Epilogue

Epilogue

Daxton

A month later

Watching Addison sitting on their sofa cradling her nephew, Dax propped his hip against the doorjamb. Marleigh, Alicia, and Harri had turned up half an hour ago with ten-day-old baby Hudson, who every member of Addison’s family doted on and treated like a prince.

Seeing her cuddle the infant, her face awash with pure joy, Dax felt warmth flare in his chest. Before marrying her, he’d wanted children. But now it was a different kind of “want.” Because now it wasn’t merely about having kids, it was about having them with Addison. About the journey of the pregnancy, about seeing her belly swollen with his baby, about watching her hold them the way she now did Hudson.

“I don’t need to ask what’s going through your head right now,” said Jag beside him, pulling him out of his ruminations.

Dax spared him a quick glance. “I don’t need to ask what’s going through yours.” He’d caught Jag discreetly eyeing Alicia when her attention was elsewhere—and vice versa.

Jag’s jaw firmed. “Leave it.”

Dax shrugged. “You want to deprive yourself of what you want, that’s your business.” But that wasn’t Dax’s style—hence why he’d set out to convince Addison to marry him in the first place, unwilling to consider that he’d fail.

She wasn’t the type he usually went for, but she’d snatched his attention the first time he saw her over a decade ago. It was that indifferent, unattainable vibe she gave off. She didn’t enter a room and wonder if anyone was looking at her; didn’t make a single move that was designed to snare a man’s focus—there was no artifice, no mask, no vanity, no games.

And he’d been determined to have her.

So he’d had her, having no clue that he’d grow so possessive; having no clue that the possessiveness wouldn’t fade when their fling ended and she walked away.

And having no clue that they’d one day honor their fallback marriage pact.

Though he’d been serious when agreeing to the pact all those years ago, he hadn’t expected to ever consider acting on it; hadn’t thought it would come to that. He’d believed they’d both have attained their personal life goals well before she reached the age of thirty. Still, it hadn’t been until he’d lost hope of making a deep, true, long-term relationship work that he’d given the pact any real serious consideration.

“You love her,” said Jag.

“Yeah,” Dax readily admitted.

“Not surprised. You two fit.” Jag’s gaze cut to Addison. “I like her. Don’t like many people. But I like her.”

“There’s nothing not to like.”

His mouth kicking up, Jag gave him a taunting look. “Man, she’s dug in deep, hasn’t she?”

“Like a tick.” As a rule, Dax didn’t get close to people—it wasn’t purposeful, just instinctual. So he hadn’t expected to come to care for her. He’d thought maybe he’d grow to feel a sort of warm regard for her in time, but that was all.

However, when she’d lied for him to Lowe—no hesitation, no uneasiness, no guilt—he’d known he was in trouble. Because in doing that, and in saying the things to Dax she’d said afterwards, she’d made him feel something that few people outside his family had: Accepted.

It was such a simple thing, but it wasn’t something he’d encountered much in his life. So many people had disapproved of him, judged him, distrusted him, misunderstood him, attempted to change him, expected the worst of him. The very day she gave him the false alibi, the realization had hit him hard that none of those things applied to Addison.

No matter what, she’d stuck by him. She’d given him her loyalty even when he hadn’t yet earned it. She’d never discounted his version of a story, or trusted the version of another over his. She had so much faith in him—in not only his willingness and ability to keep her safe, but in the extent of his loyalty and solidity of his integrity.

More, she’d never asked that he be anything other than who and what he was.

“Happy for you,” Jag went on. “Wasn’t sure you’d let yourself have this. Thought you might fight Addison’s pull out of loyalty to Gracie. Glad you didn’t. She’d be pleased for you, and I reckon she’d like Addison. Like her for you.”

“She would.” All warmth and softness for the most part, Gracie would want him to have what he had with Addison. It was something he hadn’t had with any other, not even Gracie herself, if he was honest.

Falling for Addison made him face that, though Gracie had loved him, she hadn’t been so accepting of him. Though she hadn’t condemned or tried to change him, she’d often nagged at him to make all his businesses legitimate, telling him he could “be more.”

She’d meant well—he knew that. He’d understood she meant it as a compliment. But, after fucking years of people expecting more and different from him, it hadn’t felt good.

Nonetheless, he’d loved Gracie. He would have been happy with her, if life hadn’t torn them apart. But in truth, he didn’t believe he would have found the same level of contentment with her as he had with Addison.

