Reckless (Mason Family #3) - Adriana Locke Page 0,85
the courage to come after me. But I shouldn’t have made you chase me.”
“I would rather you hadn’t.” He winks. “But I’ve learned a few things lately.”
“Oh, have you?”
“Yeah. One of them is that I really like fucking you.”
I laugh.
“And another one is that I hope to have our own babies really soon.”
“Really?”
He grins. “If you want to, of course.”
The idea of carrying Boone’s child inside me makes it really, really hard not to take him to the bedroom immediately. He must sense the heat in my body because he smirks.
“And third,” he says, locking his hands at the small of my back, “I want to love you with reckless abandon.”
“What do you mean?”
He stares over my head and thinks. “I want to love you without caring about what other people think. I want to love you so hard that you can barely handle it. I want to love you so wildly that you never wonder, even for a second, if my heart is yours.”
I bite my lip and bask in the warmth of his words.
I have never known this sort of love before, and although it’s hard to believe that I deserve it, I have a feeling Boone will make sure I know it. And Rosie too.
She’ll never know the doubt Nettie and I had growing up.
“I don’t know if I would’ve understood the need for that if you hadn’t run away from me,” he says.
“I’m still sorry I did it.”
“I’m not. Everything happens for a reason, Jaxi. From you picking the wrong house to being in Savannah when Rosie needed you. Doesn’t it feel like the universe was watching out for you even when things didn’t feel that way at the time?”
He has a point. Of course, he does.
When I look back at my life and trace how I got here—to a spot more amazing than anything I could’ve dreamed of—I had to go through a lot of crap. There were so many times when I thought the world forgot about me. That I didn’t belong. That I didn’t have a purpose.
The truth is, the world didn’t forget about me. It was just preparing me for the place I did belong. And that I have the most incredible purpose—the best gift—in the world.
Being Rosie’s mom and loving her with all of my heart. And now? Loving and being loved by Boone too.
For the rest of my life.
Epilogue
Boone
One month later
“Where’s Rosie?” Jaxi asks.
“How the heck do I know?”
We look around the backyard. Pink, yellow, and green balloons are attached to nearly every stable surface imaginable. A sign that says Happy Birthday hangs along the house. Streamers stretch from one end of the porch to the other and even a sling to the side of the slide going into the pool.
Holt and Blaire stand with Oliver near the pool. Coy and Bellamy sit under an umbrella with Hollis and Larissa and Libby. Mom and Dad sit with Bellamy’s dad and Hollis’s grandma Judy near the snack table while Wade hides in the garage on a top secret mission.
“There she is,” I say, spying her and Bree crawling under the gift table. “Hey, Rosie. Come here.”
She scurries out from under the table and makes a beeline for me. The rose gold watch I got her for her birthday sits proudly on her wrist.
Jaxi nearly had a stroke when I showed it to her. But Rosie had to have it. I mean, I had to have her have it. It’s too cute.
“We got you a very special present,” I tell her. “Are you ready?”
She nods, her eyes twinkling with excitement.
“Attention everyone,” I say, “it’s time.”
Everyone watches as the door from the garage opens. Wade comes out carrying a little King Charles Cavalier puppy.
Rosie screams as she races to Wade. He must tell her to be gentle because she nods her head and takes the puppy with the care of a surgeon.
She whirls around on her heel.
“Is this mine?” She gasps. “He’s so cute!”
“He’s yours,” Jaxi tells him. “But you’re going to have to take care of him.”
“Bree! Look!” Rosie turns back around to Wade. “Thank you, Wade! I love you!”
Wade freezes as Rosie leans against his leg like a cat and nuzzles the puppy.
“You’re welcome,” he says and looks at me like I should come and get her.
I hold my hands out. “Excuse me? I bought you that dog, thank you very much!”
Everyone laughs, amused at Wade getting the glory. Again.
Definitely, positively at the bottom of my favorite brother list.