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Taught me that home isn’t bricks—it’s breath.

Mya lets out a soft sound, barely audible, like she’s exhaling a weight she didn’t realize she’d been carrying.

Benji blinks hard. “It’s like a prayer and a confession and a love letter all tangled into one.”

“Man,” Carson says, spinning halfway in his chair, “you write like you’ve been doing this your whole life.”

“I haven’t,” I admit. “But she’s the reason I started.”

I don’t say her name.

I don’t need to.

Everyone in this room knows it’s her. It’s always her.

Mya catches my eye.

And the look she gives me?

It’s not a smile. It’s not forgiveness. It’s not even certainty.

It’s something else entirely—raw, unfiltered belief.

Like maybe she’s finally starting to believe this isn’t just a song.

It’s a promise.

And I’m not walking away from it.

Not this time.

Chapter Twenty-Three

MYA

The hospital smells like peppermint disinfectant and hope. The kind that wraps itself around your shoulders like a borrowed coat—too big, slightly scratchy, but warm all the same. It’s Christmas, and the halls are strung with tinsel and soft-spoken joy. Nurses wear reindeer headbands and pass out candy canes with sleepy smiles. Somewhere down the corridor, a low rendition of Silent Night hums from the chapel speakers like a prayer disguised as a lullaby.

Fletch walks beside me, close enough that his arm brushes mine with every step. He’s holding the gift bag we picked out together, filled with tiny knitted hats, two ridiculously soft Christmas onesies, and the card Reese made that says “To the littlest legends in the NICU.”

“I told her you’d cry if she sent another matching set,” he murmurs, lips twitching.

“She’s lucky I’m hormonal and forgiving,” I mutter back, fighting a smile as we turn the last corner.

The NICU is quieter than usual, but it’s a joyful kind of quiet. Reverent. Revered. Like even the ventilators and IV pumps know what day it is. Like everyone in this ward is holding their breath and their hearts in the same trembling hands.

Our boys are still tucked in their incubators, swaddled in more wires than I like to see, but looking stronger. Looking more like themselves. Tiny, perfect, fighting.

Kingston stirs first.

Kody kicks second.

And just like that, Christmas makes sense.

By the time we pull up to the ranch, the sun is already making its lazy descent behind the hills, casting everything in amber and hush. But it’s not the golden hour that makes me go still in the passenger seat.

It’s the black car in the driveway.

Not Reese’s. Not Thorin’s beat-up Chevy. This one’s too polished, too pristine, too out-of-place on a gravel driveway where the only dust-free thing is the sky after rain.