Epilogue
Seven Months Later
Afternoon light spills through the front windows, and dust motes drift lazily in the air. Anton is stretched out on the other end of the couch, a book secured in one hand, his other hanging over the side of Gabrielle’s bassinet.
Our baby sleeps peacefully. One fist is tucked up under her chin. The other is wrapped—barely—around Anton’s finger, her favorite security item.
He can’t help himself.
Despite all the articles we’ve read about slowly replacing human contact with blankies or pacifiers—lest we doom ourselves to never sleeping again—I still happily offer her the boob, and Daddy? That pointer finger.
She sleeps in the room with us at night. More often than not, I wake to see his hand resting inside the sidecar crib, her fingers curled around his warmth, Anton passed out cold beside her. Truly asleep. Not listening for threats. Not braced for the next sound.
I never thought a man’s sleep could bring me so much peace, but seeing Anton like that—relaxed, unguarded, with our baby right there—fills me with a contentment I didn’t know I was missing.
He clumsily turns the page of his very serious book on joint making, and that quiet smile that ignites my whole chest settles in again.
This. Is. It.
Anton and Riri are everything I never knew I wanted. Everything I didn’t know I needed. Funny how life surprises you.
When we brought Riri home, Anton asked if I wanted to stop working for a while.
I took the next week to think about my life as a police officer. Echo Valley is a safe place, and I doubt we’ll see a case like Zoe’s—or an officer like Ingram—anytime soon, so I feel settled with the idea of going back to work and seeing how it feels.
Knowing we have savings and room to breathe gives me a freedom I’ve never had before—the freedom not to rush my decisions.
I don’t reject the possibility of staying home either. Motherhood is a constant shift of emotions, priorities, and worry. Maybe when I go back, I won’t be able to stand the mom guilt everyone talks about.
Or maybe, like my mom, I will.
And because of Faith Johnson, I know Gabrielle can thrive in either of those situations.
I’m grateful I don’t need to predict the future to keep our family afloat. So many women out there do.
Anton shifts beside me, the couch dipping slightly under his weight as he puts his book down. How he remembers what page he’s on when sleep deprivation still has me putting my clothes on inside out some days is beyond me.
Then again, he was a Navy SEAL at one point.
Anton glances toward the bassinet where Riri sleeps, then back at me.
“We could try now,” he says quietly.
I know what he means without him saying it. The crib.
The masterpiece he made with his own hands has never been slept in.
It’s been three months since she’s been home, though, and we agreed we’d try.
My chest tightens. She’s so peaceful. We should just let her sleep here…
“Okay,” I brave. “Let’s try.”
He moves carefully, slipping his finger out of her grip. It’s unbearably sexy, the ease this man has with our baby. He rises and bends to pick her up. He locks her securely against him while his broad hand cups the back of her head, shielding her.
She looks impossibly small against his mile-wide chest. She stirs, makes a soft sound, then settles again, utterly convinced the world cannot reach her here.
That’s exactly how we both feel in his arms.
I follow them upstairs, light as I can be, but I wince with every creak of wood.
Her bedroom is dim as the curtains are drawn, and the crib is gorgeous in the corner. On the walls is the romantic wallpaper we found of a night sky and compasses.
I rush forward to smooth out the sleep sack, and Anton lowers her carefully, one hand resting lightly on her chest to maintain contact, slowly replacing the sleep sack over her chest.
I zip the sack up inch by inch, holding my breath until she’s secure.
We stand side by side, barely breathing.
She’s settled.
Easing the door closed behind us, careful not to let the latch click, we wait.
The hallway feels smaller, quieter—like the house is holding its breath with us. I tilt my head, taking him in, the competence, the care, the way he handled her like it was instinct.
Yeah. I’m not letting that go unacknowledged.
Nor the fact that we’re finally, for the first time in months…alone.
“Well done, Daddy.” I drag my finger down the center of his chest. “That was incredibly sexy.”
Something dark flashes through his eyes.
His hand comes to my waist, hard enough to tell me exactly where this is going, exactly who’s in control of it now.
“Yeah?” He barely finishes before he presses a kiss to my lips that’s so deep, I think he wants to make me a mother all over again.
My back hits the wall. His body brackets me there, all strength and intent, and I feel it everywhere. What he is, what he wants…what he’s about to do to me.
“This,” he murmurs against my mouth and cups my breast, “is not happening quietly.”
I smile against him and reach between his legs, but he catches my wrist the instant I feel the hard promise under his jeans.
