Then I am close enough to Ford to see the love in his eyes, and he’s all I can think about. The corner of his mouth curves up, and I blush.

Every moment comes back to me. My favorite is still the night he came to my house and found me alone. That was the moment someone broke through my walls and I’ve been his ever since. I don’t need them anymore, not while I have him.

Ford is as restless for me as I am for him, so he crosses the room and meets us halfway. “I told Sin this room was ridiculously large,” he grumbles while our friends and family laugh.

“Thanks, Bennett. I’ve got her from here,” he tells Benji. There’s no malice or taunting behind it though.

“Take care of her,” Benji says quietly enough for only the three of us to hear.

“I promise,” Ford answers.

While Benji goes and sits with Lydia and Tracy, Ford walks me the rest of the way down the makeshift aisle in front of Shane.

He smiles, and I roll my eyes. This actually feels like the way this had to be done. With Raven and Sin standing next to us, and Shane, ordained by the power of the internet, Ford and I add husband and wife to the confusing list of our relationship titles. He’s been my enemy, my stepbrother, my friend, my lover, my boyfriend, and now he’s just going to be mine. That’s how we were always supposed to be.

You can’t fight fate. You can fuck it up, delay the inevitable, and draw out the conclusion, but in the end, what is meant to be will be. Ford and I were always meant to be. If only I could have trusted more, but maybe that too was always part of our story. Pluck one thread and the tapestry can unwind. Every experience brought me here, and as painful as some moments have been, they were all worth this.

“I think I can say for all of us how happy we are to finally be able to hear these words,” Shane begins, and snaps me out of my internal monologue. “Ford, you may kiss your bride.”

All awareness of there being people watching disappears when his lips meet mine. If my life were a movie, this is where the end credits would roll, because this is a moment I want to live in for a while.

Epilogue

Ford

Five years later

“Tessa,”I call through the house.

It isn’t as easy to find her as it was when we had our one-bedroom apartment in Seattle. When I signed with the Portland Wolves I went a little overboard and bought Tessa the kind of house she grew up in.

“That’s a lot of house for just the two of us,” she said.

It took me a little over a year to convince her, but after she graduated with her bachelor’s degree in journalism, we began trying for a baby.

A streak of dark hair and naked flesh zips past me, and I reach out and scoop up Ben. Tessa comes around the corner, panting and soaking wet.

“He fighting you on bath time again?” I ask.

“Whoever said the twos were terrible forgot to mention the terrifying threes.” She rubs her swollen belly. “If you hadn’t already knocked me up with this one, I swear Ben would be an only child.”

“Why are you giving your momma such a hard time?” I ask my son.

“Because I a mud monster,” Ben declares with as much authority as he can muster with his adorable toddler voice.

“You certainly are,” I agree.

“We were outside playing on the swing, but it started to rain. Bennie decided to stomp through all the mud puddles on the way back to the house. I’ve been chasing him to get him in the bath for half an hour. I almost had him, but I got more of myself in than him.”

He’s a little hell-raiser, and probably exactly how I’d have been if I were raised in a loving home. I love his curiosity, but Tessa needs some help now. I wish I could be the one here with her all day long as she finishes baking our little girl, but we do spend every free moment I have together.

“When is your mom coming?” I ask her.

“Tomorrow, and she’ll be here until this one comes.” She presses against her stomach. “Good timing too, because this one is kicking the hell out of my ribs.”

With our son held under my arm, I rub the spot I can see my daughter kicking. “You two are way too rough on your mom.”

Tessa sighs in relief, then shakes her head. “Of course, she already listens to you. You do have a way with women.”