Page 54

EPILOGUE

Mael

Seven Months Later

“What do you think a retired hitman is supposed to do for fun?” I asked, leaning back against my chair, swiveling around on it.

Theo glanced at me sideways. I knew he was getting annoyed with me, and I grinned. Tough.

I wasn’t fucking leaving.

I was so fucking bored, especially since Lia decided she wanted to take some classes or shit “to find her passion,” as she put it.

She didn’t need to find her passion when she had me. I was her passion, just as she was mine, but my girl was insistent. So now, she was off to a pottery class, and I was fucking bored out of my mind.

I could find something— someone —to kill, but I was sure Lia wouldn’t like that. Plus, I was trying to be good, whatever the fuck that meant.

I didn’t kill the fucker who cut me off on my way over to the crematorium, so that was an improvement.

“Why don’t you take a vacation?” Theo suggested.

I grabbed a piece of paper he had lying on the desk nearby. I didn’t bother to read more than a few lines—something about taxes on his business. Boring. Instead, I attempted to make a paper airplane.

Theo slapped my hand and grabbed the paper away when I barely got in the first fold.

“You’re annoying,” he muttered. “Why don’t you try opening a business? I’m sure that would keep you occupied.”

“And away from here, huh?” I asked, smiling. “I can never do that to you.”

He didn’t say anything to that. I laughed and patted him on the shoulder, and he let out a small sigh. “I think I might need help.”

“You have help,” I said, pointing my thumb at myself.

He shot me a look. “You’re not helping at all. You’re more like an annoyance. Retirement seems to bring that out of you.”

I laughed. “And you’ll be stuck with me for the next hour until Lia gets home.”

He mumbled something under his breath, drawing my amusement.

God, he was fun to fuck around with.

Things had been tense since the day he had driven me to the hospital. He took a risk moving me after the fall, considering I could have broken something major that would have lasting damage, but fortunately, that wasn’t the case.

The doctors said it was a miracle that things weren’t worse.

I knew better. I had my lucky charm by my side. And she was currently leaving me to my own devices while taking a fucking pottery class.

I shook my head.

I was fucking jealous of a class.

Whatever.

I swirled around in my chair, holding back a grin when Theo stared at me from across the room.

He let out a small sigh, put his foot out, and stopped me mid-spin. “Go away. You’re annoying me.”

“And you need help.”

“Not from you,” he said.

I nodded my head in agreement. Not from me, but he needed an extra set of hands around here, considering he had taken on the job of helping… people get rid of things they didn’t want. I might have retired from the profession, but Theo seemed to be going ahead at full steam as if he were afraid there would be nothing else for him to do.

Having this business didn’t seem to keep him busy.

“Are you okay?” I asked. I could see him tensing from where he sat in front of the desktop.

“Yes,” he answered tonelessly, sounding like he had rehearsed the answer for hours in the mirror to appear as unaffected as possible.

Now it was my turn to sigh. “Listen, if something is wrong?—”

“Nothing is wrong. Why would you think that?”

I shrugged. “You just seem… different.”

“And you are projecting. You think I feel different because you are different. How long until Lia is due?”

“Any day now,” I answered with a small smile. Lia was supposed to be due within the next week, but with how grumpy my girl had been in the last couple of days, I knew she wanted him out.

I was having a boy.

A precious little boy who would never have to go through the same pain I’d gone through. A precious little boy I would protect with everything in me.

“Being a dad changes you,” Theo commented.

I shot him a look. “And just how would you know that?”

He shrugged. “I don’t. But it’s pretty obvious.”

“And what about you? Are you excited about being an uncle soon?”

“Yes,” he answered quietly. Seriously. My brother had always been serious—it seemed to be his default mode, but this yes felt much heavier than any other response he could give.

I reached over and cupped his shoulder, squeezing it affectionately.

He shot me one of those rare smiles.

My phone vibrated in my pocket before I could say anything else to him. I pulled it out and saw Lia’s name flashing over the screen.

My heart pounded heavily in my chest—a fucking typical occurrence ever since Lia entered my life. It was a fucking inconvenience, especially since I still didn’t know what to do about it, but I was getting used to it.

