Page 130 of With Spite

And I was safe in my husband’s embrace.

“Merry Christmas, baby.”

I twisted my lips to meet his. “Take me to bed.”

He didn’t make me ask twice.

He took me to bed and made sweet love to me.

His hips were thrusting, soft and easy, when he said, “I’m so glad I stalked you.”

I snickered. “You and me, both.”

Epilogue II

Author’s note:

Okay, so I don’t usually ever write endings like this. They’re heartbreaking, and I don’t want to make your heart hurt. I want the characters to ALWAYS live happily ever after, FOREVER. I don’t want to ever think about them dying.

However, a good friend from our CrossFit gym passed away recently, and yesterday we attended her memorial. Something her husband said made my heart literally ache. And I knew that I had to write that into a book.

So…read at your own risk.

Hux

Thirty-one years later

Married thirty-four years

“It’s time.”

I looked at my wife and knew that she was right.

Her body was failing her.

She hadn’t had a sip of water since Monday.

She was on a steady morphine drip, and it was still barely keeping her pain at bay.

“I know.”

Her fingers squeezed mine.

Barely enough to feel like butterfly wings.

“When I die, don’t spread my ashes.”

I looked at her. “What? I thought you wanted to go into our backyard?”

“I do, kind of.” She paused. “I don’t want to go anywhere without you.”

I instantly knew what she meant.

I dropped down to one knee beside her bed and said, “Then I’ll tell the kids that where I go, you go.”

“Mix us together,” she breathed, though it sounded like saws rattling in her chest. “Spread us at the base of the mountain, where we planted those wildflowers the first year we moved in.”

The tears in my eyes didn’t fall, but it was close.