Hostile(74)

I start school next semester. I don’t talk to my parents, other than to get the check for school, but it doesn’t matter. I have Rhett. I have his love. And his family. A cabin.

I wouldn’t change a goddamn thing.





EPILOGUE





* * *



7 years later . . .

“We need to get going.” Grayson walks into the living room with a giggling kid turned upside down and hanging down his back.

I laugh and stand up, grabbing the five-year-old and turning him upright, holding onto him. “What are you doing, goofball?”

Andrew just giggles—a happy kid now—a far cry from when we first met him last year. He was dirty and way too small for a four-year-old, crying and clinging to his brother.

Grayson finished college faster than anyone should, but he got a degree in business and humanities with a minor in art. He immediately got a job with city mission, overseeing a lot of projects there.

When Andrew and Ben were introduced to us through one of the after-school programs, we knew it was right. That they were supposed to be ours.

A lot has changed in the last seven years, but Grayson’s spirit and unyielding stubborn love have only grown. He’s grown into the man I know his grandfather would admire. I certainly do. We were married a few years back in a small ceremony with all my family in attendance. Josh was even his best man, while Bree and Fletch stood by my side.

When we decided we wanted to adopt Ben and Andrew, we bought a house near Rhys’s and my shop—yes, I went into partnership with my dad, and I couldn’t be happier about it. I earned it, and I’m damn good at my job. And I’m coming up with new ways to market the shop and making it even more profitable.

We also still have the cabin in the Ozarks that we go to any time the kids aren’t in school and we can take off for a bit. But right now, we’re late for Christmas. “Grandma Blair is going to be mad if we’re late,” I say in a teasing way to my son.

Andrew just giggles and squirms out of my arms. “Grandma never gets mad at me!” he singsongs, and he knows it’s true. The little shit can get by with anything.

Grayson laughs as Andrew tugs his boots onto his feet by the front door. “I can’t believe Blair insists on being called ‘Grandma.’ She seems like one who wouldn’t like that title.”

I laugh because yeah, she’s still blonde and a total bombshell, but if Ben and Andrew call her anything else, she tells them quickly just exactly who she is to them. “She loves it.”

Grayson turns to me, cupping my face in his big hands. “I love you.”

“You’re being gross.”

He just laughs, strong and heavy with happiness. “Yup. Join me.”

I kiss his nose. “I love you too. Now let’s get our kids ready to go because I don’t want to hear the lecture from Blair. She loves to give me shit.”

“Ummmm! You said a bad word!” Ben says as he bounces into the room.

I roll my eyes but grab him around the waist and tickle him. “You’re not going to tell on me though.” I tickle him more, throwing him into a fit of laughter. “Right?”

“Okay, okay,” he giggles. It’s the most beautiful sound in the world. Fight me on it. You’ll be wrong. He puts his hands up in surrender. “I won’t tell.”

I release him, and he runs away, laughing as Grayson pulls a coat on Andrew, and I watch in awe. I never thought this was possible. That a broken kid whose parents didn’t want him could find so much damn love in this ugly world.

Who couldn’t just have it but could also give it back, but that’s what Grayson has done for me. He’s shown me love. Hell, he wouldn’t take no for an answer and loved me through all my anger and bitterness until I had no choice but to love him back.

Bree is happy now. Married with one kid and another on the way. Fletch—yeah, he shocked us all, and I’m pretty sure he’s totally and completely in love too. Blair and Rhys are solid. Still happy beyond believe, and when Max and Ian left home to go to college, Blair found two more souls who needed a home.

I used to think she saw Rhys in all of us. That she was trying to right a wrong, and maybe she was in her own way. But she told me recently that to her, we’re each our own perfectly individual human with our own thoughts and struggles. With our own souls that need guidance, and she gets something unique from each of us.

That we actually healed a part of her and continue to do so.

She’s an angel in her own right, but she claims we are too. I don’t know if that’s true, but I do know she’s one hell of a mother, and any kid who lives in her house becomes hers, through and through.

Grayson kisses my lips and studies me carefully. “You okay?”

I grin, something that’s so easy for me now. “Yes. Let’s go.” He kisses me, and we grab the boys and head out to the car.

I still consider myself demisexual, but the specific label hasn’t mattered to me in a long time, because once I was with Grayson, he’s all I needed. He’s all I’ve ever wanted. Still, I realized I blew everything up into a huge thing when maybe it wasn’t at all.

My family, they’ve loved me, no matter what, since I’ve known them. I should have trusted them, but I can’t change that I didn’t do it then. Now I do. They loved me, and I just had to let them.