Page 38 of Big Nick Energy

“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck,” he cursed. Suddenly, his steps grew longer, wider. “We’ll do this next year,” he muttered, sounding almost angry.

“Next year?”

“The winter festival stuff. Or maybe we can come tomorrow.”

“Why?” This surprised me. He’d sounded excited to check out the place. Maybe I had said too much, too fast?

“Because the things I want to do to you right now after you gave me those sweet words would get us arrested. Even if the windows to my truck are tinted.” That made me laugh andbury my face in the crook if his neck. I breathed in his manly expensive scent and let it fill my lungs.

“I need to get you home and show you just how much I love you under our Christmas tree,” he added, and I pulled back.

“You love me?”

“With every cell of my body, Blanca.”

Love stories come in all shapes and sizes.

But in the end, it’s simple. Even through the complicated messes. Finding your person, two people who somehow match or click with each other, no matter what their thing or kink is, like Libby liked to say.

And thankfully, Nick’s matched mine. Because even after only the small amount of time of us being a thing, I couldn’t imagine life without him.

And I couldn’t wait to see what life had in store for us.

Epilogue

NICK

Eight years later

I walkedthrough the quiet kitchen. The only sound was of my feet patting against the cool tile as I got to work on making my wife and kids breakfast.

Eight years together, seven married and five, almost six, of those as parents.

Life was wild.

I couldn’t believe just how much my life had changed. It was less than ten years after I had been looking forward to Noah graduating high school and going off to college. I’d finished, or so I’d thought.

Man, had I been wrong!

Life had just started for me.

I took stuff from the fridge for breakfast and set it on the counter. My eyes caught the twinkling lights on the Christmas tree, and my lips twitched. Quietly, I closed the fridge and tiptoed my way to the tree.

Sure enough, our Irish Twins, Nora and Bodie, were lying under the tree. The two of them tucked inside their matching sleeping bags. I pulled my cell from the pocket of my PJ pants and snapped a shot before kneeling down and looking at my little angels sleeping.

Our Nora was about to turn six a couple of days after the new year. And Bodie would turn six nine months later in September. I smiled and stood up before looking at the tree they slept soundly under. My eyes caught all the ornaments on it. Different ones from through the years. My favorite, though, were two that always sat at the top next to one another that boasted our first Christmas together. I rubbed my chest at the sight of the two of us smiling into the camera, the tree farm behind us, while the other had our faces illuminated brightly, my face at her shoulder as I held her by the waist. I loved both those pictures.

My daughter stirred and stretched, but she didn’t wake up. She loved to sleep. Not like Bodie, who, as soon as he woke up, was up and running.

They kept us busy and made life so much more interesting than I could have imagined. I’d loved being a dad to Noah, but older and wiser now, I took time to appreciate the small quiet moments I had stupidly rushed through when my firstborn had been younger.

I reached for the throw blankets on the couch my beautiful wife liked to keep so the kids and I could cozy up and covered them up as well as added a couple of throw pillows over the presents they were close to. To make sure neither of them poked out an eye with a corner of a box.

I walked back to the kitchen and got breakfast going. I was slicing up strawberries for the waffles when I heard my girl making her way down the stairs. A couple moments later, I felt her behind me, wrapping her arms around my waist, resting her face on my bare back.

“I don’t know where you get that Big Nick Energy from,” my wife mumbled against my back before pressing a couple of kisses to my skin. I. turned and lifted her up and sat her on the counter.

“Big Nick Energy?” I asked with a quiet chuckle.

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