Epilogue
“Baby girl?”
Tiffany turned from her position on the small step stool ladder in the closet and called out, “Upstairs.”
He appeared at the threshold leading into the room, wearing a pair of jeans, his cut, and a black tee showing off his chiseled chest and arms. As she took him in, she smiled.
His sapphire gaze shot from her face to her feet then went feral. “What the fuck?”
Damn. She let herself get caught. Carefully, she stepped off the stool and closed the distance between them. Placing her hands on his chest with her very pregnant belly between them, she got on the tips of her toes and leaned into him for a kiss. At more than six-feet tall, he towered over her. If he didn’t lean down, she wouldn’t get one. He looked like he’d refuse though he’d never refused before. She tried to pull away. His arm snaked around her back, holding her to him. He leaned down giving her a brief open-mouthed kiss. She smiled against his lips.
He drew away. “Still pissed, Tiff. You know you shouldn’t be climbing anything. Told you I’d fix the closet when I got home. Told you not to try to do it yourself. Told you to wait for me. Told you this shit fifty times, and you didn’t listen.”
True. Nothing she could deny. Tiffany knew if she disregarded him, she’d only infuriate him. She just couldn’t help herself. Thirty weeks pregnant and “nesting,” the baby’s room was nowhere near done.
The old ladies and Tina hosted a baby shower for her last week. They, along with the rest of the club, gifted her tons of clothes, necessities, and she had to get it in order. Thomas insisted he wanted to help, insisted they had time. They did have some, except the next ten weeks would slip by.
Besides, Thomas was being overly cautious, overprotective, and unreasonable. Just because she was pregnant didn’t mean she should be in bed or lounging around all day. He even suggested she take a leave of absence from work. Unless he wanted her to go stir crazy, she couldn’t do that. In her third trimester, her belly had slowed her down a bit, but the doctor and the books she read said exercise and staying active were good for the baby, barring complications, of course, which thank God thus far, they hadn’t had.
Instead of saying any of this though, knowing he wouldn’t agree, she whispered, “We missed you.”
He sighed heavily then ran his hand up her spine to the back of her neck, placing the other over the swell of her stomach. “You loving how you got me wrapped around your finger right ‘bout now, huh?”
She smirked. “I don’t—”
He leaned in, lips grazing hers, before he said, “You do, and that’s okay ’cause I love it, too.”
Damn, how she loved when he did that, when he said things that made her heart flutter. He always had, even when they’d just been friends, though she hated it then. Still, he did it, often, and for no reason at all.
“Your dad called. Said they wanted to come over. Said they’d bring dinner.”
Much to her surprise, her parents had come around. She knew they weren’t pleased she married Thomas without telling them, but they hadn’t said a word about it, probably because she had no reason to tell them. Both her parents had since made an effort to include Thomas. Her father, in particular, had come a long way. She was thrilled. She loved her parents and wanted them to be a part of their lives. Thomas, because he was Thomas and despite the wedge her parents attempted to draw between them, welcomed them.
“So they’re coming over?”
“Yeah.”
She slanted her head. “Do you know what they’re bringing?”
“That pasta you like.”
She smiled then twirled her finger on his chest.
His gaze snapped to the movement for a brief moment. When he met her gaze again, he broke out in a huge grin. “After, was thinking we could make a fire outside…”
He spent the last two months making small improvements to their home. First thing, he installed a surveillance system. Next, he hung a swing on the front porch and bought the most expensive fire pit he could find.
The changes and improvements hadn’t gone unnoticed by her. She noticed too that the improvements he’d made, with the exception of the surveillance system, she’d mentioned in passing, and he’d gone out of his way to do—for her.
A couple of weeks ago, she’d been thinking aloud when she said she was considering buying a shoe rack for her closet. In the master, they had two closets, his and hers. Hers was bigger, huge, in fact. She had a lot of shoes and thought a shoe rack would be a great way to organize and display them. She just as easily forgot about it. The next day, he came home with a large box. She assumed it was a piece of furniture but hadn’t asked. As she made dinner, he assembled it in her closet. Later that night, she realized what he’d done. And it was a huge shoe rack, four-feet in width, six in height. Needless to say, it was big enough to display all her shoes.
