Epilogue
ALMOST TWO YEARS LATER
Harlow
Our entire family stands in the backyard, gathered around a table covered in food and presents. It is Scarlett’s second birthday.
“Happy birthday, Scarlett. Hip, hip hooray,” everyone sings. Scarlett leans forward, lips pursed as she tries to blow out her candles. Thane’s standing behind her and helps. She claps her hands, and he fixes the party hat on her head.
“Who wants cake?” Thane calls out. He spent two days making a unicorn-dinosaur cake that Scarlett insisted she wanted.
It has a T-Rex body with a unicorn head and horn.
The twins waddle over to Thane as he helps Scarlett cut the biggest chunk.
Her dark, curly hair blows in the breeze as he sets it in her bowl.
The twins are just learning how to stand and have to use Thane’s pant legs to pull themselves up.
Scarlett notices them and grabs a piece of her freshly cut cake.
She leans over and holds it out to Xavian, who was given Rhen’s middle name.
Thane named him while Leon demanded to name Emeric, which is Raidon’s middle name.
This caused many arguments because Raidon wanted to give him Leon’s.
They eventually agreed on Emeric so long as I agreed to have another baby later, which turns out to be now. I’m nearly full-term with our second daughter, who will be named Falon.
“Xavian, let Scarlett eat her cake. Daddy has some for you here,” Thane tells him as he gnaws on Scarlett’s hand, slobbering all over her fingers.
Thane scoops him and Emeric up in one arm, perching them on his hip while he grabs their bowls.
Raidon moves to help him as Scarlett holds the mushed-up cake to Raidon, wanting to feed him some.
“All yours, baby girl. Eat it up,” he says, yet she continues to thrust the cake at him. He pulls a face, reluctantly eating the mushed-up and slobbered on cake. “Mmm, yum,” he tells her. Thane chuckles at him.
“Happy birthday, Scar!” Zara leans down, kissing her cheek and dropping a tiara on her head.
Zara has six kids in total now. She insists she is done, but Jake keeps pestering her for one more.
I watch as Zara helps Scarlett open her present, who holds it up to show us while I move to take a seat.
My lower back is killing me from standing half the day.
So much has changed in the last two years.
Thane got the Omega laws officially overturned in the Supernatural Parliament.
Omegas can no longer be considered an Alpha’s possession.
We now have free will and laws that protect us.
He accomplished what his mother always wished. What she fought and died for.
Hands grip my shoulders, and I peer up at Leon.
He leans down to kiss me, and I growl at him when he tries to deepen it.
He chuckles, pulling back and moving to clean up Scarlett, who is covered in cake and frosting.
Thane is feeding Emeric while Raidon feeds Xavian.
I look around for Rhen and see him walking toward me.
He places a piece of cake in front of me.
Everyone is sitting at the table eating. Before cake, Leo and Charles spent half the afternoon chasing the kids around on the climbing frame and playing with them in the bouncy castle with Emily. Elaine is sitting next to me, and her hand smooths over my huge belly.
“See, think of all the tummy rubs you could get,” Sam tells Zara, nodding to Elaine’s hand.
“Not a chance. I am not a breeding machine. I am done,” she tells him, shooting him a look. I chuckle as they continue to bicker. Her other mates join in, but she remains firm.
“How much longer now?” she asks, changing the subject and looking at my belly.
“A week,” I say.
“Still want me to come down? Jake can drive me,” she offers. I was at her last birth, and she arrived a few minutes after my twins were born. I smile, nodding.
“Of course,” I tell her, and she nods back.
Zara and I try to get our families together for a weekend every month. We alternate between her house and ours. Family gatherings are huge now and something I don’t take for granted.
I always make sure to find the time, and I know Zara feels the same. We both wanted cousins and relatives growing up, but living on the run, we didn’t get that. Now, we make sure our kids have it, because to us, family is everything.
The End.