“You have one now, teeny. You have me and everyone on the ranch. We will always be here for you.”
“I know.” She smiled at him through her tears. He parked outside their cabin. Their home. She let out a sigh of relief. He turned and undid the clasp of her car seat, pulling off the straps. Then he came around the truck and lifted her down. But instead of letting her walk, he carried her into the cabin.
After he removed their jackets and coats, he led her into the bedroom and sat on the bed with her on his lap.
She looked up at him. “If I’d stayed with Harry, I’d likely have been happier. Taken care of. Loved.”
“I know, Mari-girl.”
“But I wouldn’t have met you,” she whispered. “And if going through all of that pain means that I get you at the end, then it’s worth it to me. You’re worth that to me.”
“Teeny.” He closed his eyes and kissed her forehead. “Me too. All the pain that Jessica caused me was worth it. Because here I am. With you. Always.”
Epilogue
“Daddy! Look at that giant gorilla. It’s so cute!”
She kept her voice low so no one would hear her. Although the fair was pretty quiet tonight. In fact, there was hardly anyone around them, other than the game attendant. It was one where you had to get the rings around the tops of bottles.
“Can I play?” She tugged at his arm excitedly.
“Of course you can, Mari-girl.” He kissed the top of her head.
It had been over a month since she’d seen Rosalind. Zander had been true to his word. He’d handed Rosalind to the task force on a platter. They hadn’t been overly pleased since they’d been hoping to get to Saber and the Devil’s Sinners. However, Rosalind had surprised them all by singing like a canary about everything.
Marisol wasn’t sure how Zander had gotten her to keep quiet about the role he and his people had played in everything. And she didn’t want to know, frankly.
Tiger had disappeared. She guessed Markovich had taken care of him. Sometimes she still felt some guilt over it, but then Linc reminded her of everything Tiger had done. That he likely would have gone on to hurt other women and she didn’t feel so bad.
It was less than three weeks until Christmas and Linc had brought her down to Houston for a break from the Montana winter. She loved the snow. But she was struggling with how cold it was. Linc had banned her from leaving the house without him, because she’d gotten a cold a few weeks back when she’d been making snowmen and stayed out too long.
He’d gone into protective overdrive. She’d found herself in bed for a week. And as soon he’d declared her well, she’d ended up over his knee, getting paddled.
Last night they’d gone out for some Venezuelan street food. She hadn’t eaten arepas since Ana had made them for her. They’d been delicious.
She attempted the ring toss, pouting as most of them missed. “I’m no good at this.”
“You can’t be good at everything. Let Daddy have a try.”
She glanced over at the attendant to see if he was paying attention, but he was more interested in his phone than the two of them.
Linc started tossing out rings, getting each one over the bottles. She clapped her hands and cheered excitedly.
“Well done, sir. You can choose anything from the top row.”
“The gorilla! The gorilla!”
“That’s going to be interesting to get home on the plane,” Linc said dryly as the attendant handed over the pink gorilla which was nearly as big as Marisol was.
“We might have to buy him his own seat,” she said with a giggle, hugging him tight. “Can we go have a corn dog, Daddy?”
He grimaced but nodded. “All right.”
Linc kept a close eye on her diet, but he wasn’t an ogre about it. And she liked that she had freedom, but she still knew he was watching over her. He could be far stricter about other things. Like her walking around while reading. She’d done that just this morning in the hotel suite when she’d thought he was in the shower. She’d just needed to finish beta reading Caley’s latest story. She hadn’t been looking where she was going and had ended up walking right into Linc.
Then she’d ended up over his knee, getting spanked. Afterwards, she’d had to sit on her hot ass and write fifty times, that she would not walk while reading.
Caley had hired her on as her assistant. She just worked in the mornings for her. Then in the afternoons, she read. Or if Linc was home, she crafted or played. Often times, he’d come home for lunch then put her down for a nap afterwards.