“You heard from Mimi?” asked Jag.

Dax gave his head a slow shake. “And I don’t expect to. I finally got through to her last month at that party. She hated what she heard. She might even now hate me.”

“It’s a shit situation. But if hating you is the only way she’ll let go and move on, maybe it’s best.” Jag paused. “I noticed a ‘For Sale’ sign up in Felicity and Grayden’s front yard.”

“I heard about that.” Caelan had mentioned it.

Jag’s lips curved again. “Bet you’re not whatsoever heartbroken to hear they’ll be relocating.”

Not one bit. “The sooner they’re gone, the better. I won’t have to worry they’ll have a relapse and start giving my wife problems again.”

Jag nodded. “Blaise seems to be keeping his head down in general, so whatever you … said … had an impact. Speaking of people you’ve had an impact on, Drey told me that Thaddeus is in rehab. I take it that’s your, shall we say, influence.”

Dax grunted. “I strongly urged him to seek help.”

“He needs it, or he could get someone else hurt—maybe worse.”

Dax had thought that Lowe might push Thaddeus into pressing charges, but the sheriff hadn’t bothered. In fact, neither Dax nor—more importantly—Addison had heard anything more from Lowe. According to Dax’s contacts, the sheriff had chosen to backoff. He was a prick, but Lowe wasn’t a prick in the habit of biting off more than he could chew or interested in having his wife divorce him.

Dax straightened as Addison and her relatives stood, each making promises that the other would see them again soon.

“I’m gonna head out as well,” Jag told him. “Got some shit to do.”

With a nod, Dax walked him to the front door. “Take care of yourself.”

“You too,” Jag gruffly returned before stalking over to his bike. Moments after he disappeared out of the driveway, Addison began guiding her relatives to the front door. After a round of goodbyes—and the several soft kisses she planted on her nephew’s head—she waved them off, not closing the door until their cars were pulling out onto the road.

Turning to Dax, she smiled at him. “Hudson is just the cutest baby in the world. And I don’t just say that as a biased aunt—which, of course, I am—I say it because it’s true.”

“Hmm,” was all he said, catching her wrist to pull her closer.

“I volunteered us for babysitting duty, by the way,” she said, sinking her fingers into his hair. “But so did my sisters, parents, Sabrina, her parents, and also my grandparents … so you won’t have to worry that we’ll be babysitting a lot.” Her brow creased. “Sadly.”

“You hungry?” he asked, tracing the dragonfly tattoo on her inner wrist with this thumb; stroking down the curve of its tail only to smoothy backtrack.

She pursed her lips. “Not yet. Maybe in an hour.”

He hummed deep in his throat. “Good. That gives me time to bend you over the sofa.”

He’d had to wake up early for an urgent business call, so he hadn’t been able to fuck her senseless this morning in bed. Then her relatives had arrived, so that had further curtailed his plans. He didn’t intend to delay them any further. Almost seven months they’d been married, but the intensity of his need for her still seemed boundless.

“We need to practice making our own baby,” he added, nuzzling her temple.

“We don’t get enough practice,” she said with complete seriousness, her pupils dilating, a slight flush staining her cheeks. “That needs rectifying.”

“Couldn’t agree more.”

Her eyes stared at—not into, but at—his own.“I don’t know which one is my favorite. The blue one, or the green one.” She twisted her mouth. “Hmm, yeah, I can’t pick. I love them both.”

“And me. You love me.”

A smile tugged at her lips. “And you.”

It meant more to him than she could know. Women had loved him before, but not exactly as he was—flaws, fuckups, illegal shit and all. Only Addison had given him that.

He kissed her, lapping up her taste—a taste that had years ago stamped itself in his memories and rooted itself deep, so there was no way he could forget it.

He’d never before been owned. Never. But yeah, she owned him.

Drawing back from the kiss, she looped her arms around his neck. “You’re quite loveable.”

Uh, not at all. “I don’t think many people would agree with that.”

“The haters don’t count,” she said with a dismissive curl of her upper lip. “If they’re too distracted by the predator in you, that’s on them. As I’ve said before, I’m quite partial to the wolf.”

A pleasant burn settling in his chest, he slid one hand down her wrist to thumb her rings. “Never forget.”

She full-on smiled. “I won’t. Never forget I love you right back.”