I can hear the ocean just outside of the balcony doors. I stir in bed, taking a deep breath, and I smile.

Ethan is already up and outside. I climb out of bed and push aside the curtains. The view is astounding and amazes me every morning just as much as it did the first time. The beachfront town spreads out around us, with the ocean barely a quarter mile away. Sea birds cry out and I blink at the sun.

“Morning,” Ethan says. “My beautiful wife.”

I laugh and smile at him. “Morning yourself. Why’d you let me sleep so late?”

“You looked too content. Couldn’t wake you.”

I smile and walk over to him. Ethan is sitting at a table eating a modest breakfast and wearing a white shirt open at the chest with white slacks.

After everything with my father, we got married almost right away. Ethan said he didn’t want to wait, and I wasn’t going to argue. We eloped to France, and when I got pregnant four months later, we decided to stay. We left Jenkins behind, mostly because he hates me, and although I thought that might be tough for Ethan, he doesn’t seem to mind one bit. He’s so much more resourceful than I thought.

Ethan works remotely now, and most of his duties have been taken over by his subordinates. He’s transitioning away from being the high-powered full-time CEO to being something else, something more domestic.

I don’t have to worry about debt anymore. Ethan paid it off practically the night Lorraine destroyed my father. And my father never once bothered us, and even signed the contracts as he was told. Whatever was in that envelope scared him straight, and we never heard from him again.

The Syndicate never bothered us again, either, though I wish I could see Lorraine. She was good to me when I was staying with them, and I even began to think of her as a friend.

Now though, we live far away in the south of France, and I’m so pregnant I can barely walk around.

Ethan stands up and kisses my pregnant belly then kisses my lips. “Another perfect day,” he observes.

“It’s always perfect here, isn’t it?”

He shrugs. “I guess so. If you get tired of it being too perfect, we can leave at any time.”

I laugh, shaking my head. I’m still not used to having unlimited money and time and freedom. It’s hard to really understand just how easily we can move around and do whatever we want.

I feel so content, so surpassingly content. I’ve never been this happy in my entire life. I still feel like that awful junky girl that I used to be, but I’m slowly getting away from it.

All because of him. We’re a family now, and he treats me like a queen. He spoils me, and I’m still his pet. We’ve been exploring all the different ways he can tie me up, or at least we were until I got too pregnant.

Once I have this baby, we’ll go back to it. And I can’t freaking wait.

“What do you want to do today?” he asks me.

“I don’t know. Isn’t that awful? We can do anything, and I never know what to do.”

“Horrible problem to have.” He laughs and kisses me again.

This is how life turned out for me. I don’t know how. Sometimes, it shocks me. But I’m Mrs. Locks, wife of the rich and handsome Ethan Locks, and still his little pet.

And soon, we’ll be a bigger family. I’ll have my baby and maybe another, and maybe another. We’ll live wherever we want, do whatever we want, and I know it’ll be perfect. There are bad days ahead, of course. Nothing is ever perfect for long. But the good days will always outnumber the bad ones, because I’ll have Ethan with me.

He’ll protect me. He’ll bring me through anything.

I’m still that junky girl. But maybe soon, I won’t be anymore. All because of him.

We’re a family. And I couldn’t be happier. I’ll keep following him forever, as long as he’ll have me, until I can’t follow him any more.