by Layne, Ivy
We didn't have a booster seat, but this one time I didn't think Lily would mind. I owed Evers big time for handling all the bullshit that was about to rain down on his head.
I backed down the drive, turning away from my burning house without the slightest twinge of regret.
It was a house.
Adam was safe. Alice was a little banged up, but Cooper said her heartbeat was steady. Until I heard differently, I was going to assume she was fine. Two for two. If I counted getting Tsepov off our backs for good, it was a complete victory.
In light of that, I wasn't worried about my garage. At the wail of sirens, I relaxed even more. The fire department would stop the flames before they spread much further.
Evers' house, as he'd told Adam, was around the corner. We beat Lily there. Using the key on the ring from the SUV, I let us in, directing Adam to the bathroom as soon as we cleared the threshold.
After almost five weeks with the kid, I knew any transition required a bathroom break if we wanted to avoid disaster. The tiny bit of normalcy steadied me like nothing else could.
Adam was safe. I waited by the door for Lily, taking a minute to send Tsepov one last text.
You have the money and the box. This is done.
I'm coming for your father. Stay out of my way.
I ignored the stab of regret as I answered.
He's all yours.
Then Lily was there, bolting out of the SUV in the drive and flying up the stairs to me, her eyes wild. Adam was just leaving the bathroom, wiping his wet hands on the front of his shirt as she flew through the door, her eyes landing on him immediately.
“Adam!” she cried, darting forward and scooping him into her arms, holding him close, her face buried in his neck, tears streaming down her face.
“Mom, there's a fire, and Mr. Knox and his brother said we could go swimming.”
Oh, to be a five-year-old, where a house fire and swimming ranked the same level of excitement. I wrapped them both in my arms, pressing my cheek to the top of Lily's head, her soft hair tickling my nose.
“Everyone's okay, Lily. Everyone's okay.”
Well before she was ready, Adam started to squirm, not understanding his mother's desperate need to hold on to him.
“Mom, put me down. I wanna go swimming. Mr. Knox said I can swim in my underwear. Can I? Can I?”
With a Herculean effort, Lily loosened her grip and set Adam on his feet. Her voice wobbly and her eyes wet, she said, “It's okay this time, baby.”
“I'll show you where the pool is.” I led them out to Evers' deck and down the stairs to the pool. Adam tore off his clothes as he ran, screeching with delight before he cannonballed into the shallow end.
Taking Lily's hand, I led her to the steps, and we sat, getting rid of our shoes and dropping our feet in the cool water.
“Alice?” she asked. “They said Cooper took her to the hospital.”
“No word yet. She'll be fine,” I said, hoping I was telling her the truth. I filled her in on everything else, forgetting I hadn't told her about the bombs before I left her at Sinclair Security.
She smacked my shoulder twice before she shoved with both hands, trying to dump me in the water. Despite her effort, she barely moved me an inch.
I had it coming. Leaving out the bombs was a pretty big omission, not that I regretted it. With a sigh, Lily let it go, shifting from anger to remorse.
“Your house,” she said, “oh, Knox, your beautiful house.”
I leaned over and plucked her from the edge of the pool, settling her into my lap. “It was only the garage, Lil. The fire department is already there. They'll catch it before it spreads. Anyway, I was thinking we need a bonus room.”
Too stunned to follow, she asked, confused, “A bonus room? What are you talking about?”
“A bonus room. Like a playroom kind of thing. We only have the three bedrooms. Ours, Adam's, and the other one can be a guest room, or maybe another kid's room if that's how it works out. Either way, we need a playroom. Kids need space. And maybe, while we're at it, I'll put in a pool. Adam needs a pool.”
“A pool?” Lily asked faintly. I stroked the side of my thumb down her arm.
“Don't you want a pool?”
“I—” Her voice failed her as she looked at Adam, splashing at a bug, then back at me.
“You—” I prompted. Lily leaned back to look up at me, her mouth gaping open and closed like a fish.
