call me daughter the way Lena could, and she knew it. She said quietly, "I just... I wish you peace. Health. A life where nothing hurts you anymore." For her, the fact that I was sitting there breathing was already more than she’d dared to hope for.

Jeffrey looked like he was holding himself together by sheer effort. Even Julian, who had been quiet the whole evening, lifted his glass. "Riley stay happy, stay healthy, stay safe. Everything else can wait."

Lewis looked at me the way he always did like I was the only steady thing in the room. "Riley. May we sit at this table together, just like this, every single year."

My eyes burned. I looked at every face around me and felt the old bitterness dissolve, quietly, without ceremony. There’s something about surviving that strips resentment down to nothing. Being alive just that, just breathing and sitting with the people you love turned out to be the only thing that ever really mattered.

I raised my glass, and my voice came out smaller than I intended. "Thank you. All of you. Happy New Year."

There was so much more I wanted to say. But somehow, that was everything.

Winter was already loosening its hold. Somewhere underneath all that cold, spring was getting ready to push through. This new year it would be better. It had to be.

After the New Year, Lewis threw himself into planning our mating ceremony with the kind of focus he usually saved for pack decisions. Every detail the dress, the venue, the flowers, the rings he handled personally, going over each one more times than necessary. I knew what he was really doing. He was trying to replace every painful memory with something beautiful. He wanted the ceremony to be so perfect that it would crowd out everything that came before it.

Wisteria made it difficult, of course nudging things out of place, interfering where she could. The dress design alone went through dozens of revisions. But Lewis didn’t stop. He even sat down and sketched our bonding rings himself, erasing and redrawing until he got it right.

One evening I came up behind him while he was bent over yet another draft, and I wrapped my arms around him and pressed my face to his back. "Lewis," I said softly, "as long as I’m standing beside you, I’d be happy with a ring made of twisted grass."

He went still. "No, Riley. You deserve the best of everything. All of it."

"Carl," I murmured, "you are so good to me."

He set the draft down and turned, pulling me into his arms. He held my face and looked at me the way that always made me feel like I was his whole world. "How are you feeling today? Any better?"

My recovery had been slow. The birth had taken more from me than it should have too much blood lost, my body pushed past what it could handle. The pack doctor had been honest: the damage was lasting. The only way forward was time and rest, nothing faster than that.

I leaned into him and didn’t answer right away. His heartbeat was steady under my cheek, and his arms were solid and warm around me.

Let’s not be apart again. Not in this lifetime.