Epilogue

TWENTY YEARS LATER…

JULIEN

"Oh, shit."

Liz shields her eyes from the glaring summer sun and lets out a shrill whistle.

"Grant Alexander Jameson Barnes! You get your Romeo lips off my daughter right now!"

She twists around and punches me in the arm.

"What did I do?" I rub at the soreness. Liz isn't dainty with her punches.

"He's your son."

"Well, Charlotte is your daughter. She kissed him first."

Liz falls back onto the beach blanket and throws an arm over her face. "I'm not ready for her to grow up yet. With the boys, they have Ryder to go to about… stuff."

"Sex, Liz. It's called sex. Rounding the bases. Getting lucky. Smashing. Sneaky links. Clapping cheeks."

She punches me again. Hard. " Shut up , Julien. She's seven, for fuck's sake."

Charlotte and Grant have been thick as thieves since the day we put them in the same portable crib together. I hate to break it to Liz, but I think our children are destined to walk the same path she, Jay, and I did. Hopefully, that path won't be mired in all the heartbreak and drama like ours was. Who am I kidding? Once they become teenagers, we'll be drowning in teenage hormonal angst. God help us all.

Speaking of Jay, I need to call him today and check in. He put roots down in California. Got married. Had a kid. Our relationship never recovered after he left, but at least he's in my life in some capacity. Jay still refuses to come home and hasn't set foot in North Carolina since he walked away. So, we go to him. Elijah and I take the boys to San Francisco once a year. I want Grant and Nicholas to have some kind of connection with their uncle and cousin. Family means everything to us. Even a broken one. Which is why we allowed Beverly a presence in our sons' lives. It was brief but good. Elijah never forgave her for what she did, but they made peace before she passed away. He needed that closure. To not hate her anymore. To hear her say she was sorry. To hear her say she loved him.

"Is there anything hotter than our husbands all wet and sexy and playing with our kids?"

I look toward the breakers. Grant and Charlotte found a spot on the beach to build a sand castle, but they keep getting distracted by Marcus's loud laughter as Ryder tosses him into the swells. A little farther out on a surfboard is Elijah and Nicholas. Sitting between Elijah's legs on the surfboard, Nicholas excitedly points to something in the distance. A large spray of water jets upward right before the back of a whale arches from the ocean's surface and quickly disappears.

As I gaze at my husband and our two perfect boys, love swells my heart to almost bursting. Elijah and I will celebrate our twentieth wedding anniversary next week. Twenty years of love and happiness that never dim, only grow with every day we're together. I'm more in love with him now, something that should be impossible, but soulmate love is infinite in its capacity.

As I watch my husband and our sons, the sight fills my heart with a warmth that no sunrise could ever match. This is my life—this beautiful, chaotic, and love-filled existence that I never could have imagined all those years ago when I first met Elijah. Back then, we were two souls navigating a world that didn't always understand them. But now? Now we had built something so perfect, so right, that it oftentimes took my breath away.

Liz sits up and digs through the cooler. She takes out a chilled bottle of water and hands it to me before taking one for herself.

"The kids are excited about Utah."

I press the cold bottle to my sunburned neck. "Grant wants to do the stargazing thing at Panorama Point."

We've kept up the Barnes' men camping tradition for the boys. It's become this massive annual event, kind of like a family reunion. Me, Elijah, and the boys. Liz, Ry, and their kids. Jessi and Pixie. Ash, Mei, and their daughter. My folks. Elijah's dad and his wife, Pamela. Shaun, Yo, and their two girls. This summer, we're heading to Utah to visit Arches and Canyonlands.

"Summers go by way too quickly," I comment.

"Old age does as well."

I balk at her implication. "We're forty, not old."

"Forty-two. And speak for yourself. You're not experiencing the joys of perimenopause."

"Thank God."

I laugh when she glowers at me.

"Dad! Dad! Watch!" Nicholas shouts.

I know he's calling me because the boys call me Dad. Elijah is Daddy.

My eyes train on Nicholas as he and Elijah ride a wave to shore. Nicki wobbles a few times, but E is standing behind him, holding onto him so he doesn't fall off.

I cup my hands around my mouth and shout, "Way to go, Nicki!"

The smile that splits his face is absolutely beautiful.

Grant lets out a whoop and runs out into the breakers to meet them. As soon as Nicki jumps off the board, Grant jumps on him in celebration.

It's funny to see the boys' personalities grow as they do. Grant is more like me. Confident, take-charge, and a phenom on his little league soccer field. Nicholas is basically Elijah's mini me. His little heart is huge. So sweet and empathetic. But you get him in the water, and Nicki is a beast, just like his daddy.

Fuck, how I love our two boys. I didn't know my heart could love so much or be so full, but Elijah, Grant, and Nicholas fill it to overflowing.

Liz is right. The years are soaring by way too quickly. It feels like only yesterday when I told her the big news.

"Hey, pretty girl," I say to Liz, pushing open the screened door and stepping onto the back deck. "You look deep in thought."

"Just eye-fucking my husband," she says, watching Elijah and Ry kick a soccer ball back and forth in the backyard.

She waves to Ry when he looks our way and blows him a kiss. He pretends to catch it with a dramatic flourish.