I nearly dropped the phone trying to answer it. “Baby?”

“Mael—” She let out a small groan that had my heart plummeting to the fucking ground.

“What, baby? What’s wrong?”

“It’s time.”

“It’s time?” I asked, frowning. What the fuck did that mean?

“ Labor ,” Theo mouthed to me.

It took a moment for the word to process in my brain.

Labor.

Lia was in labor.

Fuck me.

All that I had learned, all that I had done to prepare for this moment, seemed to be thrown right out the window.

I stuttered incoherently, which only drove Lia to hysterics, and she started crying.

Theo rolled his eyes and grabbed the phone away from me. “Just stay where you are, sweetheart. We’ll be right there.” He listened to her say something patiently on the other end of the line before ending it with “I promise.”

He hung up the phone and looked at me. Amusement flashed in his blue eyes, and I made a mental note to fucking punch him in the neck for that later. Right now, I was trying to get the trembling to stop.

“Come on,” Theo said, pulling me out of the chair and directing me out of the office. Theo drove us to Lia.

I couldn’t think, couldn’t feel.

I had thought it would be easy. I fucking thought wrong. And Lia was the one doing the heavy lifting. What if… what if something happened to her during labor? I closed my eyes and willed away the thought. I couldn’t even think about it. I didn’t know what I would do. The only thing I did know was that I couldn’t fucking live without her, and that was fucking that.

Theo pulled up to the side of a small park bench just across the street from her pottery class.

I was out of the car before he came to a complete stop. I ignored the curse he let out, my eyes focused on my girl. She stood quickly and rushed forward into my arms. I caught her in time, feeling her protruding belly pressed up against me. I pulled back and cupped her over the stomach.

“We’re about to meet our baby soon. Are you ready?” she asked me softly.

“As long as you’re by my side, I will be ready for anything,” I answered her, and wasn’t that just the truth? With her by my side, I felt like I could take on a fucking army.

Her face scrunched up when another contraction hit.

I led her to the car, shutting the front passenger door I had left open when I flew out of it and instead got in the back with her. We didn’t need to worry about the bags I had packed in preparation for this. I had stashed one in every car I owned, along with Lia’s car and every one of Theo’s cars.

There was one in the trunk.

I pulled the seatbelt over her and held her close in my arms, my eyes moving up to meet Theo’s in the rearview mirror.

He nodded—his reassurance that he was going to get us to the hospital safely.

I trusted him.

The ride to the hospital was uneventful, thankfully. I timed her contractions. They were still far enough apart that I didn’t have to worry about Lia having our son on the fucking road, in the car, no less, and away from hospital equipment.

It didn’t take us long to get her checked in, considering I had booked this room well in advance, and thankfully, Theo had thought to call ahead for the doctor, who met us by the entrance.

“How are you feeling?” she asked Lia as we got her settled in the bed.

“Like I’m about to push a watermelon out of my vagina.”

Across the room, Theo made a small sound between a cough and a laugh.

Lia blushed a little before she let out a small chuckle.

“Is everything okay?” I asked the doctor, watching closely as she hooked Lia up to the machines.

“Everything is as it should be. You don’t need to worry too much.”

Not worry too much?

Was she crazy? I would fucking stop worrying when I’m dead.

“I’m going to get some coffee,” Theo said. “Do you guys need anything?”

“We’re good,” I said, looking at Lia, who was shaking her head. I walked over to the hospital bed and grabbed her hand in both of mine, looking into those devastating brown eyes that had me completely hooked at first sight.

“I fucking hope our son has your eyes.”

She smiled sweetly at me. “I hope he looks like his dad… whoever that man is.”

I leaned down and nipped at her neck playfully for that bratty comment. She let out a laugh and tried to pull away from me. I stopped when another contraction hit her. They were getting closer and closer.

“Okay?” I asked.

She let out a small breath of air and seemed to force her shoulders to relax. She was trying hard not to show her pain.

My brave, silly girl.

“As long as you’re here with me, I’ll be okay.”

“Good. ’Cause I’m not going anywhere.”

