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I laughed, wrapping my arms around him in a proper hug. “Because you made excuses, then kicked me out last night. That’s not on me.”
“Shit. I knew I should have gone against all my principles and fucked you sooner.”
I patted his shoulder, rolling my head to the side. My gaze landed on a very, very unexpected voyeur. “Ethan?”
“Mm?” He kissed my shoulder again and again.
“Remember how you kicked me out last night because you didn’t want to corrupt Mr. Prickles?”
“Ava, my dick is still inside you. Are we going to have this conversation now?”
“We corrupted your hedgehog.”
He pulled back, meeting my eyes. “What?”
I pointed toward the spiky pig who was watching us from my shoe. What was the obsession with my shoes? “He escaped. He’s corrupted.”
Ethan contorted his body so he could see where I was pointing. “Goddamn it, he’s like fucking Houdini. You wouldn’t believe the number of times I’ve found him running amok in my bedroom when you weren’t here.”
“I’m sorry, what?”
“Nothing.” He dropped back down and kissed me again, another one of those long, lingering kisses that sent my entire body into overdrive. “He’s already corrupted. Let’s do it again.”
EPILOGUE – ETHAN
Always and… Hedgehogs
One Year Later
“I don’t know how this happened.” Ava stood with her hands on her hips, staring at the cage.
“Well,” I said, peering into it over her shoulder. “I’m going to say it’s because we put a mommy and daddy hedgehog together and didn’t give them any condoms.”
She shoved her elbow into my gut, and I hissed out a breath.
To be fair, I deserved that.
“Babies. Eight of them. Ethan, I’m not even sure I like Mr. Prickles.”
“You’re so full of shit. You’ve been all over Barbie since we rescued her.”
“You rescued her,” she corrected me. “And Barbie is a stupid name for a hedgehog.”
“All names are stupid for hedgehogs. Literally none of them make sense.” I slung my arm over her shoulder. “I feel like a proud dad.”
“Why? Did you make them?”
“It’s validating to see Mr. Prickles as a father. I raised him well.”
She raised one eyebrow as she looked at me. “He’s a randy hedgehog who watched us have sex one too many times. Get over yourself.”
I loved it when she kept my ego in check. “Still, that’s a lot of kids.”
“You’re not getting any ideas, are you?”
“Why? Don’t you want eight kids? I was hoping for eleven.”
“Eleven?”
“To have my own soccer team.”
Ava stepped away from me and pressed one finger against my chest. “Okay, no. Unless science discovers how to put a uterus in your colon and make you birth a child out of your ass, it’s not happening. One is bad enough.”
I slid one hand down her body and pressed it against her still-flat stomach. When she’d screamed at me six weeks ago that her period was late and that she was going to fucking murder me if I’d gotten her knocked up, I’d genuinely feared for my life.
Since I was still here six weeks later and had indeed knocked her up by accident, I was feeling a little better about my safety.
“All right, so it wasn’t planned.” I cupped her cheek. “But you’re not mad at me. Not really.”
If looks could kill… Maybe I shouldn’t be too cocky about my safety.
“You didn’t spend two hours alternating between throwing up and peeing this morning,” she shot back. “One time, I threw up into my pee, Ethan. This isn’t glamorous.”
“Well, at least I missed that at work.”
“Ugh!” She smacked me and walked out into the kitchen.
Boxes littered the apartment. Some stacks were five high, and others were only one or two, but it was a little like a maze trying to get around.
Ava reached out to move one and got tape stuck to her hand. She flailed with it for a moment before I darted to her rescue and freed her from her sticky prison.
Probably something I should have done a few weeks ago, to be honest…
“How many more days?” she asked, pulling apple juice from the fridge. “How many days until I no longer have to fear death by cardboard box?”
“Three.” I kept my distance on the other side of the island. “Three days.”
“I suppose I can handle that.” She scanned the room as the front door opened. “Unless I throw up on them all.”
“Ugh, are you still throwing up everywhere?” Leo strolled in and took one look at her and stepped back. “Man, being pregnant gives you one hell of a stomach bug, huh?”
Ava blinked. “How did you—”
“You’ve been throwing up for three or four weeks. That’s one persistent bug.” Leo smacked me on the shoulder. “I can’t decide if I want a niece or nephew. I think fun Uncle Leo is fucked either way with you two as their parents.”
I smiled over at Ava. She was looking anything other than happy, but that was her hormones. She was only happy if I came back with pizza.
