Epilogues
Kane
Flames flickered and leaped for the darkened sky, the logs crackling and popping where we sat around the campfire.
The heavens stretched overhead, going on forever, the blanket of stars so clear where we had set up camp in the private cove near the lake where our family often spent our Sunday afternoons having picnics.
This time, we were spending the entire weekend out here. Surrounded by every member of this incredible family.
This family that had grown and woven into me.
Threads that I hadn’t known I’d been missing.
I was still having a hard time fully wrapping my head around the fact that they were mine. No clue that this kind of joy even existed.
A peal of laughter wound with the peace. “Look it, Daddy! Look it!”
Maci giggled like mad as she held the long metal rod with a marshmallow at the end over the open flames. The white, gooey blob bubbling to a golden perfection right in front of her eyes.
“I see it. You’re doing a great job,” I told her. “It’s almost ready.”
I sat right behind her on a blanket that we’d strewn across the grass-covered ground, hugging her close to make sure she didn’t get too close to the campfire .
Emery was right next to us, her sweet little body tucked up next to mine, radiating all her beauty and light.
Her gorgeous face lit in the glinting leaps of the flames.
“I told you that you were gonna do a really super great job,” Nolan told Maci from where he sat next to her roasting his own marshmallow with his dad on the other side of him watching him closely, though his dog, Rocky, was basically on his lap, doing a little protecting of his own.
His tail wagging nonstop.
My sweet nephew was finally getting his camping trip, even though it was about six weeks late. After everything had gone down, we wanted to give Emery and Maci time to readjust. Time to heal and rest and find the relief in the fact that they were safe.
To settle into this brand-new life after they had been so close to losing it.
My chest tightened as I wrestled with the thought. How close that fucker Tyke had gotten to stealing my heart right out of me. Our minds still twisted over the truth of what we’d discovered.
The connection that Emery and I shared was so much greater than we’d imagined. This thing that had burned between us an affinity only our spirits had recognized.
But I got it now. The depths of what we meant to each other.
Emery snuggled even closer, no doubt, feeling the significance of it, too.
“Guess I didn’t have a fing to be worried about.” Maci shrugged one of her adorable shoulders.
Amused affection pulled through my being, and I pressed a kiss to her temple. “No, Angel Face, you don’t have a thing to be worried about.”
I would fight with everything I had for that. For her to be able to live a life that wasn’t riddled with the types of fears that no child should face.
Give her a life that wasn’t wrought with injustices and wrongs and abuse.
No, I knew I couldn’t protect her from everything. I knew she needed to experience some hardships and obstacles .
They’d make her strong and wise.
Discerning.
But I’d be right at her side to help her see them through.
But for the rest? The monsters that lurked? They’d meet with my wrath first.
“That’s ’cause I got everyfing I need.” Maci gave a resolute nod.
“Well, you got me and you’re always gonna have me,” Nolan told her in his sweet little drawl.
Could feel the love that rolled through the entire circle as everyone watched down on these kids who had us enchanted.
Theo and Cash chuckled a bit, and River and Charleigh smiled softly where they were snuggled under a blanket together on the other side of Nolan.
From where Raven sat on Otto’s lap on a folding chair across the fire, I could see the flames dance in her dark gaze as she watched down on them.
Otto squeezed her a little tighter, the two of them obviously dreaming about the day their little one was going to join Maci and Nolan.
“That’s because I had to come here to find my daddy and my aunties and my uncles and my most very best friend,” Maci prattled.
My arm tightened around her waist, and I simply breathed in her sweetness. “And I am so glad you found me,” I murmured before I shifted to gaze at Emery through the babbling night.
“So glad you found me.” It came out rougher that time as I stared at my woman, and Emery bit down on her bottom lip, toffee eyes full of so much emotion the sight of them hit me like a freight train. The amount of love that slammed me every time I looked at her stunning face.
“I’m so glad we found you, too,” she whispered.
Charleigh tipped her face toward the serene calm of the heavens and exhaled a contented breath. “I really do think this place draws us to it. Guides us where we’re supposed to be.”
Emery peered over at me, so much joy in her expression I could feel it spilling into me. “I do, too. ”
“Daddy! I got a fire!” Maci suddenly shrieked.
“Uh-oh, that’s bad. Real, real bad.” Nolan sadly shook his head.
“Ah, crap,” I rushed, a bit of laughter riding up my throat as I saw the orb of fire that had become Maci’s marshmallow.