“I know,” she said. “Out of everything in my life, the one thing I am most sure about is you. Thank you for being that for me.”

I swallowed hard, trying not to show any emotions to her words. I was supposed to be the strong one, holding steady, so she had someone to lean on, no matter what.

“You don’t ever have to thank me for that,” I said. “I love you.”

Those words were getting easier and easier to say every day I got to spend with her. And they were the truest words I had ever uttered to another human.

I fucking loved her yesterday, I loved her today, and I would love her tomorrow, until forever. I thought I might have loved her the first time I saw her, as if my soul had recognized that this girl belonged to me, even if my conscious mind hadn’t yet been made aware of it.

“I love you too,” she said sweetly.

I leaned down and kissed her deeply, savoring the very taste of her and vowing to myself that everything was going to be okay. It had to be. I would make a deal with the devil if that was what it took.

* * *

Eight long, grueling hours later, I heard my baby cry for the first time.

My heart stuttered wildly in my chest from the sound, and I could feel a small ache forming there—a good kind of ache.

Lia let out a small, tired cry. “Mael, go check on our baby,” she urged.

I was still trying to make sure my feet were planted firmly on the ground and that my knees wouldn’t betray me.

I looked down at my wife. Her skin was flushed, with a thin layer of sweat coating it, and her long brown hair was a mess. She looked tired. And beautiful. So fucking beautiful, my chest hurt.

“Are you okay?” I asked, bending down and cupping her cheek.

She smiled, leaning her head to the side and kissing the inside of my palm. “I am. Now go check on our son.”

I nodded and moved over to where the nurses had taken him. I watched as they cleaned him up and checked him over. He was crying.

Loud and proud.

There was a thin patch of light hair at the top of his scalp, his skin was pink, and his cheeks were chubby. I wasn’t a man who gave in to my emotions, but I could feel tears welling in my eyes at the first sight of him.

He was beautiful.

And innocent, so completely oblivious to all the terror of the world, all the monsters. And I vowed I would protect that oblivion, that innocence, with everything in me. Tears rolled down my cheeks.

He looked like mine.

He was fucking perfect.

I fell in love with him at first sight.

He was mine.

Mine and Lia’s.

I turned back to my girl. She had tears rolling down her cheeks as well.

“He’s perfect, kitten.”

She made a choked sound. “Really?”

“Absolutely perfect.”

The tears turned into a full-blown cry when the nurse placed our little bundle of joy on her chest. He smacked his lips as if looking for food, making me smile.

She looked at me. “You’re right. He is perfect.”

I leaned down close to her, wrapping her in my arms, and together, we gazed down at our beautiful, perfect boy.

Contentment filled me.

I knew I had done a lot of bad shit in this world. I knew redemption was a word that would never touch me, knowing I was so far beyond it that I would never be able to ask for it back.

But this contentment?

I just wanted to hold on to it forever and never let go. I would never ask for anything else.

“I love you,” I whispered the words onto the skin of her temple. I turned to my son, leaning down and kissing his little forehead. “And I love you.”

And that was all there was to it.

Lia

Five Years Later

I smiled when I heard my children playing in the yard.

Things were good.

No, they were more than good. They were… peaceful.

That was the only way I could describe our life.

Everything was peaceful and happy, and I thanked my lucky stars that we got to wake up to this normal every day of our lives.

I knew Mael didn’t think he deserved it, that he was far out of reach of redemption, but I didn’t agree with him.

He was right when he said having kids could be his chance at redemption.

And I loved the man he had become with our children in the picture. I loved that everything that made him him still remained. That the core of the man I had fallen in love with was still very much present, but he had become more refined with age.

And I had only loved him more and more with each year that passed.

My smile widened when my children came into view, and then my husband, who was chasing them around in the backyard, playing their favorite game of the tickle monster.

That was the only monster in their life—a mythical creature that Daddy sometimes pretended to be to bring them joy.

My eyes turned blurry at the thought.

My family was here and safe and happy. I looked out to the huge yard. We bought this house when our son, Caden, was three, and our daughter, Isabella, was one. As much as I loved living in the apartment, Caden and Isabella needed a yard to grow up in. And we had kept the apartment.