The following week, they’d been watching TV together when a commercial flashed across the screen, a man on a hammock at a beach drinking a beer. She made a comment about how relaxing hammocks were. Two days later, they laid in their own hammock.
He’d always been thoughtful, but as of late, he’d been more so. She thought it had something to do with her being attacked. This worried her. She didn’t want him thinking about it or stewing over what could’ve happened. Maybe it was unreasonable, but she wanted him to forget it. And so, she’d asked.
He’d replied quickly, easily, and simply. “I’m doing what I’ve been doing ’cause I promised you I’d do everything I could to make you happy. ’Cause I wanna make you happy.”
“Tiff?”
Her name on his lips drew her away from her thoughts. She smiled. “Sounds good, but tomorrow night, just you and me.”
He grinned. A devilish look in his eyes, when he said, “Won’t hear me complaining about that, baby girl.”
****
Ten hours of labor and Tiffany still looked beautiful. All Cuss could do was stare, stare at his girl with their son in her arms.
She went into labor early that morning. He would be a liar if he said he hadn’t been scared out of his mind. A million things could’ve gone wrong. Luckily nothing had, and they welcomed a healthy, baby boy weighing eight pounds and six ounces. They named him, Mason Charles Layne.
Cuss, at her bedside, held her throughout the labor. When the time came, he cut the umbilical cord. Then the doctor handed him his son. Carefully, he held him. Looking straight into his puffy face and eyes, a rush of raw emotion flooded him. He promised to be the best father he could be, promised he’d teach, love, and protect his son just as fiercely as he protected his mother. He didn’t know how long he stood there, staring at his beautiful boy. It wasn’t until he heard her voice that he realized he’d been at it a while.
“Thomas… Is he okay?”
He snapped his head up and met Tiffany’s beautifully flushed face. She’d carried him for nine months but hadn’t held him yet. She’d let him take his time. He loved that, loved everything about her.
He grinned. “Yeah…” Walking the short distance to her, he handed her their son.
Her face brightened, that smile that lit up her whole face, blinding. “He’s beautiful.”
Settling beside her, he slung his arm around them both. “Yeah.”
She angled her head to meet his face. “Like you.”
He leaned into her, pressed his lips against hers then drew away only slightly to disagree. “No, baby girl, like you.”
She shook her head. “Don’t you see it? He looks just like you.”
He smirked. “That disappointing?”
Her voice soft when she whispered, “I’m thrilled. A baby like you to spoil.”
He smiled wide. Gaze snapping to his son, he ran his finger against the soft skin on his cheek. He did that for a long while and watched them both, thinking his life couldn’t possibly get better.
****
The soft cries of her newborn woke Tiffany instantly. She jolted up in bed, swinging her feet over the side. Before she planted them on the tile floor, Thomas’s arm snaked around her waist. He hauled her toward him until her back hit his chest.
His mouth at her ear, he whispered, “Got him. Stay here. Rest.” He pressed a kiss to her shoulder blade before he left.
Despite her exhaustion, she smiled, watching him head to the bassinet. Her smile didn’t fade. Instead, it widened while she watched Thomas check and change their son’s diaper, talking to him softly as he did. Moments later, he handed him over, so she could breastfeed. Routine by now.
Despite Thomas being now a twenty-five-year-old biker, he fit into his father role perfectly, helping her more than she ever imagined.
He woke at every night feeding insisting he change diapers since she breastfed. He bathed their son and read bedtime stories, too. It surprised most his brothers, her parents, even his mother, but it didn’t surprise her. She knew he’d be a good father because he was so good to her. Still, the tender way he did everything relating to their son touched her in a way she never expected.
As her son began feeding, Thomas did something else that had also become routine. He sat up in bed beside her, slung his arm around her, and shifted her until she lay against him. Then he pressed a kiss against her temple and whispered, “Love you.”
She angled her head to meet his stare and whispered back, “Love you, too.” She said it like she did often, but it never seemed like enough. Every day, she thought her life couldn’t get better.
It did, for them both.
Four years later, Thomas and Tiffany along with their son who resembled his father more and more each day, the same dark hair, the same sapphire eyes, welcomed a daughter, Jackeline Grace Layne.