Enlightened End
Page 25
Since he resigned in his position on the board of Winters Group, the company has thrived. None of us realized the hold he had over the decisions being made. Now that he’s gone, I’m able to truly lead, and so far, our profit margins have risen in spades. The board members are happy. The staff are ecstatic, and the construction of the Berkeley Towers is going smashingly. We should be moved in by next year as long as new problems don’t arise.
Sighing, I pull out another letter farther along in the stack. Based on the date, it looks like around the time I graduated high school.
My beautiful boy,
Seeing you walk across that stage was a dream come true. You’re so tall, a foot above your sister, but incredibly handsome.
Your valedictorian speech made me weep. I know, I know, I’m a sappy mom, but in that moment, I knew you’d be okay. Sure, I could see the cocky confidence your father has bestowed on you, but in your eyes I could see your soul, son. And, baby, it’s beautiful. You are beautiful. I can’t wait to see where you end up.
A mutual friend of your father’s stated you were going Ivy League. What an honor. My son, Valedictorian and an Ivy League college attendee. You must be spinning with excitement.
Greta and I are cheering you on from afar. She’s very proud of her big brother and sad, too, that she doesn’t get to know you. I have to keep talking to her about approaching you. She wants more than anything to have a relationship with you, but alas, I fear for her safety and well-being as well as yours. We’re not a part of your life, and I fear we never will be. At least I know that my son is going on to bigger and better things. Hopefully, leaving all of this behind.
I wish you all that life has to offer and more.
I love you dearly.
Your mother,
Gretchen
Without even taking a breath, I grab another in the stack. Tears pour down my face and wet my shirt. My heart is pounding out of my chest.
Grant,
I am so proud of you! Greta and I cheered so loudly when your lacrosse team won the championships. We’ve attended every home game and have loved seeing your skills grow along with the man you’re becoming. You’re a natural sportsman. Fair, strong, and calculated. Keep up the great work, my beautiful boy.
I love you, forever and ever.
Mom
Wiping my nose and clearing my throat, I suck back a huge gulp of my whiskey I’d poured earlier. The alcohol burns the back of my throat, but it wakes me up. Brings me back to the here and now. This is not a decade ago. It’s the night before my wedding. The night before the rest of my life. Still, I grab the very last one in the stack. I need some closure. The rest I’ll read with Luna. Allow my connection to her to help heal the wounds of the past as we go through them together. For now, I’ll end at the end. The very last one in the box.
My dear son,
Today you graduated college. I have never been happier in my entire life. My son, graduating with honors. I know this is the last letter I will write to you. I now know you are not getting them, and each one returned breaks my heart all over again. Plus, I can’t bear to spend another year receiving no responses. Just know, my beautiful boy, that your mother loves you. Always. Forever. And through the rest of my life, until the day I take my dying breath, I will think of you. Often. Fondly. With more love than I can ever bear to share in person.
I wish you the most beautiful life, Grant.
With everything that I am, I love you.
Your mother,
Gretchen
Epilogue
LUNA
Today is the first day of the rest of my life. Grant reaches for my hand, and we turn to face the small congregation together.
I see everyone I could ever want or need in my life standing up and cheering.
Dara and Silas McKnight, with their daughter, Destiny, on her daddy’s hip and almost one-year-old Jackson on his mommy’s. Dara is beaming with joy. “Your auras are beautiful, baby!” she cries out with glee. Silas just shakes his head and kisses his daughter’s temple.
Next to them are Atlas and Mila Powers, her large pregnant belly protruding on her small frame. Atlas is holding his daughter, Aria, around the waist as she stands on her chair and claps wildly.
Behind them are Trent and Genevieve Fox and their entire brood, including her brother, Rowan, who has almost finished college at Berkeley State and about to go into the majors alongside his brother-in-law. The Ports want him badly, and he wants to be on the same team as Trent. Mary is standing sweet as can be next to her new boyfriend. Trent keeps giving the boy the stink eye, one arm around his wife, the other around his child, William. Genevieve looks like the mother of fertility as she cradles their newborn daughter, Amberlyn, named after Viv’s bestie Amber.