It flamed and charred before it fully melted off the tip of the rod and plopped into the flames.
“Oh, no!” Maci cried, close to distraught.
“It’s okay, sweetheart, we have plenty more. Maybe this time your dad will pay attention and stop being so distracted.” Theo sent me a razzing look as he tossed me the bag of marshmallows from the ground next to him.
“Hey, what can I say? I can’t help myself.” I turned my words to Maci. “I got distracted looking at how pretty your auntie is, and I missed the perfect moment.”
“That’s ’cause you lovie doves don’t never stop kissin’.” She huffed like the fact put her out.
“Guess I’m just a kissing dragon.” I smacked a bunch of loud kisses against my daughter’s cheek.
“Daaaaaad,” she drew out with a giggle and shriek, and I was chuckling as I edged back and carefully loaded another marshmallow onto her rod before I helped her place it back into the flames.
That time, I made sure to keep watch, then helped her build a s’more when it was ready.
“Be careful, it might be a little hot,” I told her as she went to take a bite.
She blew on it for a second before she nibbled the edge, chewed, then just dove in and took a giant bite.
“What do you think?” I asked.
She turned to look at me, her precious face a mess of chocolate and marshmallow. “I fink it’s my most very favorite.”
Tenderness pulled and lashed, and Emery curled her hand into the crook of my elbow and rested her cheek on my shoulder.
I glanced between them.
Love swelled.
Powerful .
Unshakable.
Absolute.
And I murmured, “Well, I definitely know what’s mine.”
Emery
A giggle rolled out of me as Kane hauled me up the steep incline behind him. The night was all around us. The moon just enough to light our path.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” I kept my voice hushed against the bewitching silence that surrounded us.
The only sound the low drone of bugs and the soft lapping of the lake hitting the shore in the distance below.
“Won’t like a bear eat us or something? Raven hasn’t stopped talking about them since we got here. ”
Maci had fallen asleep three hours ago in River and Charleigh’s tent next to Nolan since the two of them couldn’t be separated for a second, and once everyone else had gone to sleep, Kane had insisted he and I go for a walk.
He had something he wanted to show me.
Something he promised would be worth it.
Lightness drifted between us, this sweet contentment that I never thought I would find.
My home had become this place.
With him.
With Maci.
He sent me a cocky glance from over his shoulder. His smirk slipped through me on a fit of greed.
God, I would never get enough of this man.
“You really think I’d let a bear get to you? Besides, I think my Little Warrior can handle herself. Wrangle that bear right to its knees.” A playful tease filled his words.
“Hmm…I’m thinking dragon wrangling is more my specialty.”
“Is that so?” That magic gaze glinted as he glanced back while we trudged farther up the path. Our breaths coming short as we climbed our way up the side of the mountain.
“You did say I have you on yours.” It was so freeing that I could flirt with him and feel confident in it. Every emotion I experienced was so different when he looked at me.
The burn and the need and the comfort.
The joy and the hope and the peace.
He shifted around to face me.
The moonlight spilled over him, and the warm glow illuminated his defined jaw and the harsh cut of his brow.
The first time that I saw him, I thought his face was a carved sculpture of fierce, unnerving beauty.
And that’s what he always left me.
Unnerved and shaking.
One glance and a tumble of desire rushed through my veins.
A shockwave of that energy pounded between us. There was no chance of me not being completely swept away by it.
I didn’t care any longer.
I no longer wished to fight it.
Because I now understood why it was him. Why I was drawn, that connection so powerful.
Relentless.
Unstoppable.
Because that’s exactly what we were.
“Is that where you want me, baby? On my knees?” His voice was a low, guttural rasp as he leaned in close.
Heat brushed across my flesh.
Mine dipped to a whisper. “No, Kane, the only place I want you is with me.”
He dragged his fingertips down the side of my face, then gently traced them over my lips. “Good thing because I don’t plan on ever being anywhere else.”
We were nearly at the top, and he kept backing up the trail, tugging me with him until we crested the summit .
Kane guided me out ahead of him, and the breath escaped my lungs on a gush.
At the awe-inspiring beauty stretched out in front of us.
We were near the edge of the cliffs, boulders all around, the lake appearing like silvered glass from the glow of the moon that hung just over the peaks of the mountains in the distance.
“It’s gorgeous.” It was a wisp of wonder.