With a low sound, he lifts me, my legs locking around his waist. The hallway dissolves into motion and mouths and heat as he carries us toward the bedroom.
“You’re in so much trouble…” he growls.
“Why? I thought I was your good girl?” I tease, and he kicks the door open with his heel.
He tosses me onto the bed, and I gaze up at him coyly from under my brow. “You’re impatient.”
He braces his arms on either side of me. “No man would have patience once he knows what it feels like to be inside you.” His weight settles between my thighs. “That and she might wake up.”
He’s right. There’s no time to waste.
I smile and drag up his shirt, baring his chest. My palms skim over muscle, and the sound he makes against my neck turns me molten.
He lowers himself to the floor, onto his knees, my legs falling open as he tugs my sweatpants and panties down in one urgent motion, tossing them aside. His hands glide up my inner thighs, his mouth following, teeth grazing my skin and lighting something deep in my bones.
As he works his way up with peppered kisses, pushing my sweatshirt higher along my torso, I become suddenly aware of the shards of daylight cutting across the room.
It’s bright—the first time we’ve had sex when it wasn’t dark or rushed beneath the covers with Gabrielle sleeping in the sidecar beside us.
My body is on display in a way it hasn’t been since having our baby.
I still. “It’s so bright. Let’s grab the curtains.”
“Why?” He glances up at me with those piercing blue eyes, a predator poised between my legs. “You don’t want me to see you?”
“I’m still not used to”—it’s hard to admit—“this body.”
His brows furrow, confusion flickering across his face.
I spell it out. “The stretch marks.”
His gaze shifts from hungry to reverent. “I don’t see marks, Freya. I see everything you gave me.” His voice drops. “Look at me, honey. I’m on my goddamn knees for you.”
He splays his hand warmly over my stomach. “You have no idea how hot you look.”
Then his mouth is on my core again, slow and deliberate, pulling every thought right out of my head. Tension drains as his tongue learns me, circles, lingers.
I open my legs wider and tug my sweatshirt over my head, giving him everything he asked for. I thread my fingers through his hair as heat builds fast and sharp, my legs already starting to tremble under his mouth.
“Mmm.” I writhe against the sheets behind me.
He slips a finger inside, lifting me higher.
“You taste so damn good. I could eat your pussy all day.”
And he does. Softly, quickly, he flicks and circles and fucks me with his tongue until I unravel, fluttering around his finger as he places kisses on my pulsing clit in perfect timing, keeping me there, pushing me further.
The aftershocks are still rolling through me when he finally lifts his head, mouth glistening.
But he doesn’t rush.
He rises slowly, shoves his sweatpants down, along with his boxers, in one quick motion. His hands slide up my thighs, grounding me as my legs tremble. One of them he hooks easily over his shoulder, and he stares between my legs with a wild intensity.
He swirls his dick around my entrance, wetting it with my cum, and then sinks in.
His huge cock stretches me slowly, deliberately, like he’s memorizing the way I fit around him.
The pressure is heavy, unyielding. My breath stutters, my body tightening around him before I can stop it.
He feels it.
“Relax,” he mutters, grip firm on my thigh, keeping it hooked over his shoulder. He drags in and out of me slowly, but he’s hard as fuck.
I shake my head, already wrecked. “Anton—”
“That’s it,” he growls. “Just like that.”
Somehow, I manage to relax around his girth, and he senses it, so in tune with me. His jaw tightens, and he increases his pace, becoming more and more manic with pleasure.
“Fuck,” he breathes. “You feel so good like this.”
I whimper; the pleasure is so overwhelming.
“You gonna come for me, baby?” I give him some of his own dirty talk, urging him on.
“You want it?” he bites, pace quickening.
The bed creaks.
My leg tightens over his shoulder, pulling him closer, begging without words.
“That’s it,” he says again. “You want more?” He’s becoming feral now, hips slapping against me.
And then he loses control.
Inside me, he grows even bigger. I don’t know how it’s possible, but every inch of me is full, and my body melts and pulses around him.
Molten heat fills me. He stays with me through it, my calf still over his shoulder, and he holds my hands down as we come undone.
When the panting has subsided, he lies down alongside me and presses a kiss to my temple. I roll over, draping my leg over his torso, tucking my head into the crook of his arm.
And the whole world goes still, quiet and calm.
I run circles on his chest. “Anton?”
“Mmm?”
“Thanks for loving my stretch marks.”
He says it like it’s obvious. “Honey, I have them, too.”
My finger stops mid-motion. “Where?”
“All over my heart.”