Epilogue Two
WYATT
* Six Years Later *
“T here we go.” I settle the booster seat in place, then lift my giggling daughter into it.
I sit beside her as Madison slips into the other side of the booth. A waitress in a blue uniform shows up immediately. “Morning, folks.” She sets menus in front of two of us, then pulls a small box of crayons from her pocket and slides a coloring sheet across the table. “I’m Ella. Are we starting off with coffee?”
Our four-year-old straightens up. “I’m Molly. I’d like orange juice, please.”
Ella grins, writing it down carefully. “Of course, Miss Molly. What excellent restaurant manners you have.”
Molly’s little brown pigtails brush my arm as she dances in her seat. Then she whispers loudly to me, “When’s the food part?”
“Two coffees, please, and we’ll need a minute,” I tell Ella, who nods and rushes away.
“Daddy’s going to read you a list of what they have that you’ll probably like, and then you get to choose,” Madison says, lining up the crayons on the table.
It only takes three items for Molly to decide on chicken fingers and sweet potato fries.
Ella returns with our drinks and takes our order. Madison orders a salad with her burger, knowing she’ll be eating Molly’s leftover fries. Along with a few of my onion rings. Okay, maybe all of them. She’s only twelve weeks along but the pregnancy hunger pangs are already hitting. I can’t help but wonder if that means our second child will be a boy.
Once Molly begins scribbling a bright blue sky over a crowd of perky farm animals, I reach out to stroke Madison’s cheek, my wedding band catching a sunbeam through the window. “Been an interesting few years, hasn’t it?”
“Yeah. It really has.” She mouths the words, “ I love you. ”
“ I love you, too, ” I mouth back.
Molly looks back and forth between us. “Ewww! You’re... mushying again!”
“Well, we’re mushy people, sweetie,” Madison laughs.
I turn to Molly. “You know, your mommy was sitting in this very booth when I first met her.” I point to the table across the room. “And I was sitting right there, and I turned around, and that’s when I saw how beautiful she was.”
Molly looks back and forth between us, puzzled. “You didn’t know Mommy?”
“No, not yet.”
Her little nose wrinkles. “Oh. I thought you were together forever.”
Madison reaches across the table and takes my hand, her eyes shining. “We definitely are now.”
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You’ll meet Claudia again in Fake Summer Wife .
You’ll have coffee at The Tiny Goat Cafe in the Spring Heat series.
And if you’re into hulking, grumpy mountain men, check out Rescued by the Surly Woodsman …
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