Epilogue
KARLA
Two days after Lilly was born, a nurse wheeled me toward the automatic doors of Flushing Hospital, and it still didn’t feel real.
They’d made me sit in the wheelchair even though I swore I could walk. “New mom rule,” the nurse chirped, tucking a blanket a little tighter around my lap like I wasn’t already overheating. “You’ve earned the royal treatment.”
Royal treatment. If only my group home caseworkers could see me now.
Lilly was snug in her car seat on my lap, drowning in a pink onesie with tiny silver stars on the feet. Her hat was crooked, her fists balled up near her cheeks. Every few seconds, she made a little squeaky sound like a sleepy baby otter, and my heart did a somersault.
Mine.
Ours.
Family.
The doors slid open with a whoosh, letting in a rush of city noise and chilly air. Brayden stood at the curb next to the SUV like he was on a mission from Heaven and the NHL, face serious, hand wrapped around the handle of the car seat base like it was the Stanley Cup.
“There they are,” he breathed, shoulders dropping as soon as he saw us.
“You’ve been pacing this spot for fifteen minutes,” the nurse teased. “I think the sidewalk has a groove.”
He scrubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “Just making sure the car seat is anchored right.”
He’d already checked it six times. I’d counted.
The nurse helped guide the car seat into his hands. “Okay, Dad. One last reminder—rear-facing, chest clip at armpit level, and call your pediatrician if anything feels off. You’ve got this.”
His jaw flexed as he nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”
I watched him like I wasn’t allowed to blink. Tall, broad-shouldered, hoodie stretched over that ridiculous hockey-player back. Dark hair sticking up from where he’d raked his hands through it for the thousandth time today. Gray Otters cap crooked on his head.
Brayden Cox, NHL enforcer, looked terrified of a seven-pound baby and her car seat.
It was the cutest thing I’d ever seen.
He carefully clicked Lilly’s seat into the base, double-checking every latch. “Okay. Okay, I think we’re good. Are we good?”
“We’re good,” the nurse confirmed with the patience of someone who had seen a thousand versions of this same scene.
I stood up from the wheelchair slowly, feeling the ache in my body, the strange emptiness in my abdomen, the exhaustion that lived behind my eyes. I also felt… light. Somehow heavier and lighter at the same time.
Brayden immediately slid an arm around my waist. “Easy,” he murmured. “You sure you’re okay to walk?”
“I birthed a human,” I muttered. “I can make it to the parking lot.”
He grinned, that soft, crooked one that still made my stomach flip. “You did more than that. You created the most perfect person I’ve ever seen.”
I glanced at Lilly, fast asleep and oblivious, and swallowed hard. “We did.”
We.
The power of that word.
He helped me into the passenger seat like I was made of glass, tucking my coat around me. Once my seatbelt was on, he leaned in and kissed my forehead, lingering just a second longer than necessary.
“Be right back. I’m going to triple-check her straps,” he huffed.
“Again?” I laughed.
“Again,” he said firmly. “I’m allowed to be neurotic for at least the first twenty-four hours.”
He walked around to the other side and fussed with the car seat for a full minute, tugging and testing and adjusting the chest clip exactly one millimeter higher.
Only when he was satisfied did he slide into the driver’s seat, start the car, and grip the steering wheel like it had personally offended him.
I watched his knuckles go white. “You know there are speed limits lower than five miles per hour, right?”
He shot me a look. “The streets are full of maniacs. Also, there are potholes. I don’t trust any of it.”
“You hit dudes for a living,” I reminded him.
“Exactly,” he said. “I know what impact looks like. That’s why we are driving like we live in a bubble wrap commercial.”
I snorted a laugh and then immediately winced as everything down there protested. “Do not make me laugh too hard. I will sue.”
He reached over and laced his fingers with mine, resting our joined hands on the console. “Sorry, baby. Gentle humor only.”
Gentle humor. Right.
We drove home as if the entire city were made of glass. Every corner was a careful, exaggerated turn. Every yellow light was treated like a full-on red. A cab honked behind us and swerved around; Brayden muttered, “Jackass,” under his breath and then checked Lilly’s mirror again.
She slept through the whole thing.
Halfway across the bridge, the skyline opened up in front of us, all steel and windows and glitter. The same city I’d grown up in and never really felt at home in. Until him. Until her.
“Hey,” Brayden muttered quietly. “You okay over there?”
I squeezed his hand. “Yeah. Just… taking it all in.”
“Talk to me,” he urged. “Nurse boyfriend mode is still engaged.”
A laugh puffed out of me. “That’s not a real title.”
“It is now.” His chest puffed out a little as a cool smile spread, brightening his tired face.
I stared ahead, watching sunlight bounce off glass buildings. “I keep thinking they’re going to change their minds.”
