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Walker rolled his eyes at his brother. “Sorry, the last time you hugged my wife, it lasted five seconds. That should last you for the next five years.”
Cole gaped at him, before turning his attention to me. “I swear our Mama didn’t raise him like this.”
I grinned. “I happen to like him exactly as he is.”
Walker blew me a kiss and I reached out and pretended to catch it.
Cole made a gagging noise like he was about to throw up. “You guys are so sweet it makes me sick.”
Walker smiled unrepentantly and skated away. “Keep everyone away from my wife, Elaine,” he reminded her, and I swear her muscles hulked out even more as she stood there.
Thinking about Walker and Cole’s mom made my grin slip a little. She’d been officially placed in a nursing care facility a month ago, having completely given up on life. Walker had taken me to Tennessee to meet her, and she had been a sweet, if incredibly sad woman.
Walker had made peace with the fact that she probably wouldn’t get better. He’d told me that meeting me made him understand her better now.
I still held out hope for some kind of miracle for her.
I happened to be a big believer in those things nowadays.
The baby kicked again and I shifted in my seat, trying to get into a more comfortable position. Maddie leaned over from the other side of Blake, her own belly almost bursting. She was due in a month.
“Maddie Jr. giving you trouble?” she teased. Despite the fact that Maddie and Harley had a house in Dallas, we rarely saw them, so I was overjoyed she was with us this weekend since Harley had been named an All Star this year as well.
She seemed blissfully happy, and she and Harley still called me often, but Harley always had some kind of excuse for why we couldn’t actually get together in person. Maddie couldn’t explain Harley’s attitude, but we were working on him.
“That joke’s going to be funny until I accidentally say it in the hospital because you’ve said it so often,” I said snarkily, and she grinned.
“That’s obviously my plan,” she responded with a wink.
Sometimes I still couldn’t believe that this was my life. That so much sweetness could come after so much pain.
That I sang all the time now.
Of course I didn’t plan on touring or performing tons of shows again, but my fans didn’t seem to care. The album I’d just released—all love songs for Walker, might I add—had gone triple platinum.
I had nightmares sometimes, where I’d dream that nothing over the past year had happened, and I was still in that L.A. apartment…all alone.
Walker was always there though, waking me up and reminding me that I’d never be alone again, because he owned me body and soul.
If this was a dream, it was one that I never wanted to wake up from.
I would have gone through a million years of misery as long as I ended up with him.
I thought about fate alot, about how the tides could turn and change…about how one moment, one decision…could change your whole life…
Like what had happened when I’d gone to Maddie’s wedding…and I’d left with…thepucking wrong date.
EPILOGUE
WALKER
Ari: Avengers assemble!
Lincoln: What?
Ari: Oh sorry, that’s what this meeting kind of felt like.
Me: I just want to make sure everyone knows their role.
