Spending every day with Laken, with a victory for the Barricade under my belt, is far more than I could have dreamed merely a year ago.

“Come here, beautiful.” I pull Laken over me in our bed, my arms encircling her body tight like a seat belt. Laken let me know that she’s not thinking about her relationship with Cooper until after the holidays. But I’ve got a lock on her heart. She’s demonstrated that to me night after night. Sorry, Coop. You don’t win the war for Laken’s heart. Not now, not then. At least that’s what I’d like to believe. It’s easy to believe your own lies when there’s no one there to contest them—another entirely when there’s Laken in the balance.

Laken nuzzles into me. “I can’t believe Charlie and Eli turn three months this week. Three months! Where did the time go?” The moonlight washing over her reveals the tears in her eyes.

“Are you ready for another one?”

Laken tips her head back and laughs, her full breasts bouncing softly between us. “You are insane, Wesley.”

“I’ve heard worse.” I give her thigh a quick pinch. Eli cries from down the hall, loud and piercing. I always hold my breath and count the seconds it takes Kresley to retrieve him. She’s a good mother. Doting and loving, something I wasn’t quite expecting. She worships that child, and it’s refreshing compared to the attention poor Tobie receives from her mother. But Laken. She’s the prize, and both Charlie and I have her. The crying stops cold, and I take another breath.

“I was thinking”—Laken shifts uncomfortably, and I stop breathing once again—“relax, Wes. I’m not going anywhere.” Her affect falls like maybe she is, or has emotionally. Cooper has been relentless in his pursuit of her. And ever since the night of our greatest victory, she’s been stirring for him. She doesn’t need to say it, I can feel it and so can he. The slow turning of Laken’s heart has begun, and I’ll do anything to keep her heading in my direction. “What I was going to say is, I think Tobie should be in pre-school come next September. That gives us less than a year to—”

“Shop for a home on Paragon.” A grin spreads wide on my face as I finish the thought. “I’m all in. We’ll live behind the gates.”

“I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.” She takes a bite out of my bottom lip and wraps her legs around me.

Laken is a wild tigress beneath the sheets, the initiator, the instigator, the one who takes control and calls the shots, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

But I can feel us growing apart. No more Mr. Nice Guy. The Fems are on top. Laken must stay with me for her own protection. We’re family now. We always have been, and I don’t intend to sever that bond.

Laken pulls back and cradles my face in her palm. “I love you, Wesley.” Her brows furrow as if she were begging me to believe it. And I try, I really, really try.

Laken kisses me deeply. The hint of sorrow and regret emits from her, and I can’t deny it. I’ll have to fight harder. I’ll have to slit the throat of anyone who tries to come between us. I’m sorry, Coop. I never meant for this to turn fatal.

I’ve killed far more people for less offenses. I would watch the world burn for Laken.

The sun will never set on the two of us again.

Laken loves me.

Thank God it’s the truth.