Epilogue

O liver Phillips stood in the kitchen of his London flat, leaning back against a rather lovely range he'd had installed because his wife fancied a contained fire, and looked at the state of his life.

Actually, he looked for the woman who had come into his life and stayed to fill it with so many things he'd never expected, but since that was one of his favorite things to do, he decided to stick with it.

There was a little snug adjacent to the kitchen that contained a couch, a television, and a coffee table piled high with books on everything from medieval metal-smithing to Victorian cookery. The cozy little room also contained his favorite person who was currently wearing headphones and grooving to some 70s rock band for which he was certain he owned at least one t-shirt. She was wearing jeans, which she only did when her favorite pair of black cargo trousers were in the wash, and dusting when she wasn't simply standing there and singing with a heart-stoppingly lovely voice that was, he was happy to say, perfectly on key on every note.

She was also just as likely to don a lovely evening gown and go weep through Rachmaninoff or Chopin at the Royal Albert, or watch with delight whatever Drury Lane had on tap at any given time, which also made him ridiculously happy.

He was, as it happened, simply ridiculously happy about his surprisingly wonderful life.

He was still doing the job he loved, of course, trotting out his title of Vice President of Snoopery and Skulduggery as often as necessary to remind his mates that he wasn't a man to be trifled with—nor zip tied and hauled off to the wilds of Scotland and abandoned. Mairead had early on offered herself as a perfect candidate to be his assistant on his business assignments, complete with conservative business attire and librarian's glasses that made him absolutely crazy. He generally kept his hands to himself and merely watched in awe as she smoothly discussed the pernickety details of any given transaction with a finesse that even Cameron admired.

If all that working and finessing required a regular schedule of naps in the afternoon in the privacy of their own home, well, he liked to indulge her as often as possible so she would smile at him equally as often.

She'd also insisted on braces, which he'd provided without hesitation though he didn't think she needed them. Her smile was perfection because it was hers and he was happy to be the beneficiary of it as often as possible.

He jumped a little when he realized she'd taken out her earbuds and was simply watching him with a smile on her face. He considered, then lifted his hand, pointed his pointer finger at her, then turned his hand over and used that same finger in a way that could only be taken as a motion beckoning her to come to him.

She put down her duster, raised an eyebrow, and crooked her finger at him .

And so, he noted happily, was the state of their marriage. He was simultaneously bemused by and arse over teakettle in love with that woman there who had arrived in the Future only to, as she would have quoted her father saying, stride forth and conquer everything in her path, including him. He suspected if her uncle Lachlan could have seen her presently, he would have been very proud of the very confident modern woman she'd become. He knew he was.

He pushed away from the range and started around the island to acquiesce to her demand, but found himself coming to a halt at the sound of a knocking on their front door.

"Och, nay," Mairead said, reaching out and taking hold of his arm before he could react. "I've business with you."

He pulled her into his arms. "I am, as always, your humble and devoted servant. But I think we have company. There they go, knocking again as if they very much want to get inside."

"Kiss me briefly, then."

"If you insist."

"You know you want to."

He laughed and kissed her as thoroughly as he dared because, as she had so rightly divined, he most certainly did indeed want to. He lifted his head and looked at her.

"I'm having a thought."

She looked a little flushed. "So am I. Let's ignore the knock."

He smiled, because he was just so damned happy he couldn't seem to stop. "They are persistent."

She sighed. "Very well, let's go—wait, what was your thought?"

"I'm wondering if we dare answer given that it's a door and we've run afoul of them in the past."

"Let's hold hands whilst we do."

He nodded, then paused. "Let's examine your thought later."

She smiled. "If you like."

"You know I do."

She laughed a little at him, which he enjoyed more than he would ever admit, then kept hold of her hand as he walked with her across their flat, promising himself to boot out swiftly whoever had dared arrive on their front stoop at the truly indelicate hour of 7 PM.

A quick look through the spyhole revealed souls no more nefarious than Jackson and Olivia Kilchurn, whilst an opening of the door disclosed that Jackson was carrying dessert. Mairead squeezed his hand briefly, then abandoned him in favor of drawing inside one of her favorite new London friends. Jackson held up the bag.

"Mint chip and something else with seven types of chocolate."

Oliver waved him inside without hesitation, then popped Jackson's offerings into the freezer for later consumption.

He found himself once again leaning back against his AGA only this time he was listening to rapid-fire, authentic Gaelic being tossed about with enthusiasm by those three there. His headache was far less than it had been at first on those same sorts of evenings, but perhaps that was due to spending every day of his current lifetime speaking the same with his, again, favorite person.

