Almost Just Friends (Wildstone #4)(96)

Her breath caught. “Maybe eighty . . .”

“Yeah. I like the way you think.”





Epilogue


Two years later

Piper and Winnie stood back from their creation and took a long look at their work.

“Man, we’re good,” Winnie said.

“We are,” Piper agreed.

“Arf, arf, arf!” This came from Chance, the eight-week-old puppy Piper had rescued last week after a work call at the local SPCA. The manager had fallen and broken her leg.

Piper had fallen too. She’d fallen in love with the tiny little puppy in a crate at the front desk giving her the biggest, saddest eyes she’d ever seen. She’d gone back three days in a row just to hold the puppy, until finally the lady who’d broken her leg gently asked Piper if she’d ever considered a dog.

She hadn’t until that very moment. She scooped up the puppy and kissed the top of his fuzzy head.

“Ma-ma-ma-ma-ma,” garbled the adorable one-and-a-half-year-old in the baby carrier strapped to Winnie’s chest.

“Aw,” Piper said, bending in to kiss the top of her niece’s fuzzy head as well. “And you’re right, Ro. It’s definitely time for a food break.”

“Ma-ma-ma-ma-ma!” This was accompanied by wild arm waving and a smile.

Baby Rowanne, “Ro” for short, had come into the world much like her daddy had lived in it: wild and carefree. And she loved to talk. None of them could actually understand a word, but they all pretended they did.

“You heard that, right?” Piper said. “She’s telling us it’s lunchtime. In fact, she quite clearly said she’s starving and that we are working too hard.”

“Arf, arf!” Chance said, chiming in.

Winnie laughed. “You know what? I think you’re both right.”

Together they stepped back from the marina house to admire what they’d done. A year ago, Emmitt had asked Cam to become an equal partner in the marina, and to sweeten the pot, he’d offered his house to Cam and Piper.

He’d then up and married Margaret and moved in with her.

Gavin ran both the B&B and the marina, and had a few part-time workers for help when he needed it. Winnie was one of them. And when Cam wasn’t at the DEA office or on a mission, he and Piper had been renovating the house. He’d been called out a month ago, and to try to fill the time, Piper had wanted to surprise him.

She and Winnie had finished the project he’d been working on before he’d left—painting the master bedroom. But he’d been gone long enough that she was starting to miss him unbearably.

They moved down the stairs and into the kitchen, stopping short at the sight of CJ in full cop gear holding Gavin pressed up against the refrigerator. He was either trying to interrogate Gavin’s tonsils, or kissing him hello.

“Again?” Winnie asked.

“I think you mean still,” Piper said.

“Ba-ba-ba-ba-ba,” Ro said.

Winnie smiled down at her girl. “You said it, little mama.” To the guys, she said, “Isn’t the honeymoon over yet?”

“Nope,” CJ said, and smiled into Gavin’s dazed-looking eyes.

Gavin grinned dopily back at him. “Definitely nope.”

“Come on,” Winnie said. “You’ve been married for months. CJ, you promised to love and cherish and to stop hogging the GameStation. Gavin, you also promised to love and cherish, and to still grab CJ’s ass, even when it gets old and wrinkly.” She pointed to the proof—the pics taped to the fridge where Gavin had just been held against it.

There was a pic of Gavin and CJ beneath a rainbow altar being married by an Elvis in drag. And one of all of them grinning drunkenly and toasting gallon-sized champagne glasses toward the two grooms. And then another of both of those same two grooms jumping into the hotel pool in their matching tuxes.

But Piper’s favorite was a shot someone had gotten of her and Cam slow dancing in a corner beneath a flashing disco ball, eyes only for each other. She was smiling, with a goofy look on her face. Right before, Cam had leaned in and asked her, “What do you think of us being next?”

She’d said, “Next for what?”

He’d just smiled at her, and she’d nearly swallowed her tongue.

“Are you serious?”

Cam had dropped to one knee and produced a gorgeous diamond ring, and she’d gasped. “I’ve loved you for a long time,” he’d said. “You make me smile, you make me feel like a superhero, like I can do anything. But the truth is, all I want to do is be with you. I want to sleep with you every night and wake up with you every morning for the rest of my life.”

“Yes,” Piper had whispered.

“Jeez, Piper, wait until he asks you,” Winnie had said.

Cam, not taking his eyes off Piper, had smiled. “Will you—”

“Yes,” Piper had said again, softly, past the huge lump of joy and excitement in her throat.

Winnie had shaken her head.

“What if he’s asking if you’ll do his laundry for the rest of his life?” Gavin had joked.

Cam had dropped his head and stared at his own knees for a beat. Probably second-guessing his desire to join her crazy family. Then he’d tried again. “Piper, will you marry me? And to be clear, that doesn’t include doing my laundry.”