Epilogue
VAUGHN
“You got him to fall asleep?” Carissa whispered from the doorway of the nursery.
I looked up from the peaceful face of our six-month-old baby boy and flashed her a smug grin, holding in my laughter at the sight of her surprised face.
“Yup,” I whispered back. “Daddy has the magic touch.”
“And then some,” she grumbled, running a hand over the slight bump of her belly.
I carefully rose from the chair where I’d rocked Zander to sleep and slowly crossed the room to place him in his crib.
His adorable face scrunched up, and I held my breath as I waited to see if he was going to wake up crying.
After a few seconds, his expression smoothed out and I covered him with the fuzzy blue blanket he’d grown to love.
I crept away from his crib, using all the stealth skills I could muster, and flipped on the monitor so we could hear him when he woke up from his nap in a couple hours. Then I followed my gorgeous wife out the door, shutting it softly behind me.
“You know what nap time means,” I murmured in her ear, tugging her towards our room.
“Yeah, it means my hubby is going to wear me out until I’m ready for a nap, too,” she laughed.
I didn’t know it at the time, but I’d managed to knock her up before I’d even gotten a ring on her finger.
Three weeks after we first met, I took her for a month-long trip to Europe.
We spent a couple weeks with her best friends, exchanging our marriage vows in London, before heading off to our honeymoon in Rome.
We didn’t leave our hotel room for the first three nights.
Hell, we barely left the bed. By the fourth day, she wasn’t feeling well so I went easy on her and took her sight-seeing.
It ended up with her puking her way through the Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon before I dragged her to a clinic.
The doctor spoke to Carissa in rapid-fire Italian, and I wasn’t able to follow along.
I’d nearly had a heart attack when tears filled her eyes because I’d thought she was sick.
But it turned out they were tears of joy because she was pregnant.
The happy news cut our trip short, and we headed home to Atlanta.
With Carissa pregnant, I decided some changes were in order.
Gaige and I got out of the murder-for-hire business.
I had enough money that I didn’t need to work another day in my life, but I did help Brecken and his team with cases from time to time, while Gaige worked with them more frequently.
Being home meant more time with my family. With the arrival of Zander, we quickly learned to savor all the alone time we could get—most of which started with us in bed together.
“Thank you,” I whispered against her lips.
“For what?”
“For loving me with all your heart, body and soul.”