He watched them for a bit, then found himself joined in his leaning by Jackson himself.

"Any interesting finds lately?" Jackson asked.

"A few swords," Oliver said with a shrug. "A handful of rare gems and some priceless art. The usual."

"You're jaded."

Oliver shot Jackson a look. "You're one to talk."

Jackson smiled pleasantly. "Agreed. And since I am, I'm wondering if you might be up for something different."

"I'm all ears," Oliver said. "What's on offer?"

"A bit of a hunt."

"What are we hunting?"

"Whom," Jackson corrected.

"You know," Oliver said with a grimace, "I did this dance fairly recently and I ended up being the one hunted." He imagined he could save for later a detailed recounting of how that hunt had left him sprinting into the past where he'd met the love of his life.

"Who was after you?"

"Patrick MacLeod."

"I haven't met him yet."

"You'd like him."

Jackson considered that. "How did it go?"

"Tiringly," Oliver said with a faint smile. "In the end, I gave him a fat lip and he left me limping home, barely breathing."

Jackson considered. "I suspect that isn't the entire truth, but I'll let it lie for now. What of my venture?"

"I'll bite," Oliver conceded. "Whom are we hunting?"

"I have a pair of wee cousins who need to be found."

"Medieval ex-pats?"

Jackson nodded.

"Do you want them to survive the experience?"

"Hard to torture them if they don't."

Oliver held out his hand and shook Jackson's firmly. "I'm in."

"Awesome," Jackson said. "So are Derrick and Zachary, who have their own reasons for corralling the little blighters to at least thank them for their efforts."

"Text me time and place."

"We're planning a strategy meeting at Wyckham next week. Bring your lady if she likes."

"She will."

"Mine will as well." Jackson rubbed his hands together. "Let's celebrate our future success with dessert."

Oliver couldn't think of a better way to do it.

Several hours later, he woke to an elbow placed very gently in his side and realized that the mystery on the telly he and his lady wife had turned on after their guests had left had reached its end. He yawned, shook his head sharply, then looked at Mairead who was nestled in his arms and looking perfectly comfortable in her spot.

"Is it over?" he managed.

"It is," she said. "Who did it?"

"The deacon with the purple trainers."

She smiled. "When did you know?"

"Four minutes in," he admitted, "which was all I could manage before I fell asleep." He put his feet back on the floor and looked at her. "And speaking of mysteries solved, I found something for you."

She smiled and reached out to touch his cheek. "Is the gift your own sweet self?"

"You could call this Episode Two in the same series."

"I like those sorts of programmes," she said approvingly. "Very convenient to have all that time between viewings to work out the details of the crimes."

He kissed her, smiled, then went to fetch what he'd found the week before in a very musty old bookshop full of all sorts of interesting things. He sat down, then handed her the treasure, wrapped as it was in discreet brown paper.

She unwrapped it, then looked at him in surprise. "‘ The Duke and the Kitchen Maid, '" she said breathlessly. "The entire thing."

"Are you going to finish it now?"

She studied the book in her hands for several moments in silence, then looked at him. "I'm very grateful for the gift and I will treasure it," she said slowly, "but I don't think I'll read it."

"Really?" he asked, though he was smiling as he said it. "And why is that, my lady?"

"Because, my lord, I'll write my own story."

He was utterly unsurprised. He leaned back against the couch and studied her thoughtfully. "What sort of tale will it be?"

She slipped her hand into his. "A tale of adventure, great battles won, and hedges vanquished."

He shot her a look, but she only smiled.

"It will be a love story," she assured him.

"Whose?"

"Ours."

"Shall we go add a chapter to it where the happy couple actually sleeps for a change?"

"They can sleep tomorrow," she said. "I think they have other things to do tonight."

Who was he to argue with that? He laughed and pulled her up with him to go indulge in a bit more of that not-sleeping business.

He woke somewhere during the middle of the night and experienced a moment of panic when he looked to his right and didn't see Mairead lying next to him. He realized, however, that her toes were wedged beneath his calf which was somewhat reassuring. He lifted the covers to find her reading by flashlight. He noted the title, then clucked his tongue.

"You're incorrigible."

"I had to know how it ended."

He made himself more comfortable in her cave and smiled at her. "Finished yet?"

"Not yet."

"What's happened so far?"

"Well," she said, glancing at him briefly, "there have been many scorching looks, a handful of equally incendiary kisses, and a single reference to what I'm too much a lady to name."

He put his arm under his head and made himself a bit more comfortable still, though he had to pull the covers off from over their heads before claustrophobia did him in.

