Epilogue
Dani
Six Months Later
Logan likes to say I brought light into his world.
He says it as if it’s simple, like the light was simply there, something I carried in without effort. Like I just opened a door, and everything shifted in an instant.
But the truth is—
He’s the one who taught me what it means to live.
In the consistent ways he shows up. In the way he looks at me, like I don’t have to earn my place beside him. In the way he never asks me to be less, never asks me to be more—just… exactly who I am.
For a long time, I didn’t know what to do with that.
Being seen like that felt unfamiliar. Almost uncomfortable at first. Like I was waiting for the moment it would change, for the point where I’d have to adjust myself to keep it.
That moment never came. Instead, something else did; I softened.
The last six months haven’t been easy.
There were still long days at the public defender’s office.
Cases still sat heavy in my chest long after I left the courtroom.
In those moments, the weight of it all pressed in—the responsibility, the outcomes I couldn’t control, the lives that didn’t always bend toward fairness, just like before Logan.
That part of me didn’t disappear when things changed, but it shifted over time.
I stopped carrying it like it was mine alone. I stopped measuring my worth by how much I could bear, how far I could push before something gave out. But even as I continued to show up and fight, I no longer lost myself in it, because at the end of the day, I had something to come home to.
Not just a place.
A life.
Logan, standing at the stove with that same quiet focus, like making dinner is something that deserves his full attention. Harper, spinning through the living room, music playing too loud, laughter filling every corner of the house.
And me—
Right in the middle of it.
Not on the outside looking in.
Not waiting for permission.
Just… there.
My parents came around, slowly, but they saw the change before they understood it. Saw the way I stopped rushing through conversations, the way I didn’t answer every call with tension in my voice, the way I showed up to dinner without that constant edge of needing to prove something.
Then they met Logan, the man who listened when my father spoke, who asked questions instead of making assumptions. The man who stood beside me—not in front, not behind—like we were equals in something we’d built together.
They saw happiness I wasn’t trying to hide. The life that didn’t take anything away from who I was and what I could achieve, it added to it.
And slowly, they let themselves believe it too.
Some days are still uncertain.
There are still questions I don’t have answers to.
About my body.
About the future.
About what comes next.
But they don’t feel as heavy as they used to.
They don’t define me the way I once thought they would.
Because for the first time—
I’m not trying to figure out my entire life before I let myself have it.
I’m just… living it.
???
Logan
Two Years Later
“I can hear you,” I call out, leaning against the hallway wall. I pretend I’m not listening for every small sound in the house.
A muffled giggle gave them away immediately.
I take my time anyway and allow Harper to think she’s winning even when she isn’t.
“Hmm,” I mutter, stepping more heavily than I need to down the hall. “House got real quiet all of a sudden…”
Another giggle. Softer this time. Like they’re trying to hold it in.
I shake my head, a smile pulling at the corner of my mouth before I can stop it, warmth blooming in my chest at how easily their joy pulls at me.
They’re terrible at hiding, but I let it stretch a second longer. Let them have it. Then I reach for the handle and pull the door to the closet open.
“Found you!”
Harper shrieks immediately, scrambling toward me like she didn’t just give herself away, her laughter loud and unfiltered as I catch her mid-step and haul her up into my arms.
“Daddy! No fair!”
“You’re the one laughin’,” I say, lifting her higher like she weighs nothing.
Dani’s still on the floor of the closet, half tucked behind her hanging clothes, her hand covering her mouth like that’s going to hide the smile breaking through anyway.
“You’re worse than she is,” I tell her.
She lowers her hand, eyes bright. “I was being quiet.”
“Sure you were.”
I reach down with my free arm, catching her around the waist. I pull her up with us. For a second it’s just the three of us: Harper laughing without restraint, Dani half protesting, and me, my chest tight with overwhelming gratitude, my arms full in a way that still feels unreal some days.
I spin them once. Harper squeals. Dani laughs into my shoulder, her grip tightening instinctively, and something in my chest settles in that quiet, solid way it does when I realize, again—
This is mine.
This life.
These two.
Mine.
“Again!” Harper demands immediately.
