Snow falls thick and fast outside, the tufts of white blanketing our porch. I press my hand against the window, the cold stinging my skin. A horizon of pine trees stretches underneath an orange-colored sky. After a lifetime of living in the hustle of a major city, the peace and quiet was a refreshing change. When we arrived here, it was bliss to sit on the swinging bench with a tall glass of iced tea and relax in the baking heat. We take long walks now that my morning sickness is finally gone. We walk the grasslands, endless fields of green and butter-yellow flowers, and stroll past rolling hills of vineyards. It’s gorgeous. Now that Christmas is only a few weeks away, our house glows with a rainbow of lights. Bastien put them up a couple days ago.

I still call him Bastien in my head, but for six months he’s been Ethan. I chime his real name in my thoughts, over and over again, but I slip every once in a while.

The hardwood creaks as he walks into the kitchen in a pair of black briefs. My husband’s always looked good in them and I can’t resist anything that shows off his ass. His chest muscles dance as he reaches into the cupboard for a mug. I move next to him and wrap my arms around his waist, sliding my hands under the elastic.

Ethan touches my baby bump and gropes my breast. His face widens with a feline grin. “Morning.”

Sometimes I think I see a flicker of the man I met. He’s been subdued ever since we left the city. I don’t expect him to be the same after what happened. A shadow crawls over his face when the news reports an update on the murders of James Carter and Michael Ritter. The cloud of a threat still hangs over us, distant, but real. The scar on his shoulder, an opaque white, stretches like a spiderweb over his skin. It’s healed, but the wounds etched on the inside might never go away.

“What are you doing today?”

He fills his mug. “I have a shift in the morning, but I’ll come back in time to help you with dinner.”

He has a part-time job as a mechanic, but like everything else it’s temporary. We’re both taking it slow, waiting for the wounds to heal, and trying to figure out what to do with our lives.

Dinner. Right. His parents are coming over.

Claire and Richard. They’re amazing. I couldn’t ask for better in-laws. Watching them together always gives me a stab of envy for what I missed in my childhood. They love each other how a couple who grew old together should. They badgered us with questions when we first arrived, and there was only so much Ethan could tell them. Richard didn’t take the silence from his son very well, but the announcement that we were expecting quickly thawed any lingering resentment. We married in a small, beautiful ceremony in the local parish. They didn’t ask why no one on my side of the family came.

Thinking of them sours my stomach.

Dad was killed.

It happened on our drive halfway across the country to our new home. My phone rang with Madison’s voice on the other life telling me what happened. He was shot in the parking lot while picking up a prescription. In the end, it wasn’t cancer. One of his men did it. I tried so hard to keep him alive from the disease, but the real cancer was the life he chose for himself, a world entrenched in violence.

I thought I didn’t have any tears left, but I cried. Despite the horrible crimes he committed, he was still my father. I couldn’t rip out the half of my heart that loved him. The half that occasionally feels a tug toward Montreal.

Sometimes I feel guilty over the people I left behind—Madison. I would’ve liked to help repair her house. She’s a sweet soul who didn’t deserve what they did, but we had to leave before the war heated up. Now a day doesn’t go by without another gang-related shooting.

Thank God we’re out.

Ethan offered to turn around and drive back for my dad’s funeral. My brave, selfless husband would’ve risked himself just so I could say goodbye to my father, but I already said it weeks ago. It still hurts, like a wound on the mend.

One day it’ll heal.

Warmth spreads across my stomach as Ethan grabs me. “Sometimes it feels like I got married to two men.”

He sips his coffee. “Two men, one cock. I’m not sure I agree.”

“You know what I mean. You were a different person.”

“I think you want to believe you belong to two guys,” he says with a grin. “Cherish it, Eva. The feeling won’t last.”

I slug him in the shoulder, smiling. He always knows how to get my mind off things. Sometimes it’s with a wiseass joke, and other times he uses his lips and hands to distract me.

“I’ve been thinking about names.” He lowers the cup from his lips. “What about Sophie?”

Since we found out the sex, we’ve been arguing over names for weeks. “Short for Sofia?” I mull it over, liking it. “We could do a coin toss.”

He laughs. “Yeah, that’ll be a story to tell our kid when she gets older. We couldn’t decide, so your mother wanted to flip on it.”

“There’s still plenty of time.” I spread my finger through his thick, black hair peppered with gray, and he closes his eyes. I plant a kiss on the gorgeous dent just below his Adam’s apple, so deliriously happy I can’t stop grinning.

Ethan looks out the window, to the snow blanketing the landscape. “Shit, look.”

A buck picks its way across the yard, his hooves sinking deep into the snow. It finds the apple tree I planted months ago and rubs its snowcapped antlers all over the bark.

“Damn it! He’ll ruin it.”

“It’s all right,” he says. “Wow.”

Ethan’s face cracks with a wide grin as the deer shreds my tree. He palms the glass and leans closer, laughing at the stupid deer. “Little bastard.”

“I’m glad you’re enjoying the wildlife.”

It’s my fault. I had this vision as a kid, of running through an orchard and reading books under apple trees. I told Ethan about it and he bought one a day later. It’s the sort of selfless, wonderful thing he always does.

Ethan pulls me close and finds my pouting mouth. “We’ll get you more apple trees.”

My lips melt against his as he kisses me, my back pressed against the cold panes of the window. He promised me a different life, but all I wanted was one with him.

And it’s perfect.

# # #

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