Epilogue
Grace
“Merry Christmas, baby,” Dane murmured in my ear. “I have one more present for you.”
“Is it in your pants?” I whispered back.
He burst out laughing, making everyone else in the living room turn and stare. “Nothing to see here,” he said, then lowered his voice again. “Actually, it’s out in the car.”
I’d already had the best Christmas ever. Last night, we’d taken over Piper’s house for a raucous Christmas Eve, almost too many people joining the celebration to fit. Especially when you added the kids and Stella the dog. Dane and I had brought the champagne and the cheeseboard. Yum.
This morning, I’d woken up next to Dane, and we spent a luxurious half an hour in a bubble bath, kissing and caressing each other until we both were so turned on we couldn’t stand it anymore.
We hadn’t even made it to the bed, Dane taking me up against the dresser beside a full-length mirror. I hadn’t been able to take my eyes off of us as he’d thrust inside me, filling me so perfectly with every stroke. A Christmas gift to us both.
Then an hour later, we met my family at Ashford’s apartment for Christmas breakfast and opening gifts around the tree. Dane was still a mediocre cook, but Callum had taught him how to make a mean pancake. On our last visit to NYC, Dane had bought some kind of rare maple syrup from Canada that was like liquid gold. This morning, he’d passed around the bottle at the breakfast table and brought out French butter, too. Maisie ate six pancakes before Ashford made her stop.
And then, when we were all gathered around the tree, Dane surprised me with a necklace. It had a pendant of the letter G crusted in tiny diamonds. Gorgeous and completely over the top, something I would never dream of asking for. Which somehow made the gift even better.
For Dane, I’d ordered a simple, masculine leather cuff branded with our names and the date we met, the day I’d bumped into him and spilled hot coffee down his front. Mortifying in the moment, yet a memory that never failed to make me smile. And still a running joke between us.
I had more than I could ever have imagined. So much love and laughter and happiness every day. What more could I ask for?
I’d had several more conversations with Grayden in the last couple of months, thanks to Dane tracking him down. My oldest brother wasn’t planning to visit Silver Ridge just yet, not until Ashford and Callum were willing to see him, but I hoped we would get there.
Even work was better than ever. Dane had invested in my bookkeeping business, which helped me hire employees and expand my base of clients. He interacted with all kinds of people as a representative of Knightly Global, and he loved referring new clients to me.
I appreciated everything Dane did for me, and I did my best to show my love in turn in every way I could. But the man was making me look bad. I hadn’t bought anything else for him to open.
I’ll make him a nice dinner , I decided. Followed by a massage and an epic blowjob .
We’d been back in suite 701 since the beginning of the month, after some renovations. Dane’s office looked completely different than it had when Ainsley and Vincent showed up on that fateful night. But neither of us had wanted their actions to dictate where we lived. And there was no question that we wanted to spend every night together.
Besides, I had been tired of living in a hotel room with no kitchen. Dane offered to move with me to the firefighter house, but I declined. Would’ve been funny, though. Seeing my billionaire boyfriend battle for space with four other guys and sharing one bathroom. Except I would’ve had to deal with that too, so yeah, no thanks.
One afternoon, I’d asked Dane if he would rather move back to New York. As much as it would pain me to be away from my family and friends, I would’ve done it. I adored Silver Ridge, but Dane meant even more to me. He assured me that he really did want to stay in Colorado.
I still didn’t want to live in a hotel forever. He’d mentioned buying a house, and it seemed like he was making up his mind about that. Yet being with Dane meant that, no matter where we slept, we were home.
As for the Harcourt sisters, they’d both pled guilty to numerous charges and would soon be calling prison cells home. I thought of them very little these days, and that was how I liked it.
We hung out at Ashford’s a while longer, enjoying a lazy Christmas morning. Emma told me the latest on the wedding plans. The big day was coming up in February, less than two months away, and it promised to be unforgettable. I looked forward to seeing Ayla there, since I hadn’t seen her in person since New York.
Maisie roped Dane into playing with some of her new toys, while I helped clean up the kitchen and grabbed another cup of coffee. After lots of hugs with Emma and my brothers and my niece, Dane and I finally went out to his SUV.
