Epilogue
SOPHIA
The snowstorm outside is muffled, a quiet roar encircling our cabin.
It’s well below freezing out there, but in here, it’s warm and toasty.
I lean back in the armchair by the fire, my hand resting lightly on Holly’s tiny back.
She’s curled up on my chest, her chubby fist grasping my shirt as she sleeps.
The front door opens with a creak, Maddox stepping in out of the cold. He keeps his footsteps quiet, closing the door silently before turning to me. Despite his natural scowl, my husband’s face melts when he sees us.
“Hey, beautiful,” he murmurs, bending down to kiss me. Then, he brushes the pad of his thumb over Holly’s plump cheek, careful not to wake her. “I love walking in and seeing you two all curled up together. It’s so damn cute.”
I grin at him. “Not as cute as when she falls asleep on you.”
Nothing could have prepared me for the first time I saw our tiny baby curled up on Maddox’s giant flannel-covered chest. I was almost hyperventilating from the adorableness.
“She’s so tiny,” he says, running a hand over Holly’s back in awe. “Still can’t believe she’s ours.”
“I know…it’s surreal.”
It’s been three months since we brought Holly home from the hospital, but it feels like only yesterday. My husband spent most of my pregnancy working on our cabin, extending it to add a nursery and three more rooms at the back.
“How many babies do you think we’re having?” I asked him jokingly at the time.
“We’re gonna have a big brood, sugar. You just wait and see.”
I didn’t really believe him, but now that Holly is finally here in our arms, I already want to give her a brother or sister.
“You want something to drink, sugar?” Maddox asks now, straightening up. “Hot chocolate?”
“Thanks, that sounds good. I should really get up, though.”
“Want me to put Holly in her crib?”
I nod, pressing a soft kiss on our baby’s head. “I’ll come with you.”
Maddox lifts our daughter carefully off my chest, carrying her into the nursery.
I follow, my heart melting as he sets Holly in her crib.
He hushes her as she stirs, her limbs twitching.
She opens her tiny rosebud mouth, and a sleepy whimper escapes.
Then she relaxes, sprawled out on her back like a little starfish.
Our sweet girl.
My chest swells with so much love it almost hurts. I can’t believe we made something so precious. Maddox and I stare down at her for a few moments, watching her sleep. Then he takes my hand, brings it to his mouth and kisses it.
“She’s perfect,” he says. “Just like her mom.”
I smile at him, and with one last look at our sleeping baby, we head out of the nursery. Maddox heads into the kitchen and brings me a hot chocolate. It’s topped with marshmallows and cream, just how he always makes it. The way he used to make it for Ruby when she was a kid.
Maddox’s sister has become one of my best friends in the years since we met.
She ended up marrying a mountain man called Ivan and moving into his cabin just a couple of miles away.
Ivan is the man I used to buy firewood from before I met Maddox, and he likes to joke that he brought us together.
Heck, he’s not wrong. If he hadn’t been out of firewood that night, I never would have traveled up the mountain to Maddox’s firewood stand.
It was a small decision that changed my life forever.
My husband settles on the couch beside me, wrapping a protective arm around my shoulders.
The years have been kind to Maddox. He’s aging like fine wine, every wrinkle and gray hair only serving to make him look more rugged and handsome.
I still get butterflies when he fixes me with those icy blue eyes.
I’ll never forget the way my heart fluttered the first time I saw him, looming out of the forest with a scowl. Part of me fell for him in that moment. Like something deep inside me knew Maddox was everything I needed.
“You look so damn beautiful today, princess,” he says, his gaze roaming my curves. “I love how you look in my shirts.”
“Thank you.” I grin at him. Stealing my husband’s clothes is my favorite hobby. I love wearing his shirts around the house, getting to breathe in his smell all day. It feels like a nonstop embrace.
“You know what I was thinking earlier?” He reaches out to wipe a dribble of hot chocolate from my mouth.
“What?” I ask.
His face turns serious, brows knitting together. “I was thinking about how I don’t tell you enough how much I love you. How beautiful you are. How much I love your body…”
I have to press my lips together to stop myself from laughing. I can’t help it.
“Maddox, you tell me those things every day.”
“Yeah, but—”
“Multiple times a day.”
He shrugs. “Still doesn’t feel like enough, princess.”
I giggle, sighing contentedly as I rest my head on his burly shoulder. The fire dances in the hearth, the snow outside sparkling in the weak afternoon sun. Our cabin is so peaceful. So safe. Out here, it’s easy to forget that Maddox is a wanted man. A fugitive. An outlaw.
It scared me at first. I had this terrible fear that one day a knock would sound and my husband would be dragged away from me.
But over the years, I’ve relaxed. The police department where Maddox lived back in Florida was exposed last year for corruption, along with a laundry list of other offenses.
A lot of Will Osborne’s buddies—the old guard—were fired, or even jailed.
The case against Maddox has gone cold, and I know that we’re safe out here, tucked away in the mountains, protected by the wild forest.
“This is all I’ve ever wanted, Sophia,” my husband murmurs, running a hand through my hair. “This life with you and our baby. You don’t know how happy you both make me.”
But he’s wrong. I do know. Because I feel exactly the same.
Every day with my husband is better than the last, and now that our daughter is here, our life together feels even more complete.