I caught her full lower lip in my teeth for a second before resting my mouth on hers. Her lips moving against mine she whispered, “Kids?”
“If you want more,” I said.
“Do you?”
I pressed my mouth to hers again before I said, “I have you, and I have Adam. That's all I'll ever need. But if you want more, I wouldn't mind another.”
“What if I can't?”
“Then we'll adopt. Or we'll foster. Or we'll be happy with Adam. Seriously, Lily, I don't give a fuck. As long as I have you two, I'm good.”
Lily scowled at the profanity. That's when I knew the shock was fading and I had her back.
“I wouldn't mind trying for more,” she confessed, shifting in my lap so she had a better view of Adam, happily doggy paddling from one side of the shallow end to the other, splashing as much as a five-year-old could in a limited space.
He saw her watching and stopped, treading water long enough to shout, “Look, I can do a handstand underwater,” before disappearing beneath the surface, his little feet popping up and wiggling a moment later. Lily clapped in appreciation when he surfaced.
“I'm all about trying for more,” I said. “I think we should start right away.”
Lily's eyes flared. “Right away?”
“Maybe not right away. We should probably let things settle for a while.”
We watched Adam splash in the water. He'd had enough upheaval in the past year. In the past few weeks. A new baby might be too much. And we had time.
“I think we should practice,” Lily murmured. “Make sure we know what we're doing.”
“I like that plan.” I nuzzled her neck, sucking a little at her warm skin. She squirmed on my lap.
“Not right now,” she protested, breathless.
“Not right now,” I agreed. “Tonight. After our little chaperone is asleep”
“Tonight.” Her eyes warmed, and she relaxed, settling into me, resting her head on my shoulder.
“I'm not too heavy?” she asked.
I wouldn't have moved her even if she were. I told her the truth. “No, Lil. You're perfect. And I like you right where you are.”
In my arms, exactly where she belonged.
Epilogue One
Lily
The damage to Knox's gorgeous fairy-tale cottage was not as bad as it could have been. The fire department got the flames under control before they spread from the garage, leaving the rest of the house mostly undamaged, aside from the lingering smell of smoke.
When he heard what had happened, Aiden Winters invited us to stay in Winters House until the repairs were complete. We packed up our things—again—and took up residence in the grand estate.
I was a little overwhelmed, to be honest. I wasn't used to having a cook and housekeeper. I don't know what I expected the Winters to be like. I'd met Charlie, so I should have had an idea, but I still thought they'd be, I don't know, cold. Pompous and self-important, like Trey's parents, but more so. That much money. That much power. How could they be anything but?
Aiden Winters was a little formal, but really, they were like any other family, just with a bigger house. A much bigger house. Winters House is massive. I've stayed in smaller hotels.
Adam and I were fish out of water twice over—living in a new city, with a family we didn't even know. The Winters provided more than enough entertainment to ease us thro
ugh that awkward first week in Atlanta.
Aiden's great aunt Amelia was in her eighties, but she was a hoot. His sister-in-law Sophie, also Amelia's nurse, did her best to keep Amelia in line. That first night, Amelia snuck a cookie under Adam's broccoli and a fake cockroach under mine. It didn't take me long to figure out that not much kept Amelia Winters in line, even Sophie.
Everyone loved having a child in the house again. They spoiled Adam rotten, the older family members—mainly Aunt Amelia and the housekeeper, Mrs. W—aiming raised eyebrows at the younger Winters women.
Aiden's girlfriend, Violet, was about to start graduate school. Kids were not in her plans yet. Used to dealing with Amelia and Mrs. W, she just aimed a raised eyebrow back and ignored them.
Sophie, on the other hand, flushed and looked away. I had the feeling Gage and Sophie Winters were working on a new addition to the Winters clan.
Knox didn't waste our week at Winters House. The first day he tracked down Charlie and sweet-talked her into taking on his garage renovation.
