Epilogue
Declan
One Year Later
“What do you want to make for dinner tonight?” Trent asked as we headed for the produce aisle in the grocery store.
“You do realize I already have a list, right?” I asked, waving said list in the air in front of his face.
He scowled at me. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. But what do you want to make tonight? Remember that our boys are eating with us since it’s family dinner tonight.”
Trent had taken to calling Kade and Evan our boys. They hated when he said it since it made them seem like little kids—which they practically were considering we’d had to yell at them for rough housing in the living room before… on more than one occasion. Much to my own amusement, the saying had caught on so now even I was calling them our boys. We made sure we had a family dinner at least once a week, usually more, with all four of us. Having the four of us in one house was trying at times, but I wouldn’t change it for anything. The four of us—plus our two cats, because yes, my boyfriend convinced me to get a kitten a few months ago—had formed our own little dysfunctional family, and Trent and I both loved it.
“They’ll eat anything I make them. Let’s do a stir fry.” I knew that was one of Trent’s favorite meals, so I figured it’d make him happy.
He smiled at me. “Yeah, okay, stir fry it is. Peppers?”
“Obviously.”
He stuck his tongue out at me and pushed the cart over to the peppers. He picked up two and held them out to me as he said, “Here, you test them. I know how you like to fondle your peppers.”
I laughed, though I had no idea why it still surprised me when he said shit like that. He did it all the time, which would’ve been embarrassing if it wasn’t so funny, and he wasn’t so adorable when he did it. “I don’t like to fondle peppers.”
“Uh huh, you keep telling yourself that. I’ve seen the way you handle them.” I chuckled and he smirked. “Do you want me to grab some onions while you do whatever it is you do to peppers? I can give you some privacy.”
I snorted and grabbed his hand. “No, we can go over there in a second.” I grabbed his hand and pulled him closer to me. “What kind of sauce do you want to make?” While he mulled that over, I cleared my throat, then accidentally blurted, “I’m taking you to the Bear River Lodge next weekend.”
He turned sharply to me and blinked a few times. “What?”
“You know the ski resort, Bear River Lodge? I’m taking you there next weekend. I called Levi and made sure you could take off work, but I know you’ve always wanted to go skiing but have never been. I figured it might be nice to get away from our brothers for the weekend, and it’ll give you a chance to try something new and yeah… so you want to go, right?”
“Ohmygod! Yes!” he screamed, making every-fucking-one in the whole damn store look at us. He threw his arms around my neck and jumped up and down for a few seconds before pulling back. “I can’t believe you did that!”
I shrugged and grinned. “I probably should’ve learned my lesson about telling you stuff in public, huh?”
He laughed and smacked my shoulder. “I wasn’t that bad.”
“The entire store turned to make sure I wasn’t ax murdering you.”
“I could take you.”
I pushed his shoulder, laughing. “Whatever. You’re so small that you make a tiny target, so you could probably dodge and get away easily.”
He glared at me, then pushed my shoulder again before taking the cart around to the next aisle. When I caught up to him, he glanced over at me for a split second before chucking a grape at me.
“Very mature,” I said, though I couldn’t contain my smile anytime I was around him.
“You’re the one that usually throws grapes, not me.”
“Why would you follow my example?” I reached over and grabbed the bag of grapes from his hand as he threw another one at my chest. “We are so going to get kicked out of this place one day.”
“Probably. I’m surprised we’re not already on their Fugitive Grocery Shoppers list. We’re lucky we’re even allowed in here.”
“True.” I took out a grape and threw it at him.
He burst out laughing and muttered something that sounded like “Another point, Declan.”
“Did you seriously just give me a point? You still doing that ridiculous point system of yours?”
He grinned. “Not really. It just comes out sometimes. Don’t worry, though, the skiing trip gave you mega-bonus points, so you’re still totally winning.”
I leaned in and kissed his lips—just a small peck—not caring that we were in the middle of a grocery store. “I already won, Jalapeno.” I squeezed his hand to emphasize that I meant I won because I had him.
He smiled. “You seriously have all the fucking points, Cupcake. Every. Last. One. You sappy, adorable man.”
I wrinkled my nose at him. “Adorable?”
“Yep. Not gonna deny the sap?”
I rolled my eyes, but smiled and muttered, “Ridiculous.”
He grinned at me, then pushed the cart down the next aisle. “You coming?”
I smiled at him and followed behind. I’d seriously follow him wherever he went. And somehow, I finally knew that he’d follow me, too.
“Hey, Trent?” I called after him.
He stopped walking and looked over his shoulder at me. “Yeah?”
“I love you.”
His gaze softened and he turned completely around to stare up into my eyes as he whispered, “I love you too, Declan. I’ll never stop loving you.”
I believed him. He was my forever and I was his.
***
The End
Thank you so much for reading Declan and Trent’s story. I had a lot of fun writing this one and I hope you enjoyed reading it. Declan finally got his happy ending.
Next in the series will be Tristan and Hunter’s book: Recreating Our Rhythm (Finding My Forever Book 5). Dec and Trent will take a back seat, but will, of course, show up throughout the series.
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