Epilogue
Magnus leaned one forearm carefully against the lanai railing and watched his family turn a private Hawaiian beach into controlled chaos.
A week ago, he’d promised Oliver they were going home.
Instead, they were still here.
There were still too many bodies to identify, too many governments trying to clean up the fallout from Lars’s empire collapsing all at once.
Cooper’s Hawaii compound had become part recovery center, part unofficial command post while General Paxton and half a dozen intelligence agencies fought over jurisdiction and classified damage control.
Oliver hadn’t minded staying.
Not with this many uncles around.
Down on the beach, Tiikaan had the kid tucked under one arm in a fireman’s carry while Oliver shrieked threats about revenge and pounded uselessly against his back.
Merritt sat cross-legged in the sand nearby with a sketchbook balanced on one knee, laughing hard as Tiikaan pretended Oliver weighed at least three hundred pounds.
Farther down the shoreline, Rafe and Piper’s twin boys sprinted after them like tiny, sugared-up gremlins, both armed with neon-green water guns and absolutely no mercy.
Oliver twisted around upside down over Tiikaan’s shoulder and pointed toward the surf. “Attack formation!”
The twins screamed like Vikings and charged.
Magnus laughed despite himself.
The movement tugged at the healing wound in his side. Not sharp anymore. Just a deep pull beneath the bandage whenever he moved wrong or laughed too hard.
Worth it.
At the gazebo near the edge of the beach, Cooper stood beside Heath and Gavin at the grills while Magnus’s parents tried unsuccessfully to impose organization on the growing pile of food containers and paper plates.
Dad had somehow ended up in a loud debate with Heath over fishing regulations while Mom ignored all of them and rearranged the serving table the way she wanted it anyway.
Cooper caught Magnus looking and lifted a beer in silent acknowledgment before turning back to whatever argument Heath had started now. Magnus honestly didn’t know how they would’ve held everything together without the Stryker Cape Haven team.
A whistle cut across the beach. Magnus looked toward the volleyball net staked into the sand farther downshore. Sadie launched the ball hard enough to nearly take Davis’s head off.
Davis got both hands up just in time. “That was targeted!”
“It was accurate,” Sadie yelled back.
Sunny collapsed laughing in the sand beside him while Bj?rn looked deeply offended on Davis’s behalf.
“That was in!” Bj?rn argued.
“It landed three feet out,” Julie called from a lounge chair without even looking up from her book.
Bj?rn pointed at her accusingly. “You’re biased.”
“I’m correct.”
The argument escalated immediately.
Magnus took a slow drink from the beer in his hand and let the noise settle around him.
For the first time in weeks, his body had stopped bracing for the next disaster.
Not completely.
Maybe it never would.
But enough.
Lena stepped onto the deck, one hand braced on the doorframe and the other resting over the round curve of her stomach.
She looked like she’d slept for maybe twenty minutes since crossing the Pacific.
Her hair was pulled into a loose knot, her face pale with jet lag, and her feet moved carefully over the stone as she waddled toward the railing.
Magnus straightened. “I thought you were going to sleep since you just got in.”
“Marshall and Carter conked out instantly.” Lena eased herself around the table with the slow, deliberate care of a woman whose center of gravity had recently become a negotiation. “But my body thinks it’s tomorrow, yesterday, or possibly still somewhere over New Zealand.”
Magnus’s mouth tugged despite himself. “Communication-free babymoon in one of the most inconvenient places on earth. Bold choice.”
“It was peaceful, especially since I’m so close to the third trimester,” she said, then looked out over the beach, where Oliver was currently upside down over Tiikaan’s shoulder and shrieking threats of revenge.
Her smile wobbled. “Until we came back to civilization and found out we’d missed a family crisis. ”
“You were pregnant and off-grid.”
“I still should’ve been here sooner.”
Before Magnus could answer, the sliding door opened, and Gunnar stepped outside carrying a tray stacked with burger buns.
He took one look at Lena and stopped. “You’re supposed to be sleeping.”
“So everyone keeps telling me.”
Gunnar crossed to them, set the tray down on the table, and leaned over to kiss the top of her head. “You flew in from New Zealand. You’re pregnant and jet-lagged. Sleeping is not an unreasonable suggestion.”
“I’m fine.”
“You waddled out here like a penguin with a mission.”
Lena gave him a look. “A very dignified penguin.”
“Terrifyingly dignified.” Gunnar glanced toward Magnus. “For the record, the pregnancy would’ve made her very bad at infiltrating a military facility.”
Lena settled one hand over her stomach. “I would have been stealthy.”
“You knocked over two patio chairs getting to breakfast.”
“Whatever. I’m going to lounge in the shade.” Lena made her way across the decking. “Only wake me if it involves chocolate or that cheesecake thing Piper made.”
Magnus laughed, then regretted it when the movement tugged at the healing wound in his side.
Gunnar snorted and came to lean against the railing beside him. Below them, Oliver launched himself at Tiikaan hard enough that both of them nearly went into the surf.
