Xandros and Ally

Epilogue (Xandros): A Gift

All he has to do is ask.

It felt like I'd been waiting years to hear those words. As I flew out of my chair, I wondered if the wings I'd had tattooed on my chest had given me the extra speed to get to Ally while the last word was still echoing throughout the dining room.

She'd scared me to death when she'd said she wouldn't marry me for any amount of money, and then, in the very next sentence, she'd lifted my heart from the floor and had given me hope.

Grabbing her hand, I pulled her out of the room as my grandfather bellowed, "Don't mess it up this time, Alexandros!"

I kept going until we were outside, holding her hand in case she rethought things and tried to escape. Without a word, I seated her in my car, then after her door was shut, I made two calls.

"An hour," I said to one.

"Go," I said to the other.

 Then I got in the car, took Ally's hand, held it on her thigh and drove. Ally was the first to break the silence.

"Where are we going?"

"Dessert?" I blurted out the first thing that came to mind. "I kind of rushed you out of there before we had dessert." 

She looked at me, and her lips twisted. "Dessert."

That hadn't been the answer she was expecting, so I hurried on. "You want to go to Never Dessert Me? They do a killer lava cake."

"I could be talked into lava cake." 

I could tell she was laughing at me a little bit because she was confused. I'm sure she expected me to drop to one knee the second we were alone and propose, but she needed a proposal that was meaningful to her, to her life, and that's what she was going to get.

"Then we'll go have some."

Now I bet she'd be waiting for me to propose over one of her favorite desserts, but that wasn't the plan, either. I drove us to the the little cafe that sold desserts and specialty coffees and parked. When I opened her car door to help her out, I turned and pressed her against the car, my hands at her waist. I needed her to understand something that was still killing me before we got to the evening's main event.

"Ally, I'm sorry I hurt you. I've said it, I've apologized for it, but I don't think you know just how much I regret the ways I hurt you."

"Xandros, I know you're sorry."

"I dated you for a year knowing I was going to get engaged. I kept you a secret and denied you were anyone special to me. And then I made you the worst offer in the history of the world. All of this led to me hurting you deeply, Ally. My cowardice hurt you."

Her eyes never wavered as they looked into mine.

"It did. We can't change that. You caused me more pain than anyone ever had, Xandros. That's a fact, a part of our history, that will never change no matter how many times you apologize."

"I hate that," I said. Hated it to the point that I always felt sick thinking about it. "Why are you even standing here with me after what I did to you?"

She smiled at me. "That's a two-part answer. The first part is because of Zed. He told me when he messed up with women, he just let them go because he didn't care enough to fix it. And he said you were trying to fix what you'd done, so that spoke volumes to him."

I still must have looked stricken because she placed her hand on my cheek.

"And the second part of the answer is the way you showed you cared for me. You could have just thrown your money at the problem and left it at that -- and you were extremely generous with your money in so many ways. I appreciate that, Xandros, I do, but it's the other things you do that don't really cost much that mean the most to me. You're generous with your time, and I know you're a busy man, but you make it a priority to be with me."