Christmas Beau (Christmas Falls: Season 2)

Epilogue

FIVE YEARS LATER

T here was slow, and then there was slow .

The latter was what was currently happening in the kitchen.

Scott stood at the island, holiday music playing from the speaker on the counter, and watched as Hank took about a thousand years to cook Christmas dinner. Scott would’ve helped—had been looking forward to helping—but Hank was being weirdly possessive of his meal.

In his defense, his entire family had descended on Christmas Falls for the holiday, and he was a little stressed about hosting everyone for dinner. Scott didn’t think that his pointing out that stress had helped any.

So now he was hovering on the sidelines, waiting for Hank to realize there was no way he’d have every dish ready on time without help. Scott had even preemptively grabbed his favorite apron from the cupboard.

“Stop staring,” Hank muttered as he chopped carrots. “It’s weird.”

“You’re weird,” Scott shot back.

“Don’t you have somewhere else to be? Something else to do? Literally anything else.”

“Nope,” Scott said cheerfully.

Another few minutes went by. Scott bounced on the balls of his feet, eyeing the bag of potatoes. He could get started on those if only?—

“Swear to god, if Mariah tells me one more time that all I want for Christmas is you, I’m chucking the speaker into the snow.”

Pressing his lips together to hide a laugh, Scott changed the song. “All you want for Christmas is me, though.”

“Only some Christmases.”

Scott gasped dramatically and clutched imaginary pearls. “Rude.”

Teddy shuffled in wearing his Western Michigan University hockey hoodie, took one look at Hank, and turned wide eyes on Scott. “Nothing’s in the oven yet?” he asked quietly.

“Just the turkey,” Scott replied, just as quietly.

“Do we need to order pizza?”

“We’re not ordering pizza,” Hank grumbled without looking up, a note of finality in his voice that was both sexy as hell and a little worrisome. “I’ve got everything under control.”

“Um, Hank? Honey. Sweetie. Love of my life. Smartest man I know. Your family’s going to be here in an hour.”

“What? No.” Hank twisted, presumably to check the time on the microwave. “It’s only— What the... How is it three o’clock already?”

“That’s what happens when it takes you five hours to chop carrots,” Teddy said teasingly.

“I haven’t been chopping for five— Hey!” Hank gently rapped Teddy’s knuckles with the flat of the paring knife when Teddy reached for a carrot stick. “Those are for dinner.”

Pouting, Teddy rubbed his knuckles. “Mean Hank is mean.”

“Okay!” Scott practically yelled so he wouldn’t laugh, clapping his hands once. “You—” He pointed at Hank. “You’re on vegetable duty. You—” He turned to Teddy. “Peel the potatoes. And I’ll make a salad and stuffing.”

It was Hank’s turn to pout. “But I wanted to make my grandmother’s lemon-and-herb rice pilaf.”

Scott sighed for show but what he really wanted was to hug Hank. “You do that then, and I’ll do the vegetables.”

Responsibilities doled out, they got to work, breaking only to let the dogs in from where they’d been running around the obstacle course outside. Teddy took over toweling snow off them so Scott could get back to work, then Scott sent Teddy to change because baggy sweatpants and a hoodie weren’t appropriate Christmas dinner attire, no matter how proud Teddy was to be playing for a Division I school.

Everything was in various stages of cooking when the Beaufort crew arrived, toting bags of gifts, children, and pets along with them.

Scott hadn’t realized until they’d arrived a few days ago that when Hank said they were all coming, he meant all . Parents, brothers, spouses, kids, and family pets.

They were . . . a lot.

Teddy had been a little starstruck at being in the same room as three honest-to-god former NHL players, but he’d played it cool aside from a whispered “Dad. Dad. Those are the Beaufort brothers.”

“ I’m a Beaufort brother,” Hank had reminded him.

To which Teddy had given him a kindly pitying look. “Sure, but... not when it comes to hockey.”

Scott had been about to jump down Teddy’s throat, but Hank had just sent Scott a look filled with fond exasperation over Teddy’s head, clearly unbothered.

Scott had never loved the man more.

In fact, he’d loved him for nearly five years, but he’d only come to the realization the summer after they’d begun dating, when he’d watched Hank and Teddy cry tears of laughter over a movie that was so bad it shouldn’t exist.

But they’d gone slowly, just as they’d promised each other. Hell, they’d gone so slowly that Hank had only moved in about a year ago.

They discussed marriage every now and again, but with Hank’s history and Scott’s previous job, neither was much interested in getting hitched. They didn’t need a marriage contract to solidify their love for each other.

Surprisingly, it had been Teddy who’d suggested that if they were planning to stay together forever, they might want to consider getting married for legal reasons.

He wasn’t wrong.

It was unromantic as hell, but Scott had told Hank he loved him during an afternoon blow job, so he figured romance was out the window anyway.

More important than marriage was Hank’s desire to formally adopt Teddy, which had made both Scott and Teddy cry until they’d been reduced to wet hiccups when Hank had discussed it with them. In the new year, when Scott had a little more time on his hands after a busy custom quilting season, he and Hank would get the ball rolling on that.