Charlie had given Knox an arch look. “I'm sitting on a flip that's already running behind, racking up expenses every day I don't have it back on the market. I'm not giving you the family discount.”
Knox had only shrugged. “I wasn't going to ask for it. You work hard enough as it is without doing it on the cheap. Can you fit me in or not?”
Charlie's lips quirked up. “You know I'll fit you in. What do you want to do? I'm thinking three cars and a bonus room.”
“That's why I came to you, Charlie.”
Charlie and Lucas figured out a way to turn the two-car garage into three, adding a bonus room above, as well as a guest room on the first floor that Charlie cleverly tucked away behind the kitchen.
Knox hadn't been kidding about turning his current guest room into another kid's room. I don't know how they did it, but, based on the sketches, the house wouldn't look any different from the front. The side with the most changes faced the woods, and none of the additions would disturb the whimsical look of the place.
Knox wrote Charlie a check. I peeked at the zeros and handed him a check of my own. I was no freeloader. Knox tore it in half. “I let you pay off Leanne Gates.”
I opened my mouth to protest, and he held up a hand. I glared at that hand but let him talk.
“You wanted to use the money from Trey to pay off Gates, and I didn't argue.”
He hadn't. It seemed fair, using Trey's ill-gotten gains to settle the threat they'd caused.
Knox went on, “Put the rest of that money away for the kids’ college fund. I take care of my family.”
I rolled my eyes. “Sexist much?”
Knox shoved his hands in his pockets and looked down at me, thinking. I wasn't sure I was going to like what he'd say when he was done.
“Lily,” he said finally, “I don't want you to feel trapped. You want to stay home with Adam, and we want to have more kids, right?” I nodded in agreement. I did want those things. “Keep your money. Put it away or spend it however you want. Keep it as a nest egg and we'll use it for the kids’ college, or we won't use it at all. Okay?”
I nodded, words stuck in my throat. I couldn't imagine ever feeling trapped with Knox, but I loved that he was determined to make sure I never would.
“Did you call your mom?” he asked, changing the subject.
“She said anytime is good.”
“Then let's go to Hanover. We have time while Alice gets kindergarten straightened out for Adam and Charlie's working on the house.”
“Can you leave again so soon?” He'd been away from the office for three weeks while we were at the cabin, unable to work remotely because of the isolation.
“I'll bring my laptop. The semester's started, so your dad can't come here, and Adam can miss the first week of kindergarten. We need time with your parents. Anyway, Axel is bringing Emma and my mom to Atlanta. They'll have him to pick up my slack, and—.”
“—you'd just as soon not be here when your mom shows up,” I finished for him.
Tsepov was still missing. He had his money and he had his Faberge box. So far, he hadn't made any moves against the Sinclairs. Just that morning, Axel had called to tell us there was an attempted coup of Andrei's operation.
Apparently, his people weren’t impressed by his obsession with revenge, or his disorganized leadership. The coup had failed, but barely. Axel didn’t like the instability in his hometown, so close to his wife and mother.
The Sinclairs were circling the wagons, and while I knew they felt better having their mother under multiple layers of security, they were dreading her return to Atlanta.
We stayed in Atlanta for a few more days, Knox organizing his responsibilities so he could leave again, me getting Adam set up with a pediatrician and delivering all his paperwork to Alice, who was taking care of getting him into kindergarten.
She was back at work, seemingly managing the entire universe from her desk, though Cooper—according to Alice—was hovering like a mother hen.
Knox and I made final decisions on fixtures and colors with Charlie and helped the pool guy stake out the location for the small lagoon-shaped pool Knox insisted we have in the backyard.
I signed a contract with a realtor in Black Rock to put Trey's house on the market and hired a company out of Bangor to pack up everything we'd left and ship it to Atlanta.
