She teased herself with his tip, and he added women to the list. Whoever invented women was getting one hell of a snog after this.
He looked up at this beautiful woman who had promised to be his for the rest of her life, and he had to bite back something resembling a sob.
“I love you, Elaina McAllister.”
She hummed. “Say it again. My name.”
His back arched as she slid down and then up again.
“Elaina McAllister.”
This time she let him push her open, and she sank over him, blanketing him in her warmth, and Duncan knew he was home.
“Duncan McAllister,” she said as he swirled inside her.
“Aye.”
“I love you, too.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Griffin
“Ten!”
Griffin grabbed Maggie by the hand and pulled her from the dance floor.
“Where are we going?” she asked in a fit of laughter.
“Outside. I have a feeling about something.”
So they ran out Ambrosia’s front door.
Noah
Noah pulled Jordan onto his lap.
“Nine!”
“I’m sorry I injured you with my not a proposal.”
She stroked his cheek and ran her fingers through his hair.
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“Eight!”
“Guess we wouldn’t be us if there was no accidental bodily harm involved.”
He’d be full of scars by the time they were old and gray, and Noah chuckled despite the danger that lay ahead.
She kissed him on the cheek and smiled. “No. We wouldn’t be us at all.”
Miles
Guess the saying was right: you always found what you were looking for in the last place you looked.
Miles had walked the nearby streets for hours, the cobbled paths lit with bright lights as late-night revelers spilled out of clubs and cafés. He’d stood by the white tower as a horse-drawn carriage circled by carrying another pair of newlyweds. From the moment he stepped onto an airplane, people in love had surrounded him. And he’d had a shot at love himself.
But he’d blown it. So he wearily made his way back to Ambrosia. When he arrived he couldn’t bring himself to go inside. Instead he slipped behind the restaurant, ready to ring in the New Year with nothing but the waves crashing against the shore.
Yet even in the brisk December air, he picked up the sulfurous scent of a recently struck match. Alex sat in the sand just in front of the outdoor patio, arms draped over his knees and a cigarette dangling from his lips.
“Those things will kill you,” Miles said.
Alex laughed and bit down on the filter as he spoke. “So will a diet high in butter and cheese, but it’s my livelihood.”
“Thought it wasn’t a habit,” Miles added, lowering himself to the spot next to Alex.
“Told you,” Alex responded. “Only when I need to clear my head.”
“Baseball!” Miles blurted, and Alex narrowed his eyes. Shit. His brain was moving faster than he could speak. “I played baseball—in college. I’m bisexual, and I played baseball, and I’m trying here, Alex. It scares the shit out of me, but I’m trying to give you more than a name—more than I’ve given anyone in years.”
It was time to go big or go home, so Miles pulled the cigarette from Alex’s lips and stubbed it out in the sand.
“I know what I want,” Alex said. “What the hell do you want, Miles?”
He pressed Alex’s forehead to his. “You,” he admitted.
“Right. For the weekend.”
Miles shook his head. “For as long as you’ll have me.”
There. He’d said it. It was out there.
But Alex sat quiet.
“Look,” Miles said. “This makes zero sense. But I finish my PhD in May, and you travel, right? So…I don’t know. Maybe we see where this goes.”
Alex cupped the back of his neck with his palm.
“I want to trust you. I really do. But you’re a mess.”
Miles nodded. “I know. But that’s the thing about meeting someone who makes you reevaluate the way you’ve been living your life. Kinda makes you want to clean up your shit.”
“Seven!”
Alex sighed. “I was in New York to sign the final paperwork for my new position,” he said. “Head chef. I wasn’t going to tell you because I didn’t think it mattered, but I’m moving to the States.”
“Six!”
Miles felt a release in his chest, like the vise that had squeezed his heart so tight all these years had finally let go.
“Five! Four!”
“It matters,” he said. “It matters.”
Elaina
“T hree! Two! One!”
Elaina rolled onto her back, panting.
“Happy New Year,” Duncan whispered and kissed her soft on the mouth. “Elaina McAllister.”
God, she loved the sound of that name.
Maggie
Maggie shrieked with delight at the first sound of fireworks.
“I told you I had a feeling, Pippi.”
She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him hard.
“All in,” he whispered against her.
“All in,” she said.
Noah
“You’re really going to marry me, Brooks?”
She tucked her head under his neck and squeezed him tight.
“Only if you promise to never stop calling me that.”
Noah squeezed back.
“As you wish, Brooks. Happy New Year.”
And then he kissed his fiancée with the broken toe and scarred eyebrow as he cupped her cheek with his equally scarred hand. Though they’d marked each other permanently, Jordan Brooks would never quite know the mark she left on Noah Keating’s heart. But he’d spend the rest of his life trying to show her.
Miles
“We made it till midnight,” Alex said, and Miles nodded, not wanting to do anything but kiss this man who could have written him off but didn’t.
“We made it till midnight,” Miles added.
Alex kissed him—long and slow, each touch of their lips a new possibility.
“Thank you for finding me,” Alex told him.
“Thank you for wanting to be found,” Miles said. “Happy New Year.”
Epilogue
One Year Later
Elaina
Elaina stood in the bedroom doorway, peaceful as a picture, while Duncan ransacked the room. She rubbed her round belly, stifling a gasp at the onset of the next contraction. But even in the midst of his frenzy, her husband noticed, and he was at her side in an instant.
“How close?” he asked.
“Eight minutes. We still have time.”
The hospital was a short ride from their apartment, so Elaina was sure they didn’t have to leave yet. She let Duncan lead her to the rocking chair in the corner of the room, the one where just a couple of days from now, she’d nurse their first child.
She took in a deep breath, shaking as Duncan lowered her into the chair.
“Another one? Already? Shite. I’ll find it, dammit. I’ll find it.”
She shook her head and grabbed his hand before he could pull away. The first tear trickled down her cheek, but Elaina’s smile was unmistakable.
“The next time I sit here, it will be with our baby boy or girl.”
Duncan dropped to his knees and hugged her tightly, planting sweet kisses all over her belly, the same thing he’d done when he found out they were pregnant. Though they’d both decided to throw caution to the wind after the honeymoon, discontinuing any form of birth control and seeing where that led them, Elaina hadn’t anticipated things working so quickly. She laughed now when she remembered how scared she’d been to tell him.