Epilogue #2
His eyes—amber and burning with an inner fire—locked onto mine. His tail flicked behind him, betraying eagerness despite his otherwise controlled expression.
“Better?” The word rumbled from a chest that could never pass for human.
I reached up, running my fingers along the curve of one horn. Warm. Ridged. Powerful. “Perfect.”
He caught my wrist, bringing it to his mouth. His lips—still capable of remarkable softness despite the sharp canines that gleamed behind them—brushed across my pulse point. “You have frosting in your hair.”
“I’m aware.”
“And wrapping paper stuck to your sweater.”
“Also aware.”
“You organized an event for over two hundred people, baked approximately one thousand cookies, prevented at least four arguments between Mrs. Allen and Mr. Rodriguez about proper ornament placement, and somehow convinced the mayor to donate another three months of funding to the community center.” His thumb stroked over my racing pulse. “You must be exhausted.”
“Getting there.”
“And yet you’re standing here demanding I shift forms so you can admire my horns.”
“Among other things.”
His grin was all teeth and wicked promise. “Naughty little light.”
“Very naughty.” I pressed closer, reveling in the solid warmth of him. The familiar scent of frost and spice that clung to his fur. “I think I’ve earned a punishment.”
“Oh?” One clawed hand settled on my hip, burning through the fabric of my skirt. “And what makes you think you’ve been naughty enough to warrant my attention?”
“I ate the last gingerbread cookie. The one you were saving.”
“Scandalous.”
“And I may have told Mrs. Henderson that you’d be happy to help move her piano after New Year’s.”
He growled. “That piano weighs more than a small car.”
“You can lift it with one hand.”
“That’s beside the point.”
“And—” I traced a finger down his chest, following the line of fur to where it disappeared beneath his leather vest. “—I’ve been thinking about you all day. About this. About what happens after everyone leaves and it’s just us.”
His pupils dilated, the amber of his eyes nearly consumed by black. “Have you now.”
“Mmm. Very impure thoughts. Definitely naughty-list material.”
“I see.” His other hand joined the first, spanning my waist and lifting me effortlessly off the ground. “Then I suppose I have no choice but to deliver appropriate punishment.”
I wrapped my legs around him, linking my ankles at the small of his back. His tail curved around my calf, a familiar weight. “I accept my fate.”
“You’re not even slightly sorry, are you?”
“Not one bit.”
He carried me out of the nursery, pausing only to dim the star-lights to their lowest setting. Jingle Bells cracked an eye open again, saw us leaving, and gave what could only be described as a feline eye-roll before settling back to his guard duties.
Our bedroom was smaller than the nursery, dominated by a bed that had required custom construction to accommodate a being of Bastian’s considerable size.
Fairy lights twinkled around the window frame—I couldn’t help myself—and my collection of snow globes lined the dresser, each one a small world of captured winter magic.
He set me down on the edge of the bed, then stepped back.
I made a sound of protest.
“Patience.” The command in his voice sent shivers down my spine. “I’ve been waiting all day. You can wait a few more minutes.”
He moved to the window, looking out over the snow-covered street below. The shop’s lights still glowed, casting colored patterns across the pristine white. A few last stragglers made their way home, bundled against the cold, carrying bags of gifts and memories.
“Last year,” he said, his back still to me, “I thought Christmas Day would be the end of everything.”
My heart squeezed. “Bastian—”
“I’d never considered staying. Never imagined I could stay.” He turned, and the vulnerability in his expression stole my breath. “Centuries of the same cycle. Appear. Judge. Punish. Disappear. I’d forgotten what it meant to be anything but a monster serving a purpose.”
“You’re not a monster.”
“I am.” He crossed back to me, cupping my face with one massive, careful hand. “But you taught me that monsters can choose differently. That judgment can be tempered with mercy. That even creatures like me can find…”
“Love?”
“Home.” His thumb brushed across my cheekbone. “You gave me a home, Noelle Green. You and our amazing daughter and this absurd little shop full of too many ornaments and catastrophic amounts of tinsel.”
Tears pricked my eyes. “That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said about my decorating choices.”
“Your decorating choices are a crime against aesthetics.”
“And yet you love them.”
“And yet I love them.” He leaned down, his horns brushing through my hair exactly like that first Christmas Day when everything changed. “I love you. Impossibly. Completely. With every part of me.”