He opened the passenger door for me, giving me a quick kiss before I got in. I glanced eagerly around, playing with the pendant on my new necklace. “Where’s my other present?”
“So greedy. Be patient.”
I stuck my tongue out at him.
Dane rounded the car and got in. Once he was in the driver’s seat, he reached over and opened the glove compartment, pulling out a small rectangular box wrapped in silver paper with a gold bow.
I smiled as Dane set it in my lap. Maybe I was getting a little greedy, but I blamed him. Always spoiling me. But when I picked up the package, studying its shape and feeling how light it was, the smile slipped from my face.
Oh lordy. Was this what I thought it was?
I glanced up at him, my eyes probably wide as saucers. He laughed. “Relax. It’s not that.”
My shoulders lowered. I wanted everything with Dane, but an engagement was a step more than I was ready for. And like he so often did, he’d read that on my face.
“Go ahead and open it.”
I untied the bow and lifted the lid. A key lay inside. It looked like a house key. Nervous excitement surged into my chest again. “What’s this?”
Dane started the engine and put the car in gear. “Well, I have a confession. Your real present isn’t really here in the car. I fudged the truth. The key is only a small part of it.”
“What did you do?”
He grinned. “Patience. I’m driving you there right now.”
After the first few turns, I had no idea where Dane was heading. We were driving away from Main Street and the central commercial district. Driving toward the foothills.
Then I really started to wonder. But when Dane took a certain street and a familiar house appeared up the block, my mind turned into a whirlwind.
No. Way .
He pulled into the driveway of an adorable, one-story bungalow with cheerful yellow siding and a tiny porch. Snow dusted the rooftop and lawn. But in the summer, I knew the grass would fill in, and the back window of the house would overlook fields of wildflowers leading up toward the hills.
Dane switched off the SUV and nodded at the key he had given me. “Have you guessed it yet?”
“You didn’t,” I said breathlessly.
He smirked. “Oh yes, I did.”
“You bought this house? My old house?” This was the place I had used to rent. The house that I had loved and improved with such care before the landlord broke our oral agreement and I got forced out. “How did you even know?” I had never mentioned this place to Dane. I’d moved out of it before I had even met him.
“Callum told me. Said how heartbroken you were when you had to leave it. So I worked out a deal with the new owner. Made her an offer she couldn’t refuse.”
“That’s ominous.”
Dane laughed. “Nah, just offered her a tidy profit and covered her moving expenses. We closed last week, and she’s all moved out.”
I still couldn’t get my head around it. “You talked about buying a place, but I figured you meant a fancy custom home up in the hills. This place is tiny. I adore it, but it’s much smaller than your apartment back in New York. Smaller than your hotel suite.”
His hand cupped the back of my neck. “Technically, I didn’t buy it for me. I bought it for you . There’s some more paperwork we need to do, but the house will be in your name. I’d love to live here with you, if you ask me, and the square footage doesn’t matter to me. I just care that you like it. You can do whatever you want with this place. Even make it an investment and rent it out. It’s yours.”
This. Man .
“I…I don’t know what to say. Except thank you. And I love you.”
“Anything for you,” he said simply. And for Dane, it really was that simple. He leaned over to kiss me, and I held his face, opening up to the strokes of his tongue and then returning them with equal passion. I tried to put everything I was feeling into that kiss. How much I loved him. How I would do anything for him too.
If Dane wanted to live here with me, my dream guy in this adorable house, then I was all in.
But seriously, I had to come up with an epic Christmas present for him next year. I had some catching up to do.
“So you thought I was proposing when you first saw that gift box, huh?” he asked after we both had to take a breath.
I felt a blush spread up my neck and into my cheeks. “I want that someday. Don’t get me wrong. But…”
“Not yet,” he finished for me. His fingers caressed my cheek. He wore the cuff I’d given him on his wrist, and for a second, I imagined a ring on his finger too, declaring that he was mine. I was certainly his. Even if I wanted to wait to get engaged, there was no question where I belonged.
“I’m not going to rush you into anything,” he said. “Even though I am pretty pushy.”
