Epilogue
Binge-Watch this Moment on Repeat
Neve
Two Months Later
When I walk into our usual brunch spot with Grant and Sera, I know we look like a real family.
Sera has her “meeting” folder—construction paper, stickers, several unidentifiable things glued to the cover, including but not limited to a pen lid, a smooth piece of sea glass, and a stick she found on her walk home from school.
Grant’s hand is warm on the small of my back.
I’m wearing a yellow dress that makes me feel like literal sunshine, but the way Grant watches me, eyes dark and greedy, I could be wearing a trash bag, and he’d still look at me like this.
Sera manages the agenda. Pancakes, fruit, and a negotiation about whipped cream that she wins decisively. Grant’s hopeless when she flashes dimples—inherited from him. He’s soft with her in ways that make me want to cry and climb him like a tree at the same time.
Probably hormones.
Sera lines up her pencil and her pancakes like she’s prepping for a TED Talk, and the first item on her agenda is syrup allocation.
“I think it should go all the way to the edge,” she announces, squinting at Grant, then at me, like she’s open to counterarguments but will not be swayed.
Her conviction is so adorable I nearly burst.
Grant surrenders immediately. “I trust your judgment, bug.” The way he’s looking at her makes my chest do that dumb, embarrassing squeeze. God, men who are good dads. It’s so unfair.
I lean in. “I like whipped cream mountains. What’s your stance?”
Sera pauses, considering. “It’s important for the whipped cream to be taller than the pancakes,” she says, measuring an imaginary stack with her tiny hands.
Grant laughs, loud and delighted. “You heard the boss. Mountains it is.”
She beams, and I melt.
I can’t believe it’s been two months of this. I can’t believe it’s been two months of it being easy, of not having to hide, of just being this. Us.
After brunch, we do the handoff in the parking lot. It’s never not awkward, but Grant and I always play it straight—a full-on masterclass in mature co-parenting, with Sera’s backpack zipped and her “meeting folder” transferred like the nuclear football.
Marie is in sunglasses and high heels like it’s a press conference, but she can’t camouflage the way her jaw flexes when Sera hugs me, planting a sloppy kiss on my cheek and chirping “love you, Neve!” or the way she flatlines at Grant’s easy, unbothered grin as he nudges his shoulder into mine when I straighten.
I almost feel bad for her. Almost. He’s happy, actually happy, and it’s fucking killing her.
We make it back to Grant’s apartment, quiet settling around us like a fresh coat of paint.
He kicks off his shoes, rakes a hand through his hair.
There’s a lightness to him that’s brand new—or it was brand new, two months ago.
I’m obsessed with seeing it on him, though. I hope I never, ever get used to it.
Now’s the perfect time to tell him.
“Hey,” I say, stopping him with a hand on his chest. “Can I tell you something?”
He stills. “Of course, angel. You can tell me anything. You know that.”
I hesitate, and for one split second, panic flares in my chest. Maybe this is wrong.
Maybe this is the moment everything unravels, and he looks at me with that careful, analytic detachment, and I’ll know I’ve fucked it all up.
My hands shake. I press my palm harder to his chest, feeling his heartbeat under my fingertips.
I look up at him, and my voice comes out small. “I’m pregnant.”
The words detonate. For a second, Grant just stares at me, eyes wide, mouth open. Then he laughs—a sound so raw and bright it’s almost a sob, and he hauls me in, crushing me to his chest until I can’t breathe. He’s shaking. I’m shaking.
“Are you serious?” he whispers, voice gone almost as high as the sound that squeaks out of me. “Fuck, Neve.”
He buries his head in my hair, breathing me in. His hands slide down to my waist, palms splayed over the fabric of my sundress. I smirk when I feel the thickening length of him pressing against me through his jeans.
“You put it there.” I know the words will tip him right over the edge, but that’s kind of where I want him, anyway.
A groan vibrates in his chest. “Fuck.”
I grin, bright as a sunrise, and wind my arms around his neck, hauling him down for a kiss. “You like that?” I whisper. “You like knowing you knocked me up?”
His hands are everywhere at once, greedy and reverent. He palms my belly through the dress, big hands shaking. “God, yes. You’re perfect.”
I shiver, heart thundering. “Keep going.”
He pins me against the wall, mouth hot at my ear. “Fuck, baby girl. I need you. Now.”
“Yes, Daddy.”
In the next breath, Grant’s hands are on my hips. He spins us, then walks me backwards through the living room, not breaking eye contact. When we reach his room, I think he’s going to push me down on the bed, but instead, he lowers me down gently.
I laugh as I land softly, propping myself on my elbows. Grant’s smirk is panty-melting. “I’ve got to be careful with you now, angel.”
I huff a laugh. “Only if you promise to make up for it with your mouth.”
“You know I live for it.”
He’s on his knees before I can get another word out.
Hands at my calves, rucking the yellow fabric of my dress up to my hips.
I nearly leap off the bed when his mouth finds the inside of my knee.
I hook my heels over his shoulders, pulling him closer.
Grant’s palms slide under my thighs to spread me wide, his breath hot on my bare skin. I’m already so wet.
He’s the king of the long, greedy stare, and he doesn’t try to hide it. “You’re beautiful like this,” he murmurs, voice gone to dark velvet. “Fucking radiant.”
If I wasn’t already drunk on him, that would do it. The way he looks at me is illegal. If this were a TV show, there should be a warning for “intense emotional nudity” or something.
I tilt my hips, and he groans as his mouth drags up the inside of my thigh. His beard scrapes, and my whole body bursts into goosebumps.
His hands slide under my ass, lifting me to drag my panties down. All I can do is squirm and wait.
“You’re so wet, angel,” he rasps. “You want my mouth?” He drags his nose up the crease of my thigh, then pauses, just breathing me in.