“I love you too.” I pulled him down for a kiss, tasting cinnamon and promises. “Even when you’re grumpy. Even when you judge my cookie ratios. Even when you pretend you don’t enjoy caroling.”
“I do not enjoy caroling.”
“You were humming ‘Good King Wenceslas’ while you did the dishes last week.”
“A momentary lapse.”
“You did the descant.”
“I was not—” He stopped, caught. “You’re infuriating.”
“You love it.”
“Against all wisdom and reason,” he repeated. Then, softer, “Yes.”
He kissed me again, and this time there was no gentleness in it. Just hunger and possession and the bone-deep certainty that this was exactly where we both belonged.
His hands found the hem of my sweater, pulling it up and off in one smooth motion. Cool air kissed my skin for a heartbeat before his warmth replaced it. Fur and leather and solid muscle pressed against me as he urged me back onto the bed.
“My turn,” he said, settling over me with predatory grace. “You’ve been very, very naughty this year, Miss Green.”
“Mrs. Krampus, actually.”
His eyes flared. He still reacted to that. The title. The claiming. The irrefutable proof that I’d chosen him, horns and claws and ancient otherworldly nature included.
“Mrs. Krampus,” he corrected, voice dropping to that register that made my toes curl. “Who has been making eyes at me all evening while I was trying to maintain proper decorative decorum.”
“You noticed?”
“I notice everything about you.” His hands mapped my sides, relearning familiar territory. “Every look. Every smile. Every time you bit your lip while watching me lift heavy boxes. You’ve been planning this since this morning, haven’t you?”
“Maybe.”
“Definitely.” He nipped at my collarbone, a careful scrape of teeth that promised more. “You wore this skirt specifically because you know what it does to me.”
“It’s just a skirt.”
“A very short red skirt.”
“It’s Christmasy.”
“It matches the ribbon in your hair.”
“Festive coordination.”
His laugh was dark and delicious. “You’re not fooling anyone, little light.”
“Not trying to fool you. Trying to seduce you.”
“Consider me thoroughly seduced.” His tail wrapped around my thigh, the touch making me gasp. “Now let me show you what happens to naughty wives who tease their husbands all day.”
“Please.”
“Oh, this isn’t going to be nice.” He kissed his way down my throat, my collarbone, the valley between my breasts. “This is going to be thorough. Detailed. Possibly excessive.”
“Promise?”
“I’m a creature of tradition and ritual, Mrs. Krampus.” He looked up at me through dark lashes, eyes burning. “I take my punishments very seriously.”
And he did.
Later—much later—I lay sprawled across his furred chest, boneless and satisfied and possibly incapable of ever moving again. His claws traced lazy patterns down my spine, careful even in the aftermath of thoroughly delivered punishment.
“I take back what I said about being exhausted,” I managed.
His chest rumbled with laughter beneath my cheek. “Oh?”
“I’ve ascended past exhaustion into some kind of blissed-out transcendental state.”
“Eloquent.”
“I used all my words earlier. These are the spare words. The discount words.”
“I quite like the discount words.” He pressed a kiss to the top of my head. “They’re honest.”
Outside, snow began to fall. Big, fat flakes that caught the fairy lights and turned the night into something from a snow globe. Our street. Our shop. Our little corner of the world where magic had decided to settle in and stay.
From the nursery, a small sound. Not quite crying. Just the restless fussing of a baby checking that her parents were still nearby.
“I’ll go,” Bastian said, already shifting me gently off his chest.
“You sure?”
“She’ll want her father.” Pride colored his voice, warm and new. “She always does when she wakes at night.”
He pulled on a pair of sleep pants—concession to parenthood—but kept his true form. Horns and all. Because our daughter didn’t care about any of that. She just wanted the deep voice that rumbled comfort and the strong arms that made her world safe.
I watched him go, my monster husband with his infinite patience and terrible soft spot for one tiny human who’d stolen his ancient heart the moment she’d been placed in his arms.
This is my life. This impossible, ridiculous, perfect life.
A few minutes later, he returned, our daughter cradled against his shoulder. She’d settled immediately, her small hand fisted in his fur, her breathing evening out as he paced the room in the slow rhythm that always worked.
“She just wanted to know we were here,” he murmured.
“Smart girl.”
“She gets that from you.”
“I’m pretty sure the ability to summon magical beings makes her more your daughter than mine.”
“She hasn’t summoned anything yet.”
“Give her time. She’s only three months old.”