We hadn't heard a thing from Deputy Dave. Knox's threat to send Tespov after him must have done the trick. The day the moving company showed up to start packing I braced for a call from Dave or the Black Rock police, but there was nothing. Soon enough, the house would be sold. Then Dave, and Black Rock, Maine, would be behind me.
We spent two weeks in Hanover with my parents. To my shock, my mother put Knox and me in the guest room and Adam in my old bedroom with only a slight harrumph from my father. We horrified my mother by showing off my newly acquired sugar-laden baking skills.
It sounds silly, but I think my chocolate chip cookies went a long way to winning over my father. It was a little late to be overprotective considering he'd thrown me out years before, but I finally realized his glares and pointed questions were his way of telling Knox he hadn't made the cut.
One taste of those chewy, decadent cookies, packed with real sugar, and he started to melt. That's what happens after decades of sugar-free carob hemp bars. My mother only complained a little. Having her daughter home and a grandchild to spoil were more important than her anti-junk food edict.
Eventually, it was time to go back to Atlanta. Cooper called threatening to fly up and drag us back. Alice had Adam enrolled in kindergarten and he was eager to settle into his new life. Knox's house—our house, as he kept insisting—was still under construction, but the work was isolated to the garage and the back of the house. As long as we parked in the driveway, we could move in.
My Land Rover and all of our belongings from Winters House were waiting when we got back. Adam went to his first day of kindergarten with only the usual nerves at starting a new school. I'd worried that a new school would be one stress too many, but he rolled with it, eager to make friends.
Knox went back to work, and I did my best to get settled in. It helped that Knox's family and friends reached out to make sure I felt included. I saw Charlie almost every day when she stopped by to check on the garage addition.
At Sophie and Amelia's request, I brought Adam by Winters House to swim a few days a week. Knox had somehow managed to get a pool contractor working while we were gone, but pools don't spring up overnight. Amelia claimed that she needed the excitement of a five-year-old to keep her young, and Sophie seem to love having a kid around.
One afternoon I headed out to run errands, restocking Adam with school clothes since he seemed to have grown two inches overnight. Knox had offered to pick Adam up from kindergarten and I jumped on the opportunity to shop without a compla
ining five-year-old latched onto me like a barnacle.
Adam and Knox had hit it off from the first day, but lately, they'd grown even closer, whispering, then stopping abruptly when I walked into the room, going off every few days to do something together, just the two of them. I didn't pry, especially not after seeing the way Adam bloomed under Knox's attention.
I arrived home not much before five to find the driveway mysteriously empty of construction vehicles, only Knox's SUV parked in front of the house.
Reaching for the handle of the front door, I was surprised to find it already turning under my fingers. The door swung open to reveal Adam wearing a pair of long pants, a button-down shirt, and a bow tie I'd never seen before.
He said nothing, handing me a hand-drawn invitation, the artwork clearly Adam's, the printing Knox's.
You are cordially invited to join Adam Spencer and Knox Sinclair for dinner.
The picture below was something I think might have been food on a plate. I didn't ask.
“You made me dinner?”
“Well, we didn't exactly make it, but—just come in.”
Adam grabbed my hand and pulled me to the kitchen where Knox waited, standing beside a dozen roses in a crystal vase and a box of chocolates. Knox wasn't wearing a bow tie, but he was in a gray suit with a crisp white button-down, undone at the neck.
In all the time we'd been together I'd never seen him dressed so formally. My knees went weak as I took in the breadth of his shoulders under the dark gray wool jacket. He should wear suits more often, if only so I’d have an excuse to take them off.
I dragged my eyes away from Knox to look back at my son and the expectant expression on his face, then to the flowers and the chocolate.
“What—what is this?”
“Adam and I decided to make you dinner.”
Adam opened his mouth to explain further but clapped it shut at Knox’s head shake. The table had been set with more flowers, placemats, and cloth napkins. Wow. They went all out.
Adam grabbed my hand again and led me to the table, stopping to pull my seat out for me. “What a gentleman,” I commented.
