Holiday Tides (Wilks Beach Holiday Novella)

Epilogue

Summer

2 years later

“Say it.” Nick’s breath is over my ear, his arms hugging the waist of my wedding dress. Seconds ago, he carried me over the threshold to the cottage. After setting me down, Nick insisted we warm ourselves by the fire after our short walk home from our winter wedding reception at Bayside Table. Guests held sparklers in a festive tunnel at the very end before going their own ways home.

I tilt my head away playfully. “Never.”

“But it’s my favorite thing to hear, those three little words.”

Turning to face him, I take my time sliding my fingers over his white suit vest and up the unbuttoned collar to the dress shirt he rolled up the second our wedding reception started. When my fingers stall in the divot between his collarbones, his breath hitches. Ever so slowly, I lean my lips toward his jaw. Nick’s chest shudders, his inhales shortening.

My mouth brushes his beard scruff before I whisper, “Never.”

Nick’s hands gather the lace fabric at the base of my spine. “Tell me, wife .”

The word sends a shiver down my back for two reasons—his seductive tone and the fact that the title is brand new. Already, Nick used wife as much as humanly possible while celebrating with our family and friends.

I drop the ruse and my tiptoe position. White slippers replaced my heeled boots early on into the festivities. Jane was really on to something with comfortable, winter-friendly footwear at parties.

“Fine.” I huff. “You were right.”

Nick’s smile is entirely too satisfied, but the new, larger mantel over the fireplace makes our abundant Christmas decorations look less…manic.

With two Christmas lovers living in one little cottage, it’s a challenge to tone things down. Our love language during our engagement was sending texts of different holiday decor items to each other. We had to hold back on our exterior display because mainlanders were crowding up our small neighborhood street, trying to see our lights. Wilks Beach is unusual because it discourages tourism or any outsiders joining our ranks.

“Any other three little words you want to tell me?” His grin morphs into his signature smirk.

I tap my chin, glancing skyward. “Can’t think of any.”

Nick takes advantage, gently nipping at the spot below my ear before soothing it with a kiss. “I love you, Summer.”

“I love you too,” I tell him, game abandoned.

My fingers burrow into his hair just like they did on the altar when our kiss went just a hair over wedding appropriate. If the raucous hoots from the audience were any indication, our loved ones didn’t mind.

“What do you say we work on my Christmas present?”

When we began dating two years ago, I had an inkling of how much Nick loved kids. Though, I quickly learned I’d underestimated. He’d often watch his niece Mae as much as Aldon would allow. It was Nick that suggested I host my nieces and nephews to stay the night at the cottage so they could have the experience of Wilks Beach like I had growing up. Then, three months ago, when Nick did the math, he said that nothing would be better than becoming pregnant on our short honeymoon. We have plans to travel to Québec over the summer for an official honeymoon but are only taking a few days off to relax at home now.

“I had no idea men could be so overcome with baby fever.” I chuckle against his throat.

“Are you kidding?” He leans back slightly, his flirty smile sobering. “It’s the ultimate honor. Today was mind-blowing, that you’d choose me to be the person to spend all your tomorrows with.” His shoulders shake with a halting exhale. “But the idea of you pregnant with my child…of us venturing into the wild world of parenting together, of appropriately instilling the magic of this holiday in them, but also showing them how to see the beauty in the minutiae of every day—” His voice chokes off with emotion.

I slide my fingers gently across his cheeks, my heart tight when his thick lashes flutter closed.

We’ve had this conversation over a dozen times, just like we’ve had all the practical conversations that come between a committed couple. At first, it was where to go on our dinner dates—Bayside Table or Bayside Table. Then, it’d been deciding what to fix at the cottage, which projects to prioritize first. After asking me to marry him on the anniversary of when he swept me off my feet in a construction zone, wedding and future planning came into the mix. We’re agreed in our plan to start a family sooner than later.

“Nick.” His gorgeous green eyes snag on mine. “I’m the same way. I can’t wait to see you spoil our children as much as you do Mae.” His light chuckle quirks the corner of my mouth. “I cannot wait to start a family with you.”

Our lips meet in a series of soft, promising kisses. I brush my mouth to his one last time before shifting away with a stern expression. “I have one condition. As much as we both love Christmas, we can’t name our kids after the holiday.”

Nick mock gasps. “No Holly, Angel, or Noel running around?”

“Nope. Not an Ivy, or Eve, or Christopher,” I tell him. “They’re all wonderful names, but we’re already a bit much with being Mr. and Mrs. Christmas of Wilks Beach. We don’t need our kids having the same issues my siblings and I had growing up with all S names.”

Nick tucks a loose curl from my wedding updo behind my ear. “That’s fair. They’ll have their own names and their own opinions, and we’ll support them even if they don’t like Christmas.” We both seem to internally shudder at this but press on. “After all, I fell in love with a girl named Summer who loves Christmas.”

When Nick sweeps my feet from beneath me, I melt into him, leaning into our forever together.