I felt him smile against my face. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” I confirmed. “You kept them all?”
“Every single one of them.” He confirmed as he moved to look up at me. “You saved me over there. You don’t know it, but you did.”
I felt emotion clog my throat.
“Well, right back at you, big boy,” I told him. “I wouldn’t have made it through these last six weeks without you.”
He smoothed his hand down the length of my face, then paused with his fingers delicately touching the small scar around my throat.
“I hate looking at this every day,” he mumbled softly. “It reminds me of everything that I almost lost.”
I pressed his hand harder to my neck. “I’ll get it removed.”
His eyes moved back to my face.
“I don’t mind looking at it, though,” he said. “It shows me that you’re a survivor. Your soul’s exactly like mine.”
I moved until my forehead was pressed against his. “Like always gravitates toward like.”
I wouldn’t deign to compare my life to Malachi’s, but I knew that we both had fighter’s souls.
And I would fight, day and night, to make sure that Malachi never saw the darkness of life ever again if I could help it.
I knew he’d do the same for me.
“Love you, baby.”
Malachi’s words, though said often, always had the power to knock the wind out of me.
I ran my nose over his. “I love you more, Malachi.”
He lifted me then and we returned to the shower.
And not once did we stop loving each other the entire night.EPILOGUEMile high anxiety club.-Coffee CupMALACHIGabriel,
This is in response to your letter that you wrote before you were captured and held prisoner.
I know that you were joking, but I’d like to take you up on that offer now.
Yes, I will marry you.
Sierra
P.S. No, this is not a joke. I really would marry the shit out of you.
• • •
My phone beeped, and I chanced a glance down at it as I took the final turn toward home.
I frowned when I saw it was Sierra, and I was concerned enough that I pulled over just to read the message.
Sierra: Help, I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up.
I frowned hard at the text message and felt my heart rate start to race at the idea that she’d fallen and couldn’t get up.
Putting the truck back into gear, I sped a little down the road, passing Sammy who was likely heading to my place so fast that his hair blew backward.
I didn’t stop when he raised his hand, his middle finger extended in my direction.
Instead, I continued to rocket down the road to my place, pulling right up to the front walk before getting out and barely managing to turn the truck off before I bailed out.
I’d barely made it up the steps before I was calling her name.
“Sierra!” I called out over and over again.
“Baby’s room!” she called out loudly.
I groaned.
I had no clue where the ‘baby’s room’ was at today.
Sierra had fucking moved the goddamn room eight times over the last six weeks since we’d gotten married and I’d ‘officially’ moved into the house with her.
Granted, I had been living there since we’d ‘fake’ gotten together, but still.
I was now officially moved into the main house where I’d grown up, and there wasn’t a single fucking nightmare that plagued me.
“What room is that?” I called as I took the stairs two at a time.
“The one at the very end of the hall, closest to the one that we just painted,” she called.
I hurried down the length of the hallway, somewhat breathless from all the running around I’d just done, and came to a sudden halt when I saw her lying on the ground.
She was staring at me with annoyance clearly written all over her face.
My mouth quirked.
“Umm.” I paused. “What the hell happened?”
She was not amused with my amusement.
I walked over to the crib that she was lying… in… and looked down at her.
“How’d you end up like this?” I wondered.
She was obviously putting the crib together that I’d told her that I would do when I got home.
Yet, she’d started it without me.
And somehow had ended up in the crib, with all four sides around her, and no way to get out.
In her obvious attempt to remove herself from the situation, she’d realized that her belly was too big to fit underneath the crib to get out from the bottom, and in trying to get out that way, had caught her shirt on a screw that held her immobile.
She glared up at me.
“You are not seriously laughing right now, Mr. November,” she growled.
It was so fucking cute that I barely contained the urge to reach down and pinch her damn cheeks.
“No, of course not,” I lied.
I heard the door slam downstairs and knew that her brother had finally made it.
Upon seeing me passing him going ninety, he’d likely started to sprint the rest of the way.