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At the exact same time, Thalia lets out a high-pitched squeal.

“I knew it,” she shouts, bouncing on the spot like a firework of joy, her hands clapping together as if she physically can’t contain the happiness radiating from her body.

“Wait—what?” Kai blurts, eyes wide, frozen mid-step with a balloon still in one hand and a streamer in the other.

“You’re pregnant,” Colt says. No hesitation. No question mark. His voice cutting through the noise like a blade through silk.

And then, softer—“Is it true?” Liam asks, and it’s the tremble in his voice that gets me. It’s so rare to hear him like that—unguarded, raw, moved.

Everything slows again.

Time stretches in the way it does when something irreversible has just been said. When hearts are pounding too hard to keep up.

I could stretch this out—savor their wonder, the buildup, the silence thick with hope.

But why would I?

“Yes.”

It’s a single word, but it lands like thunder in still air. Clear. Certain. Irrevocable.

That’s when I see her smile.

God, her smile.

It blooms on her face like sunrise—soft and brilliant and alive. It steals the breath from my lungs and replaces it with something too big to name.

Pride.

Love.

Awe.

All of it.

For a second, all I can do is look at her.

This woman.

My wife.

The mother of my child.

The keeper of every version of me—past and future—and the man I haven’t become yet.

I was the happiest man alive when Sierra became my wife. I’ve been the happiest man alive every single day since she came back into my life.

But now?

Now I’m something else entirely.

I am whole. I am anchored. I have a purpose.

I’m going to be a father.

EPILOGUE ONE

Sierra