Epilogue

Dash

Imogen did eventually come back to the estate. I gave her a few months to get to know me and the family better, and she finally agreed to live with us here. It was a risk jumping into a new relationship so quickly, but in my heart, I knew she was the one from the moment I rescued her from the ditch.

We decided to start again, this time properly, which meant I had to call her Jeni around her work friends, but I was given permission to call her Imogen at home. It was all about compromises. We decided she would continue her work as would I, even after our baby was born and I appreciated her being a child psychologist because she was amazing with DJ and Ally and helped them embrace all the changes in their lives with beauty and grace.

We discovered that we were having a son, which I was thrilled about and couldn’t wait to meet. At our intimate gender reveal party, which was just with Gloria and her boyfriend, Lydia and Imogen’s feisty Gramps, the kids and ourselves, Imogen opened a box full of blue balloons that filled the air around us.

We were very busy planning a baby shower, but I did go to the authorities and while it took time to catch him, Mark was eventually charged with fraud, and manufacturing and trading of illegal street drugs, and was sentenced to prison with the heads of the Minneapolis drug cartel. The minute I saw Mark in an orange suit being carted off to his jail cell, a thousand-pound weight was lifted from my shoulders. Finally, I could live again. Apart from spending time with my growing family, living to me also meant diving into my work. I had a lot of success with the trials for my cancer drug. We were on the road to a medical solution that would, at the very least, prolong the life of some cancer patients. We hadn’t cured cancer, but we were getting closer and I vowed to make it my life’s work to find a cure.

Imogen convinced me to open up my mountain house for all of us to use on weekends and we built a road to her grandpa’s place so that we could visit him often. His health had taken a positive turn with all the kids and bustle about him every weekend, and despite his continuously cantankerous disposition, I could tell he secretly loved having family about.

What wasn’t a secret was how much Lydia loved it. She was always cooking something amazing for us. The person though, who was most happy next to Imogen and me, was Gloria. She had a wonderful boyfriend who had just proposed marriage and she accepted, but more than anything she was free to start her own life and family.

There would never be enough words to express my gratitude for all she’d done for me, so, while it was only a small token of my appreciation, I built them a house, made to their specifications on the same block as ours and we were in the process of building another cabin between Gramps’ place and mine.

Life truly couldn’t have been better. I was with the woman of my dreams, I was doing work that would help humanity and Imogen promised we’d continue to grow our family for years to come. I thanked God every day for sending an angel to rescue me.

Jeni

At the end of September, we gave birth to a little boy who we named Liam Michael for Gramps, whose name was Liam, and Michael for Dash’s late wife Michelle. The kids loved their baby brother and I adored being a mother.

I knew I’d like it, but I didn’t know how much I’d love it. I found my true calling. I continued to work as a psychologist after Liam was born because I still loved my job, but I felt like I was missing so much of his life at the office, so Dash built a home office for me and I started my own practice. It was perfect; I could have lunch with the kids and see DJ and Ally after school, breastfed Liam when he needed it and plan for baby number two or actually four if we were really counting.

After Liam came, the house was louder and crazier, but also more perfect. When Liam was a bit older, and the houses in the mountains were finished we spent our first Christmas together as a big family. Gramps and Lydia were there as well as Gloria, her new husband, Dash Jr., Aleksandra, and Little Liam. In order to celebrate all of their accomplishments over the last two years, Dash and I went on a mountain climbing expedition to the hill where we first met and “fell” in love.

At the top of the mountain in the freezing cold, overlooking the world, Dash dipped down on one knee and asked me to marry him and I gleefully accepted his offer.

“I hope we fill the halls of our home with laughter, love, and lots of little feet so that we’ll never be lonely again. Just us and all of our little zombie killers,” he said with a smile.

Life, while it may always have its ups and downs, was pretty perfect. Every time I get stressed or worried about anything, I look at what we’ve built and I realized we can move mountains together.

THE END