“You are. And you called me greedy.”
Dane’s nose nudged mine. “But I’m not hoping for that much, am I? I just want you to spend forever with me.”
“For a start.” I smiled, my lips brushing against his.
“Exactly. Forever will do. For a start.”
* * *
Ayla Maxwell, Two Months Later
I had just arrived in Silver Ridge for the big wedding weekend, and Ashford was stressed .
Emma groaned. “I love my fiancé, but he has been getting on my last nerve. He thinks this storm will interfere with the wedding.”
I sat at the table and grabbed a cellophane bag and some ribbon. “I checked the forecast before I left LA. I thought it wasn’t that bad.”
“It’s not,” Grace cut in. “The storm will bring just enough snow to make all the trees around the Last Refuge Inn look beautiful. The wedding will be perfect. Ashford is just a worry wart.”
That was definitely true.
“How about you go relax for a while,” I said to Emma. “Let Grace and me take care of the rest of the favors.”
It took some more convincing to get Emma to let us take over. But Grace and I finished assembling the wedding favors, and then I took my favorite little girl in the world out for an afternoon adventure.
Maisie and I skipped along together, holding hands. I was wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses, though I still got some curious looks. The Silver Ridge locals were used to me by now. Tourists could be another story. The ski resort drew plenty of them, and the media attention around my family here had inspired some of my fans to visit in the hopes of seeing me. But it still wasn’t as much of an issue as the paparazzi who liked to follow me on a daily basis in LA.
I thought of that creepy anonymous envelope I’d received several months back and suppressed a chill. Whoever had sent it, they’d left me alone since. Better to put it out of my mind.
“Where should we go first? The park?” I asked.
Maisie tapped her chin, a tiny replica of her dad. “How about Silver Linings?”
“You goof. We went to the coffee shop this morning. I seem to remember you eating a cinnamon roll as big as your head.”
“But I didn’t get to have a muffin,” she said reasonably.
I cracked up. “You’re determined to get as many treats out of me as possible this weekend, aren’t you?”
“Is it working?”
Of course it was working.
After not being in her life for so many years, I tended to give Maisie anything and everything she wanted. Maybe it was just my deprived inner child coming out. I wanted to give Maisie all the things my sister and I didn’t have growing up. Well, a loving father was number one on that list, and thankfully Ashford had that covered. But I was determined to fill in any other possible gaps.
Was I overcompensating? Possibly. But I didn’t tend to do things halfway. I rarely took no for an answer. Especially when it was a territorial man standing in my way. That was why I hadn’t given up on reconnecting with Ashford and Maisie, even though my brother-in-law had tried to avoid me for years.
Ugh, speaking of territorial men .
“There’s Uncle Teller!” Maisie said, waving at the police SUV as it rolled slowly by. Police Chief Landry sat in the driver’s seat, arm draped casually over the steering wheel. He smiled and waved back, but his mouth twisted a moment after.
I couldn’t tell where exactly he was looking because of his sunglasses. But I had the feeling that frown was aimed at me.
From the moment we’d met last year, Chief Landry had made it clear he didn’t like me. “ So you’re who all that fuss is about ?” he’d asked, his tone dripping with disdain. As if I’d wanted those reporters to mob Ashford and Emma’s building. As if I hadn’t been desperate for a break from the constant attention. The chief had wanted to make sure I knew he wasn’t impressed with me. And every time we’d crossed paths since, he’d barely been civil.
Well, I wasn’t so impressed with that man either. Even if he was a close friend of the O’Neal family and enough of a presence in Maisie’s life to warrant an uncle title.
Teller made me nervous. It wasn’t just the fact that he was a military man, like my father had been, because Ashford and Callum had been in the Army too. Same with Dane. It wasn’t those intense-looking scars on the chief’s face, either.
Nope, it was the constant scowl he wore around me. But damned if I was going to show how much he unnerved me.
Maisie wasn’t looking at me. So I lifted my hand. Extended my middle finger. And scratched my head with it, keeping that finger way up high so he couldn’t miss it.
There .
Now Chief Landry knew exactly what I thought of him too.