Epilogue
“You’re hovering again,” I said without looking up from my computer screen, where I was finalizing the Edwards’ tax return.
Klaus, who had indeed been hovering behind my chair for the past five minutes, dropped a kiss on the top of my head. “You’ve been working for hours. Pack dinner’s in thirty minutes.”
“Just let me finish the Edwards’, then I’ll get ready,” I promised, leaning back to look up at my husband of four months.
Klaus frowned, his nose twitching slightly. “You’re exhausted. I can smell it.”
I rolled my eyes fondly. “The nose thing is still creepy, you know.”
“Useful, though,” he countered, strong hands beginning to massage my shoulders. “Tells me when my mate is working too hard.”
I groaned as his thumbs found a particularly tight knot. “Tax season is always crazy. You know that.”
“Mmm,” he agreed, not stopping his ministrations. “But I don’t have to like it.”
I saved my work again and swiveled my chair to face him. “Two more days, then we can have that weekend away you’ve been promising. Just you, me, and a cabin by the lake with no internet access.”
His eyes lit up at the reminder. “Three full days. No pack, no town, no tax forms.”
“Just us,” I confirmed, standing to wrap my arms around his waist. “And maybe some of that interesting rope you ordered online and think I don’t know about.”
Klaus had the grace to look slightly abashed. “Was going to be a surprise.”
I laughed and stretched up to kiss him. “I’m married to a werewolf. There are very few successful surprises in this relationship.”
He growled playfully, nipping at my lower lip. “I can still surprise you in other ways.”
“Later,” I promised, reluctantly extracting myself from his embrace. “Let me finish this return, or the Edwards will be filing late.”
Klaus sighed dramatically but retreated to the kitchen, where I could hear him preparing for our trip to the pack dinner.
Full moon was two days away, coinciding with the end of tax season—a combination that meant heightened emotions all around, as the pack grew more wolf-like in the days leading up to their shift.
I turned back to my computer, smiling to myself. A year ago, I would never have imagined this life—married to an Alpha werewolf, part of a supernatural community, actually enjoying small-town living. Yet here I was, happier than I’d ever been in Chicago.
The claiming bite was still in our future—a step we’d decided to take on our one-year anniversary of meeting. But even without it, our connection had deepened over the months, my sensitivity to Klaus’s moods and presence growing stronger with time.
I finished the Edwards’ return and was shutting down my computer when a familiar sensation washed over me—a wave of love and contentment that wasn’t entirely my own. I smiled, feeling Klaus’s emotions flow through our developing bond.
“Ready?” he called from the front door.
“Coming,” I replied, grabbing my coat—a proper winter coat now, suitable for Pine Peak’s climate.
* * *
The main house was warm and chaotic when we arrived, full of pack members in various states of pre-full-moon energy.
Children raced through the rooms with slightly too much speed, teenagers wrestled with slightly too much strength, and the adults engaged in conversations with slightly too much intensity.
Lucy greeted us at the door, hugging me with her usual enthusiasm. “Jordan! You look tired. Is my son not taking care of you properly?”
“Tax season,” I explained, returning her embrace. “I’m fine, just busy.”
She shook her head disapprovingly. “He should make you rest more.”
“I’ve tried,” Klaus said, hanging up our coats. “He’s stubborn.”
“Pot, kettle,” I muttered, making Lucy laugh.
Dinner was its usual boisterous affair—too much food, too many conversations happening simultaneously, too much physical contact by standard human metrics. I’d grown to love it, this overwhelming sense of belonging and connection that permeated pack gatherings.
Halfway through the meal, Theo clinked his glass for attention. “Since everyone’s here,” he announced, “Sarah and I have news.”
His mate, a petite human woman who’d joined the pack two years earlier, smiled shyly at his side.
“We’re expecting,” Theo continued, beaming with pride. “First ultrasound confirmed it yesterday. Twins!”
The room erupted in cheers and congratulations. Klaus squeezed my hand under the table, his joy for his brother evident in his expression and through our proto-bond.
“Will they be…?” I asked quietly, leaning close to his ear.
“Wolves?” Klaus finished. “Likely, yes. The gene is dominant when one parent is born a werewolf.”
I nodded, watching as pack members surrounded the couple, touching Sarah’s still-flat stomach with reverent hands, already treating the unborn children as pack treasures.
“Does it bother you?” Klaus asked suddenly, his voice low. “That we can’t have that?”
I turned to him in surprise. “Children? We’ve talked about this. There are options—adoption, surrogacy.”
“I know,” he said, eyes serious. “But seeing Theo and Sarah like this…”
I placed my hand on his cheek, uncaring of the public setting. “When we’re ready for kids, we’ll find our path to them. And they’ll be the most loved, most protected children in Pine Peak, with an entire pack of furry babysitters.”
His smile returned, tension easing from his shoulders. “You always know what to say.”
“It’s a gift,” I agreed solemnly, then yelped as he tickled my ribs in retaliation.
Later that night, as we lay tangled together in our bed, Klaus’s fingers tracing lazy patterns on my bare chest, I found myself reflecting on the journey that had brought us here.
“What are you thinking about?” Klaus murmured, his supernatural senses picking up on my contemplative mood. “Your scent changed.”
I smiled in the darkness. “Just… everything. How much has changed in a year.”
“Good changes?” he asked, a hint of vulnerability in his voice that few besides me ever heard.
I turned to face him, finding his eyes in the moonlight streaming through our window. “The best changes,” I assured him. “I came to audit a tree farm and ended up with a husband, a family, and a whole new life.”
Klaus pulled me closer, his warmth enveloping me as it always did. “No regrets?”
“Just one,” I said seriously.
He tensed. “What’s that?”
“I really wish I’d packed better winter clothes for that first trip,” I deadpanned. “Those first few weeks were freezing.”
Klaus growled playfully and rolled on top of me, pinning me to the mattress. “I’ll show you how I plan to keep you warm for the next fifty years.”
And as he proceeded to do exactly that, I sent a silent thank you to Timothy Grey and his punishment assignment to Pine Peak—the best worst job I’d ever been given, leading me straight to where I was always meant to be: in the arms of a werewolf who loved me, in a small town I now called home, my heart finally, completely audited and found full.