Epilogue #2
“I don’t know yet,” I admitted. “Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe I’ll do something completely different. Take up pottery. Learn to ski. Become one of those women who hikes mountains at sunrise with golden retriever mountain gods.”
Sky giggled at the comment while Addie let her head fall back with a groan.
The back door opened with a gust of frigid air, and Teddy stomped in carrying an armload of firewood, his cheeks ruddy from the cold. He’d thrown on his jacket but hadn’t bothered to zip it, and I could see his breath clouding in the cold air that followed him in.
“Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey,” he announced, before disappearing into the living room. I heard the metallic clang of the fireplace screen being moved, then the solid thud of logs being added.
When he returned to the kitchen, he planted a kiss on the top of my head before snagging my mug and taking a long drink. “Better not be the good whiskey, Skylar Jade,” he said, smacking his lips together as he placed it back on the table.
“No, sir. Even though the recipe called for Maker’s Mark, I just used the cheap crap you keep on the bottom shelf.”
“Sure went quiet in a hurry in here,” Teddy observed as he pulled out the empty chair next to mine and sat down, immediately draping his arm across my shoulders. “Y’all talking about me again?”
Sky nodded emphatically. “Always. Actually, we just learned that Mom’s considering taking up sunrise hiking with Cali, and I for one would love to know your thoughts on that.”
Teddy’s hand, which had been idly playing with the ends of my hair, went still. “That so?”
I kicked Sky under the table, earning a yelp, but the damage was already done. His fingers tightened on my shoulder—not painfully, but enough that I felt the possessive edge creeping in.
“She’s joking,” I said in my best warning tone—the one that used to make the kids straighten up immediately. “I was making a point about not having everything planned out.”
“Mm,” Teddy grunted, the muscle in his jaw flexing. “And this point required mentioning Wright specifically?”
“It was more about the concept of spontaneity,” Addie offered diplomatically, though I could see her fighting a smile. “The sunrise was just an example.”
“Right. An example.” He took another deliberate sip of my hot chocolate, his eyes never leaving mine. “Baby, you wanna go watch a sunrise, I’ll take you. Don’t need some thirty-five-year-old pretty boy showing you around my mountain.”
“Your mountain?” I repeated, arching an eyebrow.
“My mountain,” he confirmed, utterly serious. “My woman. My sunrise.”
Sky dissolved into giggles while Addie pressed her lips together, clearly trying not to laugh.
“Theodore, it was hypothetical—”
His arm slid from my shoulders to band around my waist, hauling me closer until I was practically in his lap. “You wanna see him hypothetically buried on the side of a mountain, Kels?”
I bit back a smile at his growly tone. “I thought you said he was a good guy.”
“He is,” he agreed. “Which is why it’d be a damn fucking shame to have to kill him.”
I could have pointed out that he was being ridiculous. That I had zero interest in going anywhere with a man I didn’t know, much less at sunrise. That his caveman routine was unnecessary and borderline absurd.
But the truth was, I kind of liked it. Liked being wanted this fiercely, this unapologetically. Liked that even the hypothetical idea of another man showing me a sunrise made him pull me closer.
“That’s very sweet, but I’m not actually planning to—”
“Good,” he interjected, the tension in his shoulders easing slightly, though the possessive gleam in his eyes remained. “Because I ain’t big on sharing, especially when it comes to you, baby.”
“Not exactly breaking news,” I murmured before tipping my face up to kiss him. Right in front of our daughters, with my hands cupping his bearded jaw and my tongue sliding against his until he made that low, rumbling sound in his chest I’d loved hearing since we were teenagers.
Sky made a gagging sound. “And we’re back to the gross couple stuff. You guys are at an eleven, and I’m gonna need you to dial it back to like a six. Think you can do that?”
“No,” Teddy and I said at the same time.
“C’mon, keep it PG, you two,” Addie chimed in. “There are children present.”
“Children who orchestrated an elaborate con to get us back together,” Teddy pointed out dryly. “Pretty sure you forfeited the right to pearl-clutch about our relationship, kiddo.”
“There’s a difference between wanting you back together and wanting front-row seats to—” Sky gestured vaguely at us. “—all of that.”
Before I could formulate a smart-ass remark, our phones began buzzing in rapid succession, a cascade of notifications that could only mean one thing.