I want to laugh, but it gets stuck. “You know I do.”
“Say it anyway.”
He’s such a fucking menace. I want to whine, but I also love the way he makes me say it. “I want your mouth on my pussy, Daddy. I want you to lick me until I can’t think straight.”
He grins, slow and mean, and his breath is hot against my skin. “Such a good girl for me.”
The first swipe of his tongue has me nearly levitating off the bed.
He wraps one big hand around my thigh, holding me open, and then he sets in for real. His tongue circles my clit, slow and careful, then faster, lapping at me like I’m his favorite thing in the universe. Maybe I am—one of them, anyway. The thought is dizzying.
My hands tangle in his hair, tugging, but he just groans and buries his face deeper. He loves it when I’m loud for him. I look down, and he’s staring up at me, eyes molten green, mouth shiny with my slick. “You taste so good, baby girl. I could eat you forever.”
My hips jerk up, chasing his tongue. “No objections here.”
His tongue flicks against my clit, then he sucks it into his mouth, and the world just... drops away. There’s nothing but him. Nothing but the sensation.
I moan, desperate. “I love you. There’s nobody I want to do this with other than you. There’s nobody I want to raise this baby with other than you.”
Grant freezes, staring up at me over the landscape of my body. Then, suddenly, he’s climbing up and over me, fumbling with his jeans. “I—fuck, baby girl. I’m sorry, I just, I need to be inside you right now, I just—”
“It’s okay,” I whisper, shaping my palm against his cheek, stubble rasping. “Please.”
He’s got his jeans open in record time, cock thick and hot in his fist. The look on his face is complete, unfiltered ruin.
He pushes my dress up further, and I arch into him. I want it so bad I could scream. I want him to know it. I want him to never forget how much I want him, all the time.
He lines up, the head of his cock slick and fat against my entrance. His hands shake a little, and that’s almost the hottest part.
God, he’s perfect.
I grab his jaw and haul him down, crashing our mouths together. “Fuck me, baby. Hard.”
He groans, this wild, helpless noise, and then he’s inside me, stretching me open. The burn is perfect. I gasp, and he freezes, searching my face like he’s reading every micro-expression for distress.
I dig my nails into his biceps through the cotton of the shirt he’s still wearing. “Don’t you dare,” I pant. “Don’t you dare go gentle on me now. I want to feel you.”
There’s this split second where he just stares at me, pupils blown, then he snaps. His hips punch forward, and then his mouth is everywhere at once—biting my shoulder, kissing my neck, then finding my mouth again.
“You’re perfect,” he breathes. “So fucking perfect. You were made for me.”
I whimper, hips rolling up to meet him. “I’m yours. All yours.”
I can barely breathe as he brings a hand to my belly, palm spreading over the soft curve, the crease where it folds over my hip, striated with stretch marks. He stares down at me. “Fuck. I can’t believe you’re having my baby.”
I laugh, high and cracked, dizzy with the way he’s looking at me. “Believe it. You did this to me. You made me yours.”
“That’s right,” he groans, voice breaking over the words. “Need you full for me. Need you fucked out and happy, carrying my kid, carrying my name, everything. You look so good like this.”
I let out a high sound, then lean up to nip at his jaw. “Your name?”
Grant freezes for a second, then his hips drive down. “Does that surprise you?”
A breath shakes out of me, and I taste the salt of tears on my lips. I didn’t realize I was crying. “No. But I would. I’d be Neve King. If you wanted me to be.”
Grant groans. “Fuck, fuck, angel.”
I grip his jaw, thumb at the corner of his mouth. “I love you.”
“God, I love you, too,” he rasps. “You’re gonna come for me, baby girl. You’re gonna squeeze my cock like a good girl, aren’t you?” It’s not a question. He knows the answer.
When I nod, giving a breathless moan, his rhythm gets brutal, and I lose the thread of language. I clamp around him, thighs shaking, brain short-circuited. The pleasure is so huge it’s like my body can’t hold it all, so I just scream.
Grant curses, hips slamming forward, and I feel him pulse inside me. He buries his face in my neck, shaking with it as he moans through his release. We stay like that, tangled, breathless, both of us shivering with aftershocks, until he shifts, rolling us so I’m sprawled across his chest.
His heart whams under my ear, and he wraps his arms around my waist, holding me close.
We’re both quiet for a beat, just breathing. He strokes my back with one big hand, thumb tracing the ridge of my spine, and every so often, he drags his palm over my belly, not subtle at all.
“So,” I say, voice syrupy with mischief, “About that whole ‘carrying your name’ thing. Is that a proposal?”
Grant groans. “Careful, angel. You know I’m not above proposing right here, right now, when you’re naked and draped over me like this.”
I prop my chin on his chest, grinning. “You know I’d still say yes.”
He barks a laugh. “You’re a dangerous woman.” He lifts a brow, but he’s smiling like an idiot, and I love it. “So… you’d want to get married?”
“Someday,” I whisper, and something in my chest goes all wobbly. “But right now, I just want you. And pancakes. And maybe… to figure out how to tell Sera she’s going to be a big sister?”
Grant’s hand splays low on my belly, thumb stroking the soft curve, and he huffs a laugh. “You think she’ll be excited?”
“One of my favorite things about Sera is that she’s never been chill about anything in the whole time I’ve known her.”
He grins, soft and boyish. “You’re right. We should tell her at breakfast meeting.”
“Yes. Absolutely.” I can see it already—Sera with a stack of construction paper, a baby doll, and the kind of stone-cold focus that could topple governments. “We tell her together, so we can be a team.”
He kisses me, soft, palm warm at my stomach, and it feels as if the little bits of detritus usually floating around in my universe finally snap into place.
“Always a team,” he whispers. “Always, angel.”