Epilogue
Two Years Later
Austin
I stepped down the hallway back into the living room to find a panicked Isa moving around the room frantically. Her dark curls
bounced in every direction.
“Esme is there—” Isa pointed to the small playpen in the middle of our place. She looked behind the couch, then back up to
Esme, who peacefully played with her stuffed elephant in the playpen. “But Aisha . . .” Isa raked a hand through her hair,
looking right past me even though I was holding Aisha. “Oh my God.”
We got the little playpen out anytime Selena or Henry brought the twins over, which was almost never because Selena had a
tough time leaving her daughters and Henry was an overprotective maniac.
They were one-year-olds with a fully outfitted security detail. When they did come here, we had two guards stationed outside our door.
“She’s right here.” I held little Aisha in my arms as she giggled one of those tiny baby giggles that made me sure babies
understood a lot more than we gave them credit for. She’d wandered down the hall a few feet when I got her. “She was headed
to the bathroom, I think.”
Isa’s eyes darted around in thought and her skin paled. “She could have drowned.”
“In an empty bathtub? In the quarter second she would have been in there alone before I got her?”
Esme was a calm baby who never pushed any boundaries. Her sister, Aisha, was practically an escape artist: rambunctious and
a handful.
Isa pulled Aisha out of my arms and hugged the one-year-old snugly, rocking her in either direction. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered
into Aisha’s cheek before pressing a long kiss against it. The adorable little psycho in her arms giggled again as Isa walked
over to the playpen and put her beside her sister.
“Hey.” I put my hands on Isa’s shoulders as she stood in front of the two, watching them play. I could practically see her
mind go to terrible places. “You’re worried because you care.”
Not because she was incapable, which was what I was sure she was thinking. Isa loved spending time with them, and she prepared
for taking care of them on her own like she would for an exam. Not that she needed to—she was a natural, albeit a little anxious.
“Yeah, I know.” She let out a relieved sigh. “Let’s not tell Henry that happened.” Isa wrapped her arms around my waist and leaned into me.
“Deal.” A laugh shook my shoulders.
The twins went back to playing with the pile of toys we had for them and Isa plopped down on the couch. She watched them intently
for a few more seconds before relaxing a bit and leaning back.
“I can’t leave them.” Isa smiled and looked over to me. I looped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her in. “We’re staying.”
“You sure?”
Isa had graduated from her fellowship a few weeks ago and had three job offers. One to stay on here and work with a championship-winning
basketball team, or head to Boston or Philadelphia for their respective teams.
“Philadelphia is a little too close to my parents.” Isa counted off on her hand.
She and her dad had made their peace, in their own bizarre way. He’d told her he was proud of her exactly twice, and now they
spent their monthly family dinners casually rattling off research or difficult cases they’d completed.
It often devolved to one-upmanship, but they were both willing to give the other their due. And they seemed to bond over it,
so I wasn’t questioning it.
“And Boston?”
“It’s not Manhattan.” She sighed and looked out the window. “The twins and Jo. They’re here.”
I smiled. Isa had been turning the idea over in her head for months. She was taking the summer off to relax after years of nonstop work but was stalled on where she’d start in the fall. There were logistics to consider for me, but I’d figure it out once she did.
“So, we’re staying?”
“I reserve the right to change my mind,” she said with an upward inflection, like it was question.
“I never mind when you change plans.” I lifted her hand, and her engagement ring sparkled on her hand, sitting next to the
wedding band we added the night after I slid the engagement ring on her finger. “You know that.”
Last summer I took Isa to Paris for our anniversary, and I proposed. It was only sort of a surprise for her. Since she was
easily spooked, I had Selena sneak a few hints it might happen into conversation to get an idea of Isa’s reaction.
It was good one.
After she said yes, we celebrated in the same Ritz suite we were in the year before. The next morning, Isa started making
a timeline while we were in bed for wedding planning. After twenty minutes, she realized she didn’t want to wait. She was—in
her words—not going to put off what she wanted. She suggested we elope. So, we did.
That night.
“This way nothing has to change with the academy,” Isa added now.
We had all the things we needed to scout talent, and the facility opened its doors to its first class that past spring.
It would be a while before it was profitable, but for now I got to teach a sport I loved to the next generation of kids who’d play it.
I was living my own dream both inside and outside these walls.
“I’d figure it out,” I told her for the hundredth time. “No matter where we were.”
“I know.” Isa rolled her head back in a faux, exaggerated huff. “And the twins and Jo need to have cool Aunt Isa close by
as they grow up.”
I smiled and didn’t remind her that while she liked to think she was the fun one, she was also the one who tried to put helmets on the twins before
putting them in a stroller, convinced they might be hurt.
Instead of pointing that out, I basked in the present, a home she filled with brightness, and a sharp wit. A future spent
with a woman I’d never get tired of watching as she chased her dreams.