Caden saw me first, and he let out a happy squeal, running over to me. Isabella noticed her brother veering off course right away. She let out an even louder scream when she saw me, following behind Caden, but at a much slower pace.

Mael stood there and watched our children with a smile on his face that just about turned me to goo and made me want to have another baby with him.

My boy was five now, and he looked more and more like his father every single day that passed. I knew Mael wanted our children to look like me, but I was secretly happy that wasn’t the case.

I loved looking into my children’s blue eyes, knowing this was how Theo and Mael must have looked before they had their childhood stolen from them.

It made me feel resentful that my father even had a hand in that to begin with.

My father was still serving out his sentence.

He would be in there for the rest of his life. When I imagined my future as a little girl, I always thought I would marry my Prince Charming, have my babies, and have both my parents and my brother with me.

Now, I didn’t have my mom, my dad, or my brother, and I certainly didn’t marry Prince Charming but the villain.

And that was okay.

More than okay.

“Mommy!” Caden cried out happily, wrapping his arms around my waist and burying his face in my stomach.

I bent down and put my arms around him, and like every time I held my children in my arms, I could feel my heart expanding, as if this little organ inside me was suddenly too big for my body.

I looked up to see Mael had lifted our daughter up in his arms and was bringing her over to me. She made a grabbing motion with her hands when I was within reach, patting Mael on his chest to signal what she wanted. He grinned and winked at me before handing her over to me. I took turns kissing my children all over their faces, eliciting sweet little giggles out of them.

I never thought I could feel love for anyone as intensely as I felt for Mael, but God proved me wrong when he blessed me with my babies. And Mael and our babies were my entire world right now.

Mael picked up our son, and I picked up our daughter. I stood up and pressed in close to him, feeling a deep sense of protection… like I was in my own little snow globe with my family.

“I love you,” I said to Mael. And like every time I told him this, softness and amazement entered his eyes as if he couldn’t believe that I did love him. It made me sad to think he might feel like he didn’t deserve to be loved, so I made sure to tell him every day, multiple times a day.

And like every time I told him, he replied, “I love you too.”

And I knew he meant it. Every single time.

I reached up on my tiptoes and kissed his lips, feeling my heart race from the simple contact alone.

Caden gagged, wiggling in Mael’s arms and trying to get free, and my daughter, proving to be her brother’s shadow, did the same thing.

We put them down and let them run off to play.

Mael wrapped his arms around me, pulling me in close to his strong body.

“Are you happy, kitten?”

I put my arms around? his waist and tipped my head back to look at him, asking for another kiss.

He complied.

“Am I happy?” I said, repeating his words back to him. My eyes briefly went to our children before meeting his once more. “I am living my very own happily ever after. So, yes. I am very happy.”

Thanks to him, to our little family, I no longer felt directionless. I finally felt like I had a purpose in life.

“Good,” he responded.

“What about you? Are you happy?”

“Way more than I deserve,” came his gruff reply. I opened my mouth to argue with him when he pressed his finger against my lips. “I know it. I had expected to live the rest of my life alone. I was fine with that. Then you came in and changed everything. You changed me for the better. You gave me two beautiful children. You taught me to love someone other than my brother. You are the very reason I live, I breathe, I survive. You are the very reason for my existence. And I don’t deserve you. I didn’t deserve you back then, and I know I don’t deserve you now, and I know it won’t change anything, but I will try every day for the rest of my life to deserve you.”

I blinked, suddenly feeling emotional.

I nodded. “You’ve already done it.”

He laughed. “Not even close.”

I shook my head and rested my face on his chest, knowing there wasn’t a point in arguing. He wouldn’t believe me. But it didn’t matter because I knew better.

I knew him.

He was the dragon in my fairy tale, and he saved me, and that was all.

I stayed there for a while and watched our children play, knowing there were going to be many happy days like this ahead of us.

And I couldn’t fucking wait to live the rest of my life with this man.

My stalker.

My monster.

My husband.

Mine.

The end.