Epilogue

EPILOGUE

Ellie, aka a kickass hottie who's not taking any grief from the universe (and yes, Wyatt insisted that's how she be described for the rest of her life)

A year after Wyatt invaded Beck's house to dunk me in the tub—yes, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it—we're back in Shipwreck for the Pirate Festival with Tucker, and this year, we have a strategy to find the peg leg.

"It's in the fountain!" Tucker shrieks while we stroll down Blackbeard Avenue with all the clues printed out.

"Ssh," Wyatt murmurs. "Don't tell the whole town. They'll beat us to it."

Tucker grins.

He's grown at least six inches since last summer, I swear he has.

"Race you there, Miss Captain Ellie," he says.

I pretend to swoon, mostly to take advantage of the opportunity to lean into Wyatt's solid body. "I can't possibly race if I don't fuel up first."

"Dad! Dad, I need four dollars to buy Miss Captain Ellie a donut," Tucker says.

"A plain donut?" Wyatt's nose wrinkles.

"A banana pudding donut," Tucker says in exasperation.

"But she'll be useless after that," Wyatt replies dramatically. "All I'm so full. Tucker, you have to carry on without me ."

Tucker giggles.

"I will not," I declare. "You're just trying to sneak your way into eating half my donut."

As if I won't share with him.

He flashes my favorite smile as he hands Tucker a ten. "Also possibly true."

Tucker scampers into the bakery while we watch, Wyatt's arm casually slung around me. He kisses my crown. "He's getting too fucking tall," he grumbles.

"I hear it happens." I squeeze him around the waist. Because of a couple scheduling snafus, it's been six weeks since Wyatt saw Tucker.

But he starts a new job at the base just north of Copper Valley in three weeks, and the three of us are hanging out every last minute of those three weeks until he reports for duty. And once summer's over, we'll get Tucker every other week.

Every week of the year.

Grady waves at us from the counter after giving Tucker his change and a donut bag, and the not-so-little boy scampers back to us. "He has unicorn donuts, Dad!"

"Oh, that's trouble," I murmur. "Sarcasm won't like that. But it's not like they get the monopoly on unicorns just because they have a unicorn festival."

Wyatt watches with his jaw moving up and down while Tucker pulls a pastel rainbow painted donut with a cotton candy horn out of the bag and bites into it.

I follow suit and pull out the banana pudding donut, which is oozing on the edge, and take a giant bite that makes pudding and banana slide down my chin.

"You two," Wyatt murmurs with a grin, wiping my chin for me and licking his thumb.

"C'mon, guys!" Tucker says. "It's at the fountain, I know it is!"

We trail after him, sharing the banana pudding donut, with Wyatt staying pristine and clean, and me getting pudding all over my pirate festival T-shirt.

It's my compromise with the universe.

I sometimes get dirtier than I should be, and it lets me have all the sex I want with Wyatt without making me crash, burn down houses, or accidentally kill small rodents.

Okay, okay.

The universe and I don't actually have an agreement.

I just finally decided to stop being scared, and chose to be happy, and cut back some on my hours at work, and I'm finally running again.

Not marathons yet, but I'm running.

A year makes a huge difference.

Especially with a helper for my physical therapy exercises.

Or a drill sergeant.

Depends on if Tucker or Wyatt has the job.

But if it's Wyatt, I usually pencil him into a new cartoon of Dick and the Nuts, and always in a compromising position.

Since we're the only two who ever see my doodle pad anymore, it's worked well to keep the spark alive between us.

Or possibly the fun.

Not that we need much help.

"It's like we never left," Wyatt says as we cross the street toward the garden. The wild goats are still here, and the townspeople of Shipwreck have adopted them all.

Beck's house is still standing.

Although the Frogger score has me slightly suspicious.

"Here! I know it!" Tucker calls. " Right here !"

Wyatt tucks in a smile.

I know that smile

It's a something's up smile.

"What?" I ask.

He lifts his brows like he has no idea what I'm talking about.

"Hmm." I squint at him.

His lips spread in a full smile, and he pats my ass. "Doesn't take much to make you suspicious, does it?"

"With you? Never."

Tucker's leaping around the fountain. "It's here! It's here!"

"Where?" I ask, following him around the statue of Thorny Rock.

"There!" he cries, pointing to Thorny Rock's leg.

"Tucker," I say, laughing, "he's always had a peg leg. We're looking for a wooden peg leg not attached to a pirate."

"It's there, Miss Captain Ellie," he says, grinning big with his crooked front teeth. "Look closer!"

I lean into the statue, half-expecting Wyatt to shove me into the fountain. "Tucker, bud, I really don't?—"

I turn, and I stop, because the two most important men in my life are both down on one knee behind me.

Tucker giggles. "Or I might be wrong," he says, his bright brown eyes dancing.

Wyatt's smiling too, but it's a solemn smile.

"Calamity Ellie," he says, taking my hand, "will you do us the honor of being my pirate captain?"

"And my powder monkey!" Tucker pipes up. He fishes something out of his pocket, and suddenly I'm being presented with a plastic pirate ring.

Which is almost as beautiful as the diamond Wyatt's now holding out.

I think.

I can't tell exactly through the blur clouding my eyes. " Yes ," I tell them both.

One of the town goats bleats in approval from its spot on the bench where Wyatt did heavenly things to me last year, and I'm laughing through tears as each of them slide a ring onto my fingers.

"Fucking weddings," Long Beak Silver says from the wall above us.

"Go walk the plank, you bad bird," Tucker chides.

And the bird does.

And when he catches himself before he hits the ground, he recovers by swooping straight at my head.

I duck, my foot slips, and I go ass over teakettle into the fountain.

"Miss Captain Ellie!" Tucker shrieks.

My legs are all akimbo, my butt soaked, my T-shirt dripping, and I'm touching slimy quarters and pennies in the bottom of the fountain, but as I look at Wyatt, all I can do is laugh.

And not just because he's doubled over as he holds out a hand to help me up.

"Maybe it's Shipwreck," I say while he hoists me out of the fountain. "Because this doesn't happen anywhere else."

"I think it's life, Ellie," he says. "Now you get over here and kiss me before I take my ring back."

You can't say I won't be a dutiful wife, because I do get over there and kiss him.

I rub my wet, soggy, slimy body all over him, laughing while I kiss him, but I kiss him.

Because he's my best friend.

My everything.

And my one true love.