They’d discussed adopting a second child too, perhaps an older kid with nowhere else to go. In the end, Hank had admitted that even though he’d always envisioned being a dad to multiple kids, Teddy was enough for him. That had made Scott ugly cry until he was gasping for breath, and they were currently toying with the idea of fostering.

As the Beaufort family bustled inside one after the other like real-life matryoshka dolls, Scott took coats and Teddy greeted cats and dogs—and one hamster named Earplug.

“Where should we put the gifts?” Vic asked, his arms piled high with presents. He blew a hank of shaggy hair out of his eyes.

“In the living room under the tree,” Hank told him. “Wait, take your boots off. What are you, a heathen?”

Vic rolled his eyes—the same whiskey shade as Hank’s—but did as told.

Remi—Vic’s husband as of very recently—hugged both Hank and Scott. “I’ve been trying to teach him manners, but they haven’t taken.”

“If I had manners, we wouldn’t have done the hanky-panky in the?—”

“Shhhhh.” Remi covered the ears of one of his nieces. “There are innocent ears around.”

Scott’s parents arrived, with Sean, Anna, and Yuri right behind them, as the Beauforts were still removing boots and scarves. Scott ushered everyone into the living room, but the kids quickly abandoned the adults for Teddy’s video game console in the family room while the dogs flitted from human to human in search of food. The cats disappeared under couches and behind armoires, and honestly, Scott would be surprised if they were ever to be seen again.

It was utter chaos in the house and Hank strode around like a proud peacock, thrilled to have his family here. He was so adorable that Scott spent most of the night smiling at him.

“Do you think you might come out to visit us in Buffalo again soon?” Hank’s mom asked after dinner. She washed platters at the sink while Hank and Scott put the leftovers away and Pete dried.

“We talked about the fall,” Hank said. “Scott and I need a vacation before anything else. We’re both due.”

Two and a half years after Hank had had the idea, his hockey club had become a reality, and it was thriving. He and Josh were co-presidents, and every year they made improvements to the programs.

Scott, for his part, had gone into business with his brother. He’d questioned the sanity of that, knowing that Sean’s itchy feet could take him anywhere on a whim. But to his surprise, when Sean had said he’d intended to stay, he’d meant it. So Nest Consulting had been born.

They’d been busy too, thanks to Sean’s reputation, and although Scott wasn’t making what he’d made at the firm, he brought in enough to not worry about mortgage payments and feeding Teddy. And to his surprise, he’d found that the general rule of thumb was that as long as he practiced from within the state he was licensed in, he could represent clients pretty much anywhere. Of course, there were nuances to every state’s laws, meaning research was a heavy part of his job, but he loved it—the work and working with Sean.

So yeah. It had been a busy five years. He and Hank needed a vacation, if only to disconnect from work and concentrate on nothing but each other.

Once they were done cleaning up and dessert had been dished, Hank’s dad called everyone into the living room for presents. The kids abandoned their video game, arguing about which of them would open the first gift.

Scott made to follow Hank’s mom and brother into the room, but Hank yanked him back by the waistband. Scott fell back into him with an eep , grunting when strong arms caught him around the waist from behind.

“Thanks for having my back with dinner,” Hank muttered into his neck, sending shivers down Scott’s spine.

“Of course.” Scott pressed a kiss to his jaw. “Your desire to do it all yourself was very cute but not very realistic.”

Hank chuckled, the sound brushing against all of Scott’s senses. “Lesson learned.” He kissed Sean’s neck. “Love you.”

Scott’s stomach jumped, same as it did every time Hank had told him he loved him in the past four years. He brought Hank’s hand to his mouth and kissed his palm. “Love you too.”

A wail came from the living room. A moment later, Teddy stepped into the kitchen, a dirty plate in hand that he placed in the sink. “One of the kids is crying because she only got one doll when she wanted two. Were Christmases always this crazy at your house growing up?”

“No,” Hank said with a laugh. “But there were way fewer of us. And if we complained about a gift we received, it got taken away, and it wasn’t replaced by anything else.”

Teddy made a little humming sound, then leaned against the counter across from them. “Soooo... don’t get mad.”

Scott groaned. “No good news ever starts that way.”

“It’s not bad news,” Teddy said, playing with a button on his shirt. “Just... Uncle Sean said he’d buy me a used car for Christmas.”

Sighing, Scott let his head fall back. “Sean!”

“What?” Sean called from the other room. “You said I only had to run anything that affects Teddy by you until he was eighteen.”

Scott opened his mouth to tell Sean that Teddy was seventeen, but quickly snapped it closed again.

Teddy had turned eighteen a couple of weeks ago.

Christ. Where had the time gone? His baby boy was all grown up, attending college out of state, playing hockey like it was already his job, and getting a degree in life sciences because he wanted—eventually—to do something that mattered.

Swallowing the lump in his throat that was part pride and part nostalgia, Scott shared an acknowledging glance with Hank, then looked at Teddy. “We’ll talk about it.”

Teddy brightened. “Yeah? Awesome. Thanks, Dad.”

“Come over here and take a picture with us.”

They cuddled up close, Teddy nearly as tall as Scott and Hank, just a whole lot blonder. Scott snapped the photo with his phone, and when he looked at it hours later once everyone had left, back to their homes or to one of Christmas Falls’ B&Bs, all Scott could think was We look happy .

And they were.

THE END