He gave me a look that suggested he found this logic both sound and slightly horrifying. “I’m going to need to ward the apartment, aren’t I?”
“Probably.”
“And potentially the entire shop.”
“Definitely the shop.”
He sighed, but fondness softened it into something warm. “Our daughter is going to be a handful.”
“Our daughter is going to be amazing.” I patted the bed beside me. “Now bring her here before you pace a groove in the floor.”
He settled back onto the bed, arranging himself so our daughter could sleep safely between us. She made a small sound of contentment, surrounded by her parents and completely unaware that one of them was an ancient creature of judgment and punishment.
Or maybe she knew exactly what he was, and loved him anyway.
Children were wise like that.
Jingle Bells appeared in the doorway, surveyed the family arrangement, and leaped up onto the foot of the bed with the air of one claiming his rightful territory. He circled twice, then settled into his loaf formation, eyes half-lidded but alert.
“We really did it,” I said softly, watching snow fall past the window. “We saved the shop. Built a family. Made a life out of chaos and magic and absolutely terrible timing.”
“Terrible timing?” Bastian’s tail curled around my ankle beneath the blankets.
“I summoned you two weeks before Christmas. During the busiest retail season of the year. While trying to save a failing business and plan a town event.” I smiled at him. “If that’s not terrible timing, I don’t know what is.”
“Hmm.” He considered this. “Perhaps. Or perhaps it was exactly the right moment. When you needed me most. When I was ready to be needed.”
“Getting philosophical in your old age?”
“I’ve always been old. I’m just getting better at appreciating the moments that matter.”
Our daughter sighed in her sleep, one tiny hand reaching up to catch at nothing. Bastian caught it gently, letting her grasp his finger. She held on tight, even in dreams.
“Next year,” I said, “we should do something special for the Extravaganza.”
“Next year you’re delegating half the work to the community volunteers who keep offering.”
“But—”
“No.” He gave me the look. The one that suggested arguing would be futile. “You’re not baking a thousand cookies alone while trying to manage a three-month-old.”
“She’ll be fifteen months by then.”
“Which means she’ll be mobile. And curious. And likely experimenting with whatever magical abilities she inherits from me.” He raised an eyebrow. “You’ll be lucky if the shop survives her, let alone a baking marathon.”
He had a point.
“Fine. I’ll delegate. But I’m still making the gingerbread cookies.”
“Obviously. No one else can make them properly.”
“You’re just saying that because I give you extras.”
“I’m saying that because it’s true.” He leaned over our sleeping daughter to press a kiss to my forehead. “And because I’ve sampled every gingerbread cookie in a three-county radius, and yours are objectively superior.”
“You’ve been conducting cookie research?”
“Thorough cookie research.”
“You’re ridiculous.”
“You love it.”
I did. Heaven help me, I absolutely did.
Outside, the snow fell heavier, blanketing the street in perfect white. The shop lights glowed through the window, casting red and green shadows across the walls. Somewhere in the distance, church bells rang midnight.
Christmas Day was officially over.
A new year stretched ahead, full of chaos and magic and probably more frosting in my hair than any person should reasonably accumulate.
More late nights and early mornings. More community events and cookie catastrophes.
More moments of watching my ancient, powerful husband cradle our daughter like she was made of spun glass and wishes.
More life. Messy and imperfect and absolutely worth every ridiculous moment.
“Merry Christmas, Bastian,” I whispered.
His tail tightened around my ankle. “Merry Christmas, Noelle.”
Our daughter slept on, dreaming infant dreams. Jingle Bells kept watch at our feet. Snow fell outside while fairy lights twinkled inside. And somewhere in the shop below, ornaments caught the colored glow and sent it spinning across walls that had witnessed the beginning of everything.
One ritual. One desperate attempt at saving my shop. One absolutely terrible decision to summon something I didn’t understand.
And somehow, impossibly, it had given me everything.
I closed my eyes, breathing in the scent of cinnamon and frost and baby powder, letting exhaustion finally win its long battle. Tomorrow would bring new challenges. New chaos. New opportunities for disaster and delight in equal measure.
But tonight—this perfect, impossible Christmas night—I had everything I needed right here in this room.
A family. A home. A future.
And a Krampus who’d learned that punishment could take many forms, not all of them involving switches and chains.
Though honestly, some of them still did.
And I wouldn’t have it any other way.
I closed my eyes and let sleep pull me under, safe in the arms of my monster, exactly where I wanted to be.