The next row down are Amber and Dash Alexander. Dash is holding his wife in both his arms, his hands protectively cradling her still-flat belly. They just announced their pregnancy to the crew last week, much to everyone’s delight. Amber will continue to be a busy pediatrician at UC Davis while Dash scales back some of his tantric writing and speaking engagements to be an at-home dad. Aside from the yoga classes, he’ll write books when he can, but his kid is taking front and center while his wife becomes the breadwinner. Her brother, Brian, and his girlfriend are sitting with them, clapping away.
Standing with them are Nick and Honor Salerno and their twins, Hannon and Nick Jr. There has been no announcement of another baby, but the couple has agreed to start trying in the near future. Work has started on the Berkeley Four towers, and along with that, Nick and Honor are busy preparing their second location, which will occupy an entire floor in tower one. Gracie is sitting in the aisle with them, along with her fiancé, Victor, who happens to be one hundred percent Italian, much to the Salerno matriarch’s delight. Nick has even given Victor his approval and hired him to work at their gym. Nick plans to have Victor and Gracie oversee the new gym once it’s up and running.
Across the aisle is my mother, Jewel, standing arm-in-arm with her best friend, Crystal Nightingale. Both women are crying what I hope are happy tears. My mother is nothing but smiles. When she came back from her trip to India, she went right into wedding planning mode with her cohort, Crystal. Which was awesome because I was so busy working and preparing for the shutting down of Lotus House while work began on our buildings. My mother took to Grant like a baby to a bottle. She loved him instantly. Said she knew when she touched his hand that his heart was pure and filled with love for me. I don’t know how she knew that, and sharing did not occur, but I didn’t care either way. All that mattered was my mother was happy for me and liked her future son-in-law. Of course, he did sway her pretty well when he told her we’re going to try to conceive during our honeymoon. Grandbabies tend to trump all…or so I’m told.
Behind my mother and auntie is Grant’s family. His mother, Gretchen, and her date—who we’re told has promise—along with Brett, Greta, Gavin, and Gabriella. Greta is holding both of her hands to her chest, and tears are falling down her cheeks. She’s such a big crier! And her tears are making me a bit teary too. Brett is fist-pumping the air like a lunatic, happy as a clam we’re about to make them an aunt and uncle. Hopefully.
Standing behind them are Clayton and Monet Hart with their daughter, Lily, and son, Knight. Apparently, Clayton’s repeated tossing of Moe’s birth control pills worked, because when Amber and Dash announced they were pregnant to the group, Clayton and Monet announced they were having their third child too, though she’s only ten weeks versus Amber’s twelve. Clayton is ecstatic. Moe apparently has put Clayton on full diaper duty with Knight for his sins.
Pulling in the back rows are Bethany and Coree from Rainy Day Café and Ricardo and his now live-in boyfriend, Esteban. Next to Ricky are Vanessa and Devon McKnight and Joan and Richard Fox, as well as Annette, Grant’s assistant, who brought a date. Cannot wait to grill her about that!
The rest of the attendees are some well-loved clients of mine and business associates of G
rant’s, but for the most part, we’ve kept our wedding very small. No bridesmaids or groomsmen, just us and our loved ones as witnesses.
“It is with great honor that I present to you Mr. and Mrs. Winters!” the minister announces.
The crowd claps even louder, whoops, and hollers.
Grant squeezes my hand and leans toward me, his lips brushing against my ear. “Are you ready to walk through life as Mrs. Luna Winters?”
I smile up at him. “Absolutely!” I swing his hand, and he leads me down the aisle.
When we reach the end, he turns me around and kisses me deep. The crowd goes wild once more. Once he’s had enough, he presses his forehead to mine. “I never thought I could be this happy, but you enlightened me to a whole new world. One where I’m loved and in love in return.”
I cup both of his cheeks and look up into his sapphire-blue eyes, hoping our children get those gems one day. “When I first got your letter about Lotus House six months ago, I thought my world had ended, but you, you, Grant, enlightened me to the possibilities of what we’re going to create. To what we have created together with our love. And hopefully, we’ll be adding a family to our lives very soon. What we have is never ending. It’s only the beginning to our path of enlightenment together…forever.”