Sky lunged for hers first, nearly knocking over her mug in her excitement. “It’s from Uncle Dane,” she squealed. “He’s here! We have a new cousin!”
I covered my mouth, my heart squeezing as I opened the attached photos. The baby was perfect, with a shock of dark hair and a scrunched-up little face. He had one tiny fist mashed against his cheek, lips pursed as if he wasn’t thrilled he’d been evicted from his warm, cozy home.
Piper looked exhausted but somehow still radiant, and Dane—who took after his oldest brother in both build and appearance—had tears streaming down his face as he cradled them both.
Dane
Oliver Paul Riggs was born at 1:24 AM. 8 lbs. 10 oz, 21 inches. Piper made it through like a warrior goddess and is doing great. Meanwhile, I think I’ve cried more than Oliver in the past twenty minutes. Merry Christmas!
Oliver Paul, after the patriarch of the family, Paul “Wolverine” Riggs.
A man who’d raised his four sons to be as tough as they were loyal, who’d taught them that family came first, always.
Even when that family expanded to include an entire motorcycle club.
The man who’d pulled Teddy off Dane in the funeral home parking lot at Levi’s visitation, fighting to keep everybody together despite his own grief.
Sky let out a soft “aww” while Addie typed rapidly on her phone, probably already composing the perfect congratulatory message. “Poppy’s going to cry. You know he will.”
“Hundred percent,” Sky agreed. “Remember when Levi was born, and he held him for the first time?”
I smiled at the memory of the gruff biker insisting on counting my son’s toes to ensure he had all ten before discreetly wiping his eyes on the swaddling blanket.
Teddy zoomed in on the photo, studying his nephew with an expression that made my throat tighten. He’d worn the same look when each of our children was born—wonder and terror mixed with a love so fierce it could level mountains.
“He’s perfect,” I whispered, leaning into his warmth.
“Yeah,” he said quietly, his thumb tracing over the screen. “He is.”
The kitchen suddenly felt smaller, excitement dampening into something more complicated.
His eyes seemed to stare straight through the screen into another delivery room, another December baby.
He drummed his fingers restlessly against the table—index to pinky, repeatedly, a nervous tic I knew all too well.
Before I could probe further, he was already standing, his chair scraping against the floor.
“Gonna add another log to the fire,” he announced, even though it was burning fine.
The girls felt the shift as much as I did, and Addie shot me a questioning look, eyebrows raised. What’s wrong with him? she mouthed.
I shook my head slightly, watching Teddy’s broad shoulders as he prodded at the embers, the flames casting flickering shadows across his furrowed brows.
In another life, I would have stormed across the room, demanding he talk to me.
I would have convinced myself I could fix the distant look in his eyes and instead made his withdrawal about me.
But if I’d learned anything over the past few days, it was that sometimes people needed space to feel whatever they were feeling. That love didn’t mean trying to fix everything and everyone.
I rose from the table and padded over to where he crouched. My hand found the space between his shoulder blades, palm flat against the warm cotton of his shirt. I felt the tension coiled there, the tightness in muscles that should have been relaxed.
New life on Christmas morning. After everything we’d lost, everything we’d survived, it was proof that the world kept turning. That life continued. That families could heal.
But grief and joy were sometimes impossible to separate, each often making the other more intense.
So while welcoming our new nephew to the world was a blessing, it was also a reminder of all the milestones we’d never get to experience, like watching our son graduate or become a meteorologist. We’d never get to see him get married or start a family.
We’d never get to know how he would have turned out, what kind of man he would have become.
“Hey,” I said softly, scrunching my nose to hold back the tears that wanted to fall.
Teddy glanced up at me, and for just a second, I saw something vulnerable flash across his face before he masked it. “Hey, yourself.”
I carefully knelt beside him in front of the hearth, my knees crackling almost as loudly as the logs in the fireplace. My hand moved over his, lacing our fingers together before raising it to my mouth. I pressed a kiss to each scarred knuckle before loosening my grip in case he wanted to pull away.
He held on. Tight enough that my rings dug into my fingers, but I didn’t complain.
“First time I held Levi,” Teddy said suddenly, “he grabbed my finger. Just wrapped his whole fist around it and wouldn’t let go.
The nurse said it was just reflexes, but I thought…
” He trailed off, staring into the fire in silence for several seconds.
“Thought it meant something. Like he was telling me that he trusted me to keep him safe.”
“And you did,” I said simply. “Every day you could.”