Alissa Johnson
Romance Author


“He did. I am surprised at you, Sophie, to hold to such
silliness.”
Sophie was taken aback. “You’ve never called it that before.”
“I hadn’t thought it necessary. I assumed you knew all that
talk of luck and misfortune was merely for fun.”
“How can you say that?” she demanded. “Knowing everything
that has happened?”
“How can I not, knowing how it all happened? You are a
willful and sometimes rash young woman with a propensity
for finding trouble. That tiger came after you because you had
recently come from the butcher’s. You got lost in that jungle
because you wandered off to inspect an interesting bloom,
rather than stay with your guide as you should have, and—”
“Even if what you say is true, though I reserve the right to
disagree, how do you explain my narrow escapes?”
“By pointing out that although you are a troublesome
young woman, you are also rather clever and levelheaded
when the occasion requires it. If you had panicked, that tiger
would have pounced on you before I could intervene, and
you came across that jungle tribe by following running water
with the knowledge that it was your best chance of reaching
civilization.”
Sophie thought about that for a very long time. What Mr.
Wang was implying threatened a concept she had held as irrefutable
truth for most of her life. It was not something she
could simply accept out of hand.
“It doesn’t explain everything,” she finally said in a soft
voice.
“No, but then we are all subject to the whims of fate now
and again. You are not alone in that.”
Mr. Wang stood up and tugged gently at the hem of his coat
to straighten it. “Think on what I’ve said. Neither your father,
nor Mrs. Summers, nor myself ever meant our little jests about
your luck to be anything more than that, little jests.”
Sophie nodded, silently agreeing to consider the matter
further, but unable to promise more than that.


Mr. Wang must have understood her reticence. “If you find
you cannot bring yourself to see the matter differently, at least
consider this. You do not have twelve years and four months
with Alex, you have five- and- twenty years . . . half your life
with him, and half without, hmm?”
And with that revelation he took himself off, following the
gravel path deeper into the garden.
Sophie sat stunned for a moment.
He was right.
Five- and- twenty years.
They had five- and- twenty years!
She shot up and headed toward the house at a dead run.
She had to tell Alex!
Then she had to go back and thank Mr. Wang properly.
He’d given them five- and- twenty years.
And he’d given her hope.
The Final Two Pages of Epilogue from  AS LUCK WOULD HAVE IT