The End
* * *
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For The Reader
Lotus House and the crew have all enjoyed spending time with you. It has been a long two years, and now the series is complete. Each of the seven couples have found their happily ever after as I hope you have found your own happiness along with them.
There have been a lot of highs, lows, gut-wrenching pains, heart-stopping moments, and many tears. And I hope you’ve had just as many laughs, sighs, and happy memories to keep you warm at night when thinking about this crew. This series was a labor of love and a goal of mine to share something with all of you that’s special to me, a practice that feeds my soul.
I thank you from the bottom and top of my heart for reading all seven novels. I hope you got from these stories what you needed from a romance but also an education of sorts about the practice of yoga, meditation, auras, and the chakras, on top of the need for mental and physical wellness. There is so much negativity in the world, and I find that immersing myself in these practices takes all of that away for a time. Long enough to reset and recharge my faith in the love and beauty of mankind.
Once more, I thank you kindly.
Namaste,
Audrey
Also by AUDREY CARLAN
The Falling Series
Angel Falling
London Falling
Justice Falling
* * *
The Trinity Trilogy
Body (Book 1)
Mind (Book 2)
Soul (Book 3)
Life: A Trinity Novel (Book 4)
Fate: A Trinity Novel (Book 5)
* * *
The Calendar Girl Series
January (Book 1)
February (Book 2)
March (Book 3)
April (Book 4)
May (Book 5)
June (Book 6)
July (Book 7)
August (Book 8)
September (Book 9)
October (Book 10)
November (Book 11)
December (Book 12)
Calendar Girl: Volume One (January–March)
Calendar Girl: Volume Two (April–June)
Calendar Girl: Volume Three (July–September)
Calendar Girl: Volume Four (October–December)
* * *
The Lotus House Series
Resisting Roots (Book 1)
Sacred Serenity (Book 2)
Divine Desire (Book 3)
Limitless Love (Book 4)
Silent Sins (Book 5)
Intimate Intuition (Book 6)
Enlightened End (Book 7)
Acknowledgments
To my editor, Ekatarina Sayanova, with Red Quill Editing, LLC… This is it. It feels like it’s the end of an era, though the fact that I’m taking you with me to the next series means our work has only just begun.
To my Waterhouse Press editor, Jeanne De Vita, thank you for loving this series as much as I have. Your endless enthusiasm for the Lotus House gang has been such a kick! I hope to work with you sometime again in the future.
To my pre-reader, Ceej Chargualaf, this was a wild ride, but we made it through! Your laughter, anger, threats, cheers, daily emails, messages, and “you got this” notes have made this series so much more. Thank you for being you.
Tracey Vuolo, you came onto this project as a pre-reader later in the process, and you busted ass to catch up. I adore the way you connect with my words and am so lucky to have you as part of my team.
Jeananna Goodall, thank you for knowing just what to say when life gets in the way. You are an amazing PA, beta reader, but more than that, you are my friend.
Ginelle Blanch and Anita Shofner, my beta extraordinaires, you’re like the sprinkles on my donuts. You help make my novels more colorful and sparkly. I appreciate your willingness to always jump in and get the job done. And Ginelle…the crying pictures make my freaking day every time I get one! Means I’m hitting the readers in the squishy parts too.
To the Audrey Carlan Street Team of wicked-hot Angels, together we change the world. One book at a time. BESOS-4-LIFE, lovely ladies.
About Audrey Carlan
Audrey Carlan is a #1 New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal best-selling author. She writes wicked hot love stories that are designed to give the reader a romantic experience that’s sexy, sweet, and so hot your e-reader might melt. Some of her works include the wildly successful Calendar Girl Serial, Falling Series, and the Trinity Trilogy.
She lives in the California Valley where she enjoys her two children and the love of her life. When she’s not writing, you can find her teaching yoga, sipping wine with her “soul sisters,” or with her nose stuck in a wicked hot romance novel.
Any and all feedback is greatly appreciated and feeds the soul. You can contact Audrey or her personal assistant below:
Email: carlan.audrey@gmail.com
Personal Assistant: audrey.carlanpa@gmail.com
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