"Four years married, and you guys still act like teenagers."

"Oh please. You and Elijah are just as bad," she retorts.

My grin is full of mischief, and I can't help but chuckle, my mind flashing back to our earlier escapade in the laundry room. Elijah was wearing those fucking sexy gray sweatpants again. I pounced him, then pantsed him, then fucked him bent over the washing machine.

"Can I get your opinion about something?" I ask her.

Despite our close bond, nerves twist my stomach into knots. The conversation we're about to have feels monumental. It doesn't matter that she's my best friend, and I can tell her anything. What I'm about to say is one of those life-altering moments.

Her gaze turns quizzical as she shifts in her seat and gives me her full attention. "Go for it."

"E and I are thinking about adopting."

Her reaction is immediate and exactly what I was hoping for. Leaping out of the rocking chair, she almost topples me backward when she jumps into my lap. Her arms wrap around me in a tight embrace, her joy palpable and infectious.

"Julien, that's wonderful!"

"I'm so fucking excited." There's also a sliver of doubt that I'll suck at being a dad.

But I have two awesome role models to look up to and emulate. Dad and Mr. Barnes.

Liz pulls back slightly, her verdant eyes shiny and tear-glossed. "Any child you adopt will be damn lucky to have you and Elijah as parents. Oh! I get to be an aunt!" she squeals, nearly deafening me with her enthusiasm.

An enthusiasm Elijah and I share about starting the family we always wanted and dreamed about.

Eight months later, we brought Nicholas home. Two years after that, we were gifted with Grant.

"Mama, I'm hungry," a sun-weary Charlotte says, dropping down beside Liz.

With a huge yawn, she rests her head in Liz's lap. We've been out here for hours. Time for a mid-day siesta and some food.

Charlotte sleepily blinks up at me when I brush her long ponytail off her shoulder. "What do you want on your hoagie?"

"Ham."

"Swiss or cheddar cheese?"

"Both."

"Mustard or mayo?"

She makes a disgusted face. "Mayo is gross."

I tap her button nose with my forefinger. "Smart girl. What about you?" I ask Liz.

"You know what I like."

"Smother it in spicy brown mustard. Got it." Standing up, I grab one of the extra towels and brush off the sand from my legs. "I'll get the food started. You round up the fam."

"Dad! Dad! Dad!"

I'm tackled from behind by a Grant-sized wrecking ball.

"Come play with me!"

Getting up, Liz takes Charlotte's hand. "You go play. Charlie and I will get lunch ready."

"You heard the lady. Climb aboard," I say, squatting down.

Grant eagerly clambers onto my back for a piggyback ride.

"Hold on tight." I rise to my feet and start trotting down the beach.

His exuberant, happy laughter has a smile exploding across my face.

As we make our way toward the water, I catch Elijah's eye as he watches us with that same adoring smile, the one that had first captured my heart in seventh grade.

When we reach the ocean's edge, Grant slides down off my back and immediately runs into the breakers to join his brother in the waves. I stand ankle-deep in the warm surf, feeling the sand shift beneath my feet as I watch Grant and Nicholas play in the swells.

Elijah's hand slips into mine, and I turn to look into his beautiful hazel eyes. Our fingers intertwine, a familiar touch that carries over two decades of love, trials, triumphs, and dreams.

"Almost twenty years," I murmur.

We're going to celebrate our anniversary here at the beach with all our friends and family.

Elijah squeezes my hand, his thumb brushing gently over my fingers. "I still remember our wedding day like it was yesterday. And now… look at us."

The years have passed so quickly, each one deepening the enormity of love I feel for the man beside me. It's an unbreakable love that has weathered storms, celebrated victories, and grown stronger with every passing day.

I follow his gaze to our children. The sight stirs something deep and profound—a mixture of pride, joy, and a fierce, protective love.

"This," he whispers, his voice thick with emotion as he glances from me to our sons, "is everything I ever wanted."

I feather a gentle kiss to our joined hands. This man is my heaven, our children, my miracle.

Elijah's voice chokes up. "I didn't think I could be this happy. Thank you for such a wonderful life. Thank you for loving me."

I caress his cheek. "It's the other way around, Angel. I'm so grateful that I get to share my life with you."

My husband's love saved me in every way imaginable.

A tear slips down his gorgeous face, and I catch it with my thumb.

"I love you. So goddamn much," I tell him, my voice trembling with the weight of those simple yet profound words.

"Love you infinity," he replies.

Elijah shows me his love every day. The words are there in the way he looks at me, in the way he holds my hand just a little tighter, in the way he touches me like I'm the most precious thing in his world.

I lean in to press a soft, lingering kiss to his lips. It's a kiss that speaks of decades of love and of the wonderful life we built together, piece by precious piece.

Grant's shout from the ocean draws our attention as he tackles Nicholas into the shallow water. Both boys erupt out of the waves in fits of laughter.

"They're going to have so many adventures," Elijah says.

"And we get to be here for all of them."

I hook his waist and turn him in my arms, wanting to dance with my husband in the shallow waves.

"Happy almost twenty years."

I dip him in my arms and bring him back up.

"Happy twenty more to come," Elijah whispers against my lips.