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She takes my hand off her face and studies it closely.
It’s then that I see my knuckles are red and scratched.
She kisses each one of them, making me smile even more. “What happened to you? I leave you the perfect gentleman and come back to you brawling?” she teases.
I kiss her nose and call my elevator down, keying in the code. "Oh, no… I hope I'm still a gentleman to you, sweetheart. It's just that my hand got into a collision with the miserable face of a certain bastard we both know today. I'm not proud, but it had to be done. No, wait, scratch that. Iamproud."
Carina's laughter fills the elevator. "Well, that's okay. I don't really like gentlemen all that much… I just like one man, my man."
I cuddle her to me more. "Your man? Does that make you my woman, then?" I ask.
She smiles brilliantly at me. “Yes. It’s like you said from the start, my love. I was always yours.”
Aside from being utterly and completely true, that deserves a kiss, and I give her one.
I pull back a little, leaning my forehead down on her.
“I love you so much, angel.”
I feel her tears on my cheeks and her smile slowly growing against my lips.
“I love you too, Derek.”
I kiss her deeply as we step out of the lift and into my penthouse. "So, no more running?" I ask, half-serious, half-needing to hear her say it one more time.
She pretends to consider the point for a minute, giving me a sassy little smile. "No, love. No more running, but I can't promise I won't race you to get to your bedroom… and win!”
Epilogue
CARINA
Six years later…
Islowly wake up, comforted by the sounds of the night all around. I’m totally relaxed and boneless, courtesy of the giant of a man lying naked and sprawled beside me, and I'm so very happy. I can still barely believe all of this is really happening.
Almost daily, at least once, I catch myself staring into nothingness —probably with a silly little grin on my lips— trying to make sense of how I could've been so lucky, trying to talk myself into believing that this is really my life.
A life with my one true love.
I love it all.
The talks, the partnership, the friendship, the waking up spooning, the cooking together while singing off-key, the parenting, the vegging on the sofa, the cuddling, the crying, the working side by side behind matching desks in our huge home office, the love-making and the outright fucking, the sharing and the fighting, the pouting, and the laughing.
I loveevery single momentof our life together, and it's all there, it's all true, and it's all real, just like he promised it would be.
It was real from the start, and it got even more real with the passing of the years, the cementing of our love, and the birth of each of our four beautiful babies: four-year-old Nevil, who is Derek's Mini-Me, three-year-old Alarik, who has his eyes, my hair and the outspokenness and determination of his grandma Angelica, and one-year-old twin-girls Dora and Leany who —Derek says— are the very picture of me and have had their daddy wrapped around their little fingers since day one.
Today is our fifth wedding anniversary, and I'm happier than I ever thought possible.
I tilt my head to the side and look at Derek's handsome profile, emphasized by the shadows of the night and the silvery twinkle of the plethora of stars glittering above us in the deep, black sky reflected a million times over the rippling waves of the dark sea on which we are floating.
I smile at him, feeling the now familiar —and very dear to me—, encompassing bolt of love that falls over me every time my gaze rests on him.
I love him so much I can't put it into words. Every attempt to do so ends in frustration.
It has been like this since the day I met him and even more since the day I decided I could trust him with my heart six years ago.
Sometimes I feel like I’ve reached the furthest possible point in how much I love him. Then he does something, says something, or even simply gives me one of his smoldering looks, and I feel my heart expand even more, my soul soaring as I fall in love with him over and over again and every time a bit more.
