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And that… that made me realize I never wanted to go another day without them.
“I love you.” The words tumbled out of me before I could stop them, and once they were said, I clutched that golden cross tighter.
Zander was the first to respond: “That was definitely directed toward me.”
Behind me, Luca said, “Ah, I’m her husband, so I think she was talking to me.”
“Her husband for now,” Cade muttered.
“I’m choosing to believe it was directed at me, actually,” Damian said. “Although she might’ve meant the priest, because, hoo boy, when they’re together, they’re always humping like rabbits. Ooh! I found one of those giant beds.”
Ezekiel sighed, as if he couldn’t believe he was stuck in a room with idiots.
“Wow,” I whispered. “So I say it, and no one’s going to say it back? Fine. I see how it is.” I said it as a joke, but the guys must’ve thought I was serious, because I kid you not, after I said that, it was like they each jumped to say they loved me in return.
Seriously. It was like a chorus. Luca and Zander said it at the same time: “I love you.”
Cade muttered it under his breath, as if he didn’t want the other guys to hear: “Of course I love you.”
Ezekiel only had eyes for me on the bed as he said, “You have my heart.”
And, lastly, Damian, who must’ve been too busy ordering that large, oversized bed on his phone, because it took him a few extra seconds to say, “I love you too, baby girl. All right! The bed is ordered and should be here by… late next week? Shit. That’s so long—”
I smiled to myself as my eyelids fell. My dad, my real dad, might not be proud of me for getting revenge, and he might not understand how I could love more than one man at a time, but you know what? That’s all right. It didn’t matter what he’d think or what the world would think. All that mattered was us, right here, in this very room.
We were together, and nothing and no one would ever pull us apart. They were mine, and I was theirs. For the first ever, I actually felt like I was home.
Epilogue – Giselle
The days blurred into each other; life turned strange. Yes, even though I’d planned on taking Miguel down, ridding the world of his vile stench and making him pay for his heinous crimes, it was still odd to me, to be standing while he was nothing more than a corpse the Black Hand took care of.
The day after the wedding, I had Ezekiel take care of Rocco. As much as I used to want to be the one to end that miserable asshole, I wanted to put it behind me. That was another life, and I wanted nothing more than to move on.
So I would.
I’d push Miguel and Rocco and everything they’d done out of my mind forever. They would not haunt me in the way ghosts tended to do. I wouldn’t let them.
The Black Hand. Even though I’d advised Shay to give the positions to Miguel and Rocco, it was true that I’d planned to murder Miguel while knowing he was a Black Hand member, and thus I was resigned to whatever fate the Hand decided for me. If I would be made to pay for killing Miguel, I was fine with it. A price I’d gladly pay ten thousand times over.
Zander moved back in. I gave Gianna a few rooms to herself; she’d need ample space once the baby came. The others came and went as they pleased; Ezekiel still lived at the church, but anytime he could come by, he did. Cade was in the process of moving all of his bank accounts and everything else he’d need to permanently relocate to Cypress; he’d be moving in once everything was settled. Damian had business to tend to with his Serpents; I gave them the reins to the Santos whiskey business. I’d be a silent owner.
And Luca? Well, Luca was the one that surprised me the most. Three days after it all went down at the wedding, Luca showed up with an envelope. I invited him in, and we sat down on the wicker furniture on the patio in the backyard.
I let my eyes rake over Luca’s handsome face, meeting his dark stare for only a split-second before studying the envelope on the table between us. A brown envelope, paper-sized. A part of me already knew what lay inside, and maybe that’s the reason my stomach churned.
He’d told me this day would come. I was ready.
“I, um, I’m leaving after this to visit my mom,” Luca informed me. “She doesn’t know what happened. I want to tell her in person, be there for her while she…” He shifted his weight, and the wicker chair creaked beneath him. “While she deals with everything.”
“Are you going to bring her here?”
“No. I don’t think she’d do good in Cypress. She’s got a younger sister. I’m going to help her move in with her—after I convince her that it’s necessary. She shouldn’t live alone.” Luca’s mother had health issues; it’s the whole reason she never came to Cypress to begin with. I never asked what specific issues those were. Felt like it wasn’t any of my business.
I mean, it wasn’t like I was really her daughter-in-law.
It was because I suspected what was in that brown envelope that I heard myself asking, “Will you come back?”
Luca gave me a dimpled smile. “Of course I will.”