“You know he’s gonna try that from the roof next,” Gunnar said.
“Probably.”
“You should stop encouraging him.”
“I’m not encouraging him.”
“You looked proud.”
Magnus took a drink from his beer. “Maybe a little.”
Gunnar watched the beach quietly for a few seconds.
“You did good, little brother.”
Magnus glanced over.
Gunnar kept his eyes on Oliver when he added, “Really good.”
The words landed harder than the bullet had.
Magnus swallowed once. “You trying to make this weird?”
“Probably.” Gunnar shrugged. “Don’t ruin it.”
Gunnar grabbed the tray, then paused long enough to clap Magnus once on the shoulder before heading toward the gazebo.
A burst of laughter burst from behind him.
Magnus turned to find Grace near the stairs with Astryde, one hand still half lifted toward her mouth like the laugh had surprised her on the way out. She’d changed into shorts and one of his old T-shirts tied at her hip sometime in the last hour. That janky watch was still on her wrist.
The bruising along her cheekbone had already started fading yellow at the edges.
Astryde said something else low enough that Magnus couldn’t hear.
Grace shook her head, smiling now, then her eyes found Magnus at the railing.
Something in her expression softened immediately.
Astryde glanced at Grace, the corner of her mouth twitching once before she squeezed Grace’s arm lightly and headed toward the gazebo.
Grace stayed where she was another second, watching the beach.
Watching Oliver.
Then she crossed the lanai toward Magnus barefoot.
He straightened a little automatically when she stopped beside him, even though the movement tugged unpleasantly at his side.
Grace noticed anyway.
Her fingers slipped beneath the edge of his shirt, brushing the bandage there like she still needed physical proof he was standing in front of her. “How’s it feel?”
“Like I got shot.”
One corner of her mouth lifted.
“That answers absolutely nothing.”
“Then Gunnar was right. I’m fine.”
Grace shook her head, muttering something under her breath that sounded suspiciously like idiot. Her shoulder settled lightly against his chest while they looked out toward the beach together.
Below them, Oliver launched himself directly at Tiikaan again with absolutely no concern for physics or personal safety.
Tiikaan caught him one-handed without even looking.
Grace watched them for a long second before speaking again. “I should probably feel guiltier about keeping everyone in Hawaii this long.”
“Nobody’s complaining.”
“Rafe absolutely complained.”
“Rafe complains recreationally.” That earned him a quiet laugh.
The breeze shifted her short hair across her forehead. Magnus brushed it back automatically. Grace leaned into the touch for one brief second before her expression changed slightly.
Subtle.
But enough.
“There are people out there who lost a lot when Lars’s systems came down,” she said finally. “Money. Leverage. Protection.”
Her eyes stayed on the water instead of him. “Some of them are going to spend a very long time angry about it.”
“Yeah.”
“I may never get to be fully visible again.” The words came calmly, but exhaustion still pulled at the edges of her voice.
He looked down at the beach. Oliver had somehow recruited the twins into helping him bury Davis in the sand against his will. Davis appeared to be losing badly.
“Alaska’s pretty easy to disappear in,” Magnus said.
Grace looked up at him then. “You mean that.”
“Grace.” He shifted carefully until he could face her more fully despite the pull in his side. “You blew up an international crime network to save your son. You think a little paranoia’s gonna scare me off now?”
One corner of her mouth lifted faintly before disappearing. “You got shot because of me.”
“Technically, I got shot because Lars had terrible coping skills.”
Grace laughed again, quieter this time.
Then her face softened.
The noise from the beach drifted up around them. Wind. Water. Oliver yelling triumphantly about something. Gunnar arguing with Heath near the grills.
Grace’s eyes searched his for a long second before she said, very quietly, “I love you.”
He touched her face gently, thumb brushing once beneath the fading bruise on her cheek. “I love you too.”
Grace made the smallest sound in the back of her throat, somewhere between relief and disbelief, and then she was kissing him.
Her hands slid up into the back of his hair as she leaned into him, warm and solid against his chest, while the ocean wind moved around them. Magnus wrapped his arm around her waist, pulling her closer.
The kiss tasted like salt air and sunscreen and the cold edge of the beer he’d abandoned on the railing behind him.
Magnus kissed her deeper, slower, his forehead pressing briefly against hers when they finally broke apart.
“Mom!” Oliver shouted. “Dad! Uncle Davis says I’m banned from tactical sand warfare!”
“That seems reasonable,” Magnus called back.
“It was one incident!”
“Three incidents!” Davis yelled.
Oliver gasped dramatically. “Conspiracy and lies!”
Grace laughed outright this time.
Magnus wrapped his arm more securely around her waist and pressed a kiss into her hair while they watched their son sprint back toward chaos.
Somewhere beyond Hawaii, governments were still sorting through the wreckage Lars had left behind.
Somewhere beyond that, Alaska waited.
But Grace was here.
Oliver was safe.
Nobody in the Rebel family had ever been particularly good at letting go of their own.