"You know," he said slowly, "We've been married for a handful of months now and there has been quite a bit of that sort of activity—"

"Oliver," she said, shooting him a look, her face flaming.

He leaned up, kissed her sweetly, then put his head back down. "Very well, my lady. I will remain discreetly silent on the matter."

She blew her fringe out of her eyes and flipped a page, but she was still blushing. He tried to see how much more she still had to go, but she turned the book so he couldn't.

"Look at your mobile," she said, glancing at him briefly.

He reached behind him for his phone, promising himself to leave it charging in the kitchen more often, then pulled up a text from his wife. It contained a photo of what looked to be a fairly substantial hoard of Regency-era weaponry.

He let out a low whistle. "Very nice."

She kept hold of her wee romance with one hand and handed him a folder with the other.

He leaned up on his elbow. "Clues?"

She looked up at him with wide, innocent eyes. "Who knows?"

"You obviously do," he chided her. "Be a love and put me out of my misery."

"Ach, well, if you must know, Jamie feels there's something perhaps… off in this particular year. Something missing. Or perhaps two missing things in the same time where they shouldn't be. You know how uneasy that makes him."

He did indeed know that. "What's in here, then?"

"Tidbits," she said absently, turning back to her book. "Really, Oliver, I have to at least finish this chapter. The Duke and his gel have encountered each other in his orangery and I think there may be, well, you know." She shot him a look. "Happenings of interest."

He waved her on to her reading, smiling to himself as he did so because he knew she knew how much he loved trolling through details for clues. He turned on his bedside lamp, made himself more comfortable for the perusal of what she'd given him, and dove in.

He flipped through a dozen pages of photographs, property descriptions, and the bios of a pair of possible miscreants. He considered, then looked at his wife to find her watching him instead of reading her book.

"When did you find all this?" he asked.

"Whilst you were having a wee nap on Cameron's sofa a fortnight ago. Emily and I asked Mrs. Paxton for help in our investigations. She was a wealth of information."

Oliver imagined she was. Emily was, of course, accustomed to all sorts of unusual happenings, and she had pledged her fealty to Cameron just as they all had.

Mrs. Paxton, however, whilst in the thick of all the goings on, had remained discreetly aloof from the madness. She held court as Cameron's personal secretary, which lent an air of distinction to the place and surely impressed those coming in to gawk at the business face of the Cameron empire.

Her encyclopedic knowledge of social protocols and what he suspected was a photographic recollection—updated frequently—of the Debrett's guide to everything peerage-related had also been very useful on many occasions. But it was her unflappability in the face of the rag-tag lot of them about their usual business of uncovering potentially unsavory but always exciting things that had been a constant in their lives and, he had to admit, felt like a bit of the glue that held them all together in proper order.

"Did Mrs. Paxton enjoy it?" he asked with a smile.

"She chortled at least twice," Mairead said solemnly.

"A record."

She smiled. "I thought you'd think so." She nodded at the papers. "Does it seem like cheating to know so many details now that they couldn't have possibly known then?"

He considered. "We could term it thorough preparation and call it good. It might be wise, though, to do a little onsite investigating."

"A little stroll through the grounds," she agreed. "Just to observe."

"The current estate grounds?"

She smiled pleasantly. "Now, where would be the sport in that?"

"Well," he said, drawing the word out until he thought he could finish without rubbing his hands together with glee, "we could just go observe wherever our skipping feet take us."

"Don't tell Jamie."

"He'll know anyway," Oliver said, with feeling.

"I'm afraid that might be true, but we're too far away for him to grumble at us."

"Unless we go home to your keep or to Cameron Hall or that wee house we're building around the bay from Derrick and Sam and then he'll absolutely know where to find us and grumble at us."

She looked at him with her beautiful, luminous face and gorgeous eyes and smiled again. "You aren't afraid."

"Why would I be?" he asked politely. "My wife carries a very saucy knife in her belt and I know a few stern words to mutter in moments of peril."

She laughed a little and turned back to her book. He watched her for a moment or two before he decided there was no time like the present to celebrate the fact that his life had turned out to be so much lovelier than he ever would have expected, full of so much more than grinding through every day on determination alone.

Living every day in bliss was so much nicer.

"Read faster," he suggested.

"I'm trying to, but you're distracting me."

"Read tomorrow?"

She laughed a little, then shut her book and set it aside. "What do you suggest?"

"I might have to consult my Life Manual—"

Or, perhaps not. He smiled as his wife put her arms around his neck, described to him in great detail just how much she loved him, and he, not being any sort of eejit at all, returned the favor.

Life was sweet.

Every single blessed day of it.