He blinked. “Who?”
“The hospital. The universe. I don’t know.” My throat tightened. “Like someone’s going to run out and say, ‘Sorry, clerical error, you don’t get to keep this one.’”
His fingers tightened around mine. “Karla…”
“I know that’s not how it works,” I rushed out. “Logically. But emotionally?” I cleared my throat, fighting the sudden burn in my eyes. “Nobody ever sent me home with balloons or banners. Most of my ‘new homes’ were just… a social worker’s car and a trash bag of clothes.”
He went quiet for a beat, the air thick between us.
Then he said, soft but steady, “There will never be a trash bag in this kid’s story. Or yours. Not ever again.”
My vision blurred. “You promise?”
“On my career,” he said. “On every tooth I still have. On every game I’ll ever play. You and Lilly? You’re it for me. You’re home.”
I turned my head, really looked at him—the sharp jaw, the dark stubble, the eyes that were softer than he’d ever admit. This gruff, stubborn, gorgeous man who had bulldozed his way straight through every one of my defenses and then gently rebuilt them with me.
I’d never felt safer.
I wiped my cheeks as quietly as I could. “You’re going to make me cry my stitches out.”
“Sorry,” he said, not sounding sorry even a little. “I’ll save the heartfelt speeches for after your pain meds.”
“Too late,” I sniffed.
He lifted our joined hands to his mouth and kissed my knuckles, eyes flicking to the rearview mirror again. “Almost home.”
Home.
Our house.
Our family.
By the time we pulled onto our street, my heart was practically vibrating. There were balloons tied to our mailbox—pink, white, and gold—with tiny foil stars bouncing in the breeze. A huge sign was taped across the front door that read: WELCOME HOME, LILLY MARIE!
Myla’s handwriting. Big, loopy letters, dotting the i’s with little hearts like a teenager.
I laughed, tears spilling again. “Oh, my goodness. This is incredible.”
Brayden just stared for a second, then blew out a breath. “They went all out.”
“They?” I asked, though I already knew.
He grinned. “You know damn well this has Myla-and-Martha-went-to-Michael’s energy written all over it.”
He parked, hopped out, and came around to get Lilly’s seat, moving with the slow, deliberate caution of someone defusing a bomb. I opened my door carefully and stood, one hand on the car and one on my tender stomach.
“You good?” he asked.
“So sore,” I admitted. “But good sore.”
“We’ll go slow.” He slipped an arm around my waist again. “I’ve got you.”
We climbed the front steps together. As soon as Brayden lifted the car seat to knock the door, it flew open.
“You’re here!” Myla squealed, launching herself onto the porch in a blur of blond hair and Otters hoodie.
“Inside voice,” Gavin scolded from behind her, even as his own grin went wide. He leaned against the doorframe wearing a T-shirt that said FUNCLE: Like a Dad, Only Cooler and a pair of joggers that probably cost more than my nursing-school textbooks.
Myla’s eyes immediately filled with tears. “Oh my God, give her to me.”
Brayden took a microstep back, clutching the handle of the car seat like it might be yanked out of his hand. “Okay, okay, hang on. Rules. Hands washed. No one touches her head for more than three seconds. And nobody breathes directly on her.”
“Breathe indirectly?” Gavin asked dryly. “You want us to send it through a filter first?”
“Shut up, Hayes,” Brayden muttered.
I laughed. “He’s serious.”
“I am,” Brayden insisted. “We just got her out of the hospital bubble. I’m not taking her back because Uncle Gavin coughed.”
Myla held up both hands. “Fine. I’ll sanitize my entire soul if that’s what it takes. Can we please come meet my niece now?”
Behind them, Kari and Martha stepped into view, faces lit up. Kari had on a T-shirt that read AUNTIE SQUAD in glitter, and Martha wore a soft cardigan with a tiny silver necklace shaped like a heart.
My heart squeezed painfully.
They were my constants. The people who stayed. And now they were standing in my doorway, in my house, for my baby.
We stepped inside together.
The living room had been transformed. A pastel banner stretched across the wall: WELCOME HOME, LITTLE OTTER.
There were tiny paper hockey sticks taped to the sides of the TV, a plush otter wearing a miniature Otters jersey perched on the couch, and a stack of pink and white blankets folded on the coffee table like a cuddly fortress.
On the kitchen counter, I spotted a cluster of foil pans and Pyrex dishes with neon sticky notes on top:
Lasagna – Martha (extra cheese)
Chicken Pot Pie – Kari (eat this first, it’s amazing)
Casserole – Myla (I helped, don’t panic)
Muffins – Jordan (breakfast of champions)
Soup – McBee (healing magic in a pot)
My throat closed. “You guys…”