**Chapter 24: The Question**
Saturday arrived clear and unseasonably warm, the kind of autumn day New York produced maybe a handful of times each year — golden light, crisp air, the whole city looking like it had been specifically designed for a moment worth remembering.
"Where are we going?" Mara asked for the fourth time as they walked, Jonah steering her with a hand at her back, deliberately vague about their destination.
"You'll see. We're close."
They ended up at the Brooklyn Bridge Park, the skyline stretching out across the water in a view that had become one of Mara's favorites during their brief months in the city — Manhattan glittering on one side, the bridge arching overhead, the particular magic of a place that felt both enormous and intimate at once.
"This spot," Jonah sa