“Again later,” I say, setting her back on her feet, and she darts off without argument, already halfway down the hall.
“Don’t look!” she calls.
“I’m always lookin’,” I mutter under my breath.
But my attention shifts back to Dani before she’s even out of sight.
She’s still standing close, her breath coming quick and uneven from laughter, her cheeks flushed, her hair falling loose around her face where it slipped free.
My hand finds her waist, pulling her back into me, and she comes easily, like she always does now.
“You’re a terrible influence,” I murmur, brushing my mouth near her temple.
She huffs a quiet laugh. “You love it.”
“Yeah,” I admit, because I do.
More than I ever thought I would.
I guide her back into the closet, the door still half open. Light spills in just enough to catch the way she’s looking at me before my lips crash into hers.
Her hands slide up my chest, fingers curling into my shirt like she needs to anchor herself, and I let my forehead rest against hers when I pull back.
“Think she’s gonna find a better spot this time?” she whispers.
“Not a chance.”
She smiles.
And I feel it—
A small, unmistakable movement beneath my palm.
I freeze.
My breath catches.
“Did you feel that?” I start, my voice quieter than I mean it to be.
Dani smiles, softer now. “Yeah.”
Another small kick presses into my hand.
Real.
There.
Ours.
“Hey,” I murmur, sliding my hand just slightly, like I’m trying to memorize it. “Easy in there.”
Dani laughs softly. “He’s already stubborn.”
“Yeah,” I say, glancing down at her belly. “Got that from you.”
She nudges me lightly. “Excuse me?”
“Don’t even start,” I mutter, but there’s no bite to it.
I keep my hand there a second longer than I need to.
Because I want to.
Because even now, after every appointment, every quiet moment sitting beside her in waiting rooms I hate more than I can explain, every conversation Cami practically dragged me into therapy to have—
This still feels unreal.
I don’t miss a single appointment, don’t even consider it. Doesn’t matter how much I hate the sterile smell, the waiting, the not knowing. I show up because they matter more. Because she matters more.
Therapy didn’t fix everything. It didn’t erase what I lost or take away that instinct to brace, to prepare, to hold things tight just in case.
But it taught me how to stay in the moment. I don’t try to control how it ends.
And right now, in this moment, I don’t want to miss a second of it.
“You’re thinkin’ too hard,” Dani murmurs.
I huff quietly. “Always.”
Her hand comes up to my jaw, grounding, steady.
“You’re doing okay,” she says softly. And I know she means it. And for once, I believe it.
“Think she’s gonna find a better spot this time?” she asks, her voice lighter now.
“Not a chance,” I say, brushing my thumb once over her belly before letting my hand fall back to her waist.
She smiles.
And I feel it again, the kind of happiness I didn’t think I’d have, didn’t think I could afford.
It surprises me every time how different the world feels from this side of things.
There was a time I thought joy like this belonged only to other people, people who hadn’t lost what I lost. People who hadn’t spent years scraping by on habit and memory.
I used to keep everything at arm’s length. I learned how to live with less.
Turns out, I didn’t have less.
I just hadn’t found this yet.
“Daddy-o!” Harper calls from somewhere down the hall. “You’re not looking, right?”
I close my eyes for half a second, then lean in, brushing one more quick kiss against Dani’s mouth.
“Duty calls,” I murmur.
She laughs softly, stepping back just enough to let me go.
“Go find her.”
I nod, but my hand lingers, just for a second, on the swell of her belly.
Just because I can.
Just because she’s here.
Then I step back into the hallway, following the sound of Harper’s voice.
The house feels full in a way it never used to be.
It wasn’t so long ago that the rooms echoed with silence, every corner holding more emptiness than warmth, leaving a hollowness that pressed against my chest. Some nights, I still wake up tense, sensing the old heaviness of grief—now quieter, more like an urge to keep order and control.
But that happens less. Now, all that space is crowded with laughter and footprints, bright and impossible to ignore.
And as I move through it, listening for her next laugh, already planning how I’ll pretend not to find her right away—
I realize something that settles deep in my chest.
This isn’t something I’m holding together.
It’s something I get to be part of.
And I